Guard Changing at Cozen O'Connor
The guard is about to change Cozen O’Connor, a 546-lawyer Philadelphia-based law firm known as an international insurance coverage powerhouse.The two name partners, although they have signed employment contracts to remain at the helm for another decade, are ceding significant control to the next generation of lawyers and the firm is about to create its first board of directors.
“We had to work out a restructuring that would enable the younger leaders to say that we have transitioned the firm - that it is not just Steve Cozen’s firm or Pat O’Connor’s firm,” name partner Cozen , 67, told the Philadelphia Inquirer. “You have to give younger people opportunities at leadership.”
“I have been very well paid, and I am going to continue to be paid, not as well as I had been, but I am not going to be working as hard as I have been,” says O’Connor, 64. “You should always give up power from a position of strength, not when you become sick or become a dilettante. You do it when you are the top of your game.”
Cozen, who founded the firm in 1968, will now be its chairman, and O’Connor will be vice-chairman. The firm has 23 offices in the U.S., London and Toronto.
