How I Made Partner: ‘Work Smart, Efficient and With Passion’ Advises Sher Tremonte’s Erica Wolff
Partner Erica Wolff was recently profiled for the Law Journal’s “How I Made Partner” series, which features a Q&A with newly minted partners. Read more from Erica about her own trajectory and the advice she has for associates who are looking to move up in their careers.
What do you think was the deciding point for the firm in making you partner? I don’t think there was one “deciding point”—certainly not one specific case or event. I’ve been with the firm for five years now, and during that period I have had the opportunity to work closely with every single one of the partners. They each know my work across a variety of cases, working with clients of various sizes in many different industries and in numerous different contexts. I think what gave the firm the confidence to make me partner was the knowledge that I genuinely love to litigate, that I care about my clients deeply and am invested in getting them the best possible results (whether they are individuals, small businesses or multimillion-dollar companies) and that I am consistent in the attention to detail and quality of work I provide, regardless of the size or nature of the matter.
Describe how you feel now about your career now that you’ve made partner. I feel genuinely honored to have been brought into the ranks of the partnership at Sher Tremonte. The partners here are among the smartest, most thoughtful and most dedicated lawyers I’ve ever met, and the fact that they trust me to provide our clients the same level of service they each give day in and day out has given me the confidence to keep doing what I love to do and take even more ownership over that work. In some ways, I feel that making partner has been a very satisfying reward for the hard work I’ve done over the years, but in more ways, I feel that it is really something of a new beginning. I’m so looking forward to developing new client relationships, deepening existing ones and building a practice that both strengthens the complex commercial practice our firm has already established and that also expands our existing docket to cover more media and First Amendment-related litigation.
What’s the best piece of advice you could give an associate who wants to make partner? Before you answer any question posed to you by a partner or a client, think about how your answer can make that person’s job easier. Do the diligence to get it right every time, but own it when you don’t. And have the confidence to know what you don’t know.