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Glorified MA: I think I fall in that category too. My definition of glorified MA is someone who coordinates the deliverables (including doing some of them), makes sure that the invoices are raised and paid, briefs senior on each deliverable and before calls, and generally act as a sounding board/punching bag (depending on the equation) for the senior.
Book size: This is important if you want to grow. You can kick the can down the road by joining a Firm with bandwidth issues in the short run, but eventually your growth there also will stall if you don’t build a book.
Where I want to be of some help (hopefully) is to aid you in understanding the reason you find yourself in a position where you are a glorified MA with no book.
I’ve collected the experience of my batch mates, juniors and seniors who found themselves in this position and were kind enough to share:
One can find themselves in the position of glorified MA for three reasons - either you’re not good enough (rare but not unheard of), your team has limited work (making it impossible for you to shine independently - not so rare but also not very common) or and more likely, you’ve reached a level where you can run stuff on your own but if you do then the dinosaur sitting above you is redundant and in order to justify their existence they dont give you the freedom to run things alone (this often kills your confidence, robs you of your due client face time and to an extent discounts your authority with the juniors so that they don’t align with you should you get ideas to split). There are subtle and not so subtle ways of doing this - you’ll find your boss participating in every client call howsoever unimportant (seen this with folks from niche practice areas), you will not get face time with clients and will end up as briefing counsel to your boss while they send deliverables you prepared or lead calls spouting out the points you thought of and researched (common where the boss is on management line of fire for financial performance and try to make up by completely taking over execution), you will find your boss “coaching” you about what to say and not to say to clients (common with bosses who are control freaks with limited books themselves) and the master piece where you will be second guessed on everything over many years so that you end up subconsciously needing a sign off for the smallest of things. To sustain this kind of behaviour, your boss will need you to be in a position where management either doesn’t have any idea of your abilities (you didn’t work with them or your boss acts as the sole channel of communication) or have a poor view of you making your boss safe in the knowledge that any complaints from you will not be taken seriously.
On the book building piece, your limited success can be because of: you’re naturally shy - are good with execution but don’t enjoy putting yourself out there (not uncommon); you’ve been working with someone all your life and the concept of mutual growth stops working for them once you become partner - all clients are their clients irrespective of whether they start coming to you directly (not uncommon); you’re working with someone who doesn’t have a book themselves and will lose their job if you get a book making them redundant (uncommon); you work in a firm where building a book is actively discouraged as it would mean that the MP is no longer the demigod they believe themselves to be and the eqyity holders will have to part with more and more equity if people start getting business; or you have a boss who completely kills any direct channel with the firm management which results in the firm management having no clue of your abilities or existence so they don’t take you for BD events or refer work directly to you (some folks from Flame Sea Associates and Ashoka estate claim to have experienced this).
If your answer (an honest one arrived at after self reflection and discounting natural dislike for your firm, team, boss etc) is that you’re the reason (not good enough or shy) then, my friend, do yourself a favour and stop running this race or let your self awareness find you a spot you’re comfortable with. This will help with angst, anxiety and mental peace (think of it as: har kisi ko nahin milta yahan pyaar zindagi main, due credit for this analogy to my maggi buddy at Rajnigandha - if you know you know :).
If you’re stuck with a boss who has no book themselves, is a micromanager, general a-hole, or someone you’ve been with for far too long - leave and chart a new path, embrace the journey, it will be scary, it will be difficult, but risk hai to ishq hai (due credit for this analogy to the Marlboro man from Delhi - again if you know you know :)). A word of advice - don’t confront this category of boss because they will double down and gas light you (they can starve you of work so that management throws you out, they can increase the nitpicking to an unbearable level). Not so sure whether approaching management will help too - they typically don’t care so long as the team is making money or even if they care, it will be your word against that of the boss as there is no incontrovertible proof for such issues). But don’t lose heart - market identifies these people over time. Red flags could be senior partners who haven’t made anyone partner in their team for many years, who tend to have people leave their team beyond SA or MA level, who don’t have lateral takers.
Be honest and identify the cause. Make a plan where if you want to take a risk and move out then you’re not left financially stranded - if you have a family, then speak to your spouse and get their buy-in so that you guys are mentally, emotionally and financially prepared for a (hopefully) short period of anxiety and uncertainty (this really helped me).
Best of luck, chin up and like someone here said - don’t sell yourself short if you feel that you have it in you. Thank you for having the courage to raise this issue in a public forum - so many of us have these doubts and questions, but don’t talk about them to avoid embarrassment or be seen as anything less than stellar.