For nearly two decades, leadership at Lowenstein Sandler has been a two-for-one deal. Since 2008, Gary Wingens has served as both chairman and managing partner — a rare stretch of dual power in Biglaw.
That changes today.
The firm has elected Jonathan Wishnia as its first new managing partner in 18 years, while Wingens remains chairman. It’s a significant structural shift for a firm that has grown dramatically under a unified leadership model, nearly tripling revenue during Wingens’s tenure and reshaping its practice around sector-focused growth.
This isn’t a firm in distress. It’s a firm planning ahead. As Wingens put it in an interview with the American Lawyer, “We are in a profession that is changing faster than it ever has before. The changes are dramatic, the winners and losers are pretty dramatic.” The decision grew out of a strategic planning process, with leadership concluding that splitting the roles would “provide more bandwidth for leadership and management of the firm.”
By splitting the roles, Lowenstein joins the many Am Law firms that separate strategy from day-to-day management. Wingens will turn outward — focusing on clients, long-term vision, and institutional knowledge — while Wishnia takes over operations and builds out a new management committee to spread leadership responsibility. As Wishnia noted about the transition, “The goal of the management committee is to create leadership bandwidth.”
Succession planning is also clearly part of the equation. After 18 years in the dual role, Wingens acknowledged the timing was deliberate:
“I’ve been in this dual role for 18 years, and while I’m not slowing down anytime soon, it makes a lot of sense to make sure we’ve got other folks in management who are well-versed in other operations of the firm,” Wingens said. “We are transitioning my knowledge base and my institutional memory to other people at a time where we can do it at our own pace without external pressure and without needing to rush anything.”
If anything, the firm’s leadership restructuring reads less like course correction and more like future-proofing — particularly in a market increasingly shaped by AI investment and consolidation pressures. As Wingens framed the broader bet:
“I know plenty of shrinking firms and growing firms, and it’s more fun to be the growing firm than the shrinking firm.”
After nearly 20 years of one person running both the boardroom and the engine room, Lowenstein is opting for more hands at the helm — not because it has to, but because it wants to stay ahead.
Congratulations to both Jonathan Wishnia and Gary Wingens on their new roles at Lowenstein Sandler!
Lowenstein Sandler Elects First New Managing Partner in 18 Years [American Lawyer]
Staci Zaretsky is the managing editor of Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Bluesky, X/Twitter, and Threads, or connect with her on LinkedIn.