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Luther: Leadership as a Strategic Success Factor

In a high-pressure law firm environment, how can partners be empowered so that leadership isn’t just an afterthought, but a real driver of performance, culture, and collaboration? The answer is LEAD@Luther – a program that treats leadership not as a one-off initiative but as an ongoing process, designed to be practical, sustainable, and closely aligned with the day-to-day work of the firm.
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Oct 09, 2025

Starting Point

Luther is one of Germany’s leading business law firms, with nearly 800 employees, including 450 lawyers and 150 partners. In recent years, the firm has seen strong growth – evident both in its financial performance and in its rising reputation and market standing.

But this success also highlighted a key insight: maintaining that level and continuing to grow requires more than legal excellence and strong client work. Like in many professional services firms, the demands on leadership are steadily increasing – driven by rising client expectations, fierce competition for talent, and the need to build and retain resilient, high-performing teams.

A firm-wide survey reinforced this point: leadership was seen as too transactional – focused on numbers, with too little space for feedback, development, and shared learning. This raised an important question for the firm: how could leadership evolve beyond its transactional roots and become a real driver of performance, collaboration, and long-term resilience?

 

Goals and Intentions

The challenge was to help Luther establish leadership as a true strategic lever in a demanding law firm environment – with the aim of strengthening performance, culture, and collaboration in a lasting way. To achieve this, leadership could not be treated as a stand-alone initiative or a one-off training. It needed to be designed as a continuous development process – one that sees leadership as dynamic, where reflection and application go hand in hand.

The approach had to bring together four core principles:

1. Sustainable

Development shouldn’t stop at quick impulses. It needed to create lasting impact for leaders, their teams, and the firm as a whole.

2. Everyday relevance

Leadership shouldn’t only be learned in training sessions but applied directly in the flow of daily work.

3. Practical, not theoretical

Rather than abstract models, leaders needed clear guidance that empowers them to act confidently in real situations.

4. Specific to Luther

The program had to reflect Luther’s strategic and cultural principles, building a shared leadership framework that gives direction across the firm.

LEAD@Luther: An Integrated Development Process

To meet this challenge, GOBRAN® developed a twelve-month hybrid program that positioned leadership as an ongoing process rather than a one-time intervention. The design was deliberately practical, firmly rooted in the daily reality of partners, and aimed at strengthening both individual leadership skills and a shared understanding of what leadership means at Luther. The structure of the program was built on complementary learning elements that reinforced each other and unfolded step by step. This ensured that theoretical input was always paired with practical application, that partners had space for reflection, and that new principles could be anchored directly in their everyday work.

Live Kick-off

The launch workshop marked the formal start of the program and established a common foundation for all participants. The session focused on developing a shared understanding of leadership and on reflecting each individual’s impact as a leader. It laid the groundwork by asking fundamental questions: What lies at the core of leadership – and what does that mean for my own development?

Impact360® OnDemand Training

To maintain momentum, short online learning units were released every four weeks. Over the course of the program, partners completed ten compact modules that allowed for a continuous, yet targeted, exploration of central leadership topics. The design made it possible to integrate the content flexibly into the everyday workload of partners.

QuickCards®

After each OnDemand module, participants received QuickCards® – concise summaries of the core ideas paired with concrete recommendations for action. These ensured that learning impulses were not left abstract but became immediately actionable in practice.

Reflection Dialogues & Peer Coaching

A central part of the program was creating opportunities for reflection and peer exchange. Structured dialogues gave partners a protected space to discuss their own leadership challenges, dive deeper into the OnDemand content, share perspectives, and develop tangible options for action.

The impact of LEAD@Luther

1. Leadership as a Strategic Lever
Through LEAD@Luther, leadership shifted from being seen primarily as a transactional task to becoming a recognized strategic factor. Partners no longer regard leadership as a secondary aspect of their role, but as an essential part of what defines their contribution to the firm.
2. High Participation as a Signal of Relevance
Around 90% of partners took part in the kick-off workshop, and participation in the modules and peer dialogues has remained consistently high. This clearly signals a shift: leadership is no longer viewed as a “nice to have” but as an indispensable element of professional success – even in the demanding environment of a business law firm.
3. A Shared Understanding of Leadership
With the LEAD framework, partners now share a common foundation for how leadership is practiced. Where leadership styles previously varied widely and often remained inconsistent, there is now a clear set of principles and a shared language that guides decisions and collaboration across different offices and practice groups.
4. Clarity in Leadership Behavior
Partners today lead with greater awareness. Delegation is handled more systematically, feedback has become a regular tool, and responsibility is assumed more visibly. What was once a reactive approach has transformed into proactive, natural leadership behavior that is fully integrated into everyday practice.
5. Leadership Creates Orientation
For teams, this shift is tangible: less friction, clearer rules of engagement, and greater reliability in day-to-day collaboration. Leadership is no longer abstract or episodic; it has become a steady point of reference that provides orientation and security – particularly valuable in the complexity of a large law firm.

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