This article was published in PLI Chronicle: Insights and Perspectives for the Legal Community, https://plus.pli.edu. Not for resale. June 2026
What does it take for a woman lawyer to build a thriving practice? That question has driven much of my research and work over the years, and recently I had the pleasure of exploring it on a PLI panel with three extraordinary partners: Megan Bannigan of Debevoise & Plimpton, Danielle Patterson of Vinson & Elkins, and Mari Henderson of Quinn Emanuel. T
heir candor and wisdom produced one of the most practical conversations I have ever heard on this topic. Here are the takeaways I hope every lawyer, and especially every woman in law, will carry forward.
Authenticity Is Not a Soft Skill
In my book Breaking Ground: How Women Lawyers Develop Thriving Practices, I interviewed more than sixty women lawyers across four continents. The word that came up most consistently was authenticity. W
omen who built successful practices did so by finding business development activities they genuinely enjoyed, not by mimicking the approaches they assumed they were supposed to follow. When your business development activities reflect who you actually are, you do more of them, and you do them better.
Authenticity comes into play both in how you aim to build a practice, and maybe more important, in how you represent your work.
Danielle Patterson on our panel put it powerfully: she would never walk into a pitch and claim expertise she does not have, and she has no hesitation claiming the expertise she does have. That kind of honesty, she noted, builds trust from the very first interaction.
It Is a Long Game, With a Current Focus
Every panelist echoed the same message: relationships that generate business are often built over years, sometimes decades.
Mari Henderson, who handles crisis management and litigation, described how she monitors case filings every evening, tracks news alerts, and stays in touch with contacts through alumni events and social media, not because a matter is pending, but because she wants to be top of mind when one arrives. As she put it, the goal is for clients to remember you when the crisis hits, and the only way to achieve that is to stay present long before the crisis does.
Danielle shared a business development cycle that stretched six years. She worked opposite a counterparty as a senior associate, helped structure a bespoke transaction multiple times, and half a decade later received a call from that same counterparty on a new deal. This time, they were asking her to represent their opposite party on a new M&A matter.
You cannot plan for those outcomes, but you can create the conditions for them by doing excellent work, staying in touch, and treating every interaction as the beginning of something.
Write It Down, Then Show Someone
One of the most actionable pieces of advice from the entire conversation was provided by Megan Bannigan. Years ago, just before going on maternity leave and working toward partnership, she wrote down a simple one-page list of business development goals.
Baby steps, she called them: a speaking slot at the International Trademark Association annual meeting, leadership positions in INTA and other IP organizations, a handful of new contacts. She accomplished every item on that list. The document grew to twenty pages and has since become a model she shares with senior associates at her firm.
Research consistently shows that writing down goals makes you meaningfully more likely to achieve them. But Megan added a second step that most people skip: share the list with someone. When she showed her initial one-pager to the head of her IP group, he told her which goals were worth pursuing and offered three more she had not considered. What felt like a risk became the foundation to grow a long-term mentoring relationship.
Danielle reinforced the point by reframing business development as something closer to a sales discipline. If you were in an entry-level sales role, you would have concrete daily targets: calls made, meetings scheduled, follow-ups completed. Law does not work that way, but the underlying principle does. Break your goals into specific, crossable-off action items. If your approach is not working or does not feel authentic, adjust it. Keep moving.
Trust Is Built Before You Need It
Much of our conversation kept returning to trust, which research in adjacent fields describes through three components: expertise and logic, empathy, and authenticity. Technical skill is the price of admission. Clients assume you have it. What they are evaluating is your judgment, your honesty, and whether you are genuinely on their side.
Megan offered a striking example. When a client came to her firm hoping to file a preliminary injunction, she was blatantly honest and told them the facts did not support it. While other firms pitched the motion enthusiastically, her approach won the client by being honest.
Challenging a client’s assumptions, she noted, can be a demonstration of expertise, and it signals that you are a counselor looking out for their best interests rather than simply an order-taker.
Know Your Colleagues as Well as You Know Your Clients
One of Mari’s insights resonated with everyone on the panel. You do not always have to be the lawyer who works the matter. Sometimes the most valuable thing you can do is be the connector. That means understanding what your colleagues across the firm actually do, so that when a contact calls with a need outside your practice, you can immediately think of the right person to call.
This is especially important for laterals. When lawyers move to a new firm, one of the first things I recommend is scheduling internal meetings before external ones. Ask your colleagues what they need, learn their practices, and make sure they know exactly when to call you. Business development is not only an outward-facing activity.
Find the Method That Works for You
Every panelist was clear that business development does not look the same for everyone, and it should not. Danielle described an afternoon art walk with a client who preferred not to give up an evening away from her children. Quinn Emanuel hosts a brunch series called the Brunch of Remarkable Women, bringing together clients and colleagues for conversation and a thoughtful speaker.
Megan turns conversations at conferences, thoughtfully hosted industry breakfasts, and LinkedIn engagement into opportunities to deepen relationships and build community across her network. Mari tracks dockets late at night and attends alumni events from high school onward.
The firms represented on our panel are also getting serious about bringing associates into this work early. Quinn Emanuel requires a marketing project every year starting in the first year. Vinson & Elkins runs BD Lab, an experiential program where associates brainstorm and often execute their own client events. Debevoise holds regular meetings with the firm’s CMO, counsel and senior associates to discuss activity and strategy alongside partners. The old model, where lawyers make partner and only then discover they need clients, is yielding to something far more practical.
A Final Word
If there is one place to start, it is here: figure out your niche. What do you want to be known for? Once you have that answer, the associations, the speaking opportunities, the client relationships, and the network begin to take shape around it. Strategy before tactics, always.
Business development is a skill. It can be learned, practiced, and improved. Women who embrace it, in their own way and on their own terms, are building practices that will last.
Deborah B. Farone has had the unique opportunity to play a role in developing the best practices in legal marketing by working with some of the most respected and demanding professionals in the world. Her advisory practice, Farone Advisors LLC, focuses on helping professional service firms and individuals with their marketing strategy, personal branding, training and development and strategic planning. She is author of the book Best Practices in Law Firm Business Development and Marketing, from PLI Press.
