The Private Equity Lawyer Who Will Run Weil Gotshal

Ramona Nee: Weil’s Private Equity Stalwart Steps Up to the Top Job When Weil, Gotshal & Manges announced last week that Ramona Y. Nee will succeed Barry Wolf as Executive Partner from January 2027, the news landed with the quiet inevitability of a deal that everyone saw coming. Wolf, who has steered the firm for 16 years, called her “uniquely suited.” He was not exaggerating. For nearly a quarter-century Nee has been the quiet engine of Weil’s U.S. private equity practice and the beating heart of its Boston office. Now the firm is handing her the keys. Pictured with Barry Wolf (left) and Jonathon Soler Nee joined Weil in September 2002, literally for the opening of the Boston outpost. Fresh out of Boston University School of Law (after a magna cum laude degree from SUNY Binghamton), she was hired by Jim Westra, then managing partner of the new office and later general counsel at Advent International. Five-and-a-half years later she made partner. By 2022 she was co-managing the Boston operation; by early 2025 she was one of two firm-wide Managing Partners alongside Jonathon Soler. The trajectory is as clean as it is rare. Stellar Client List Her client list reads like a Who’s Who of sophisticated sponsors: Advent, Providence Equity, EQT, OMERS, Astorg, TruArc. She has closed hundreds of transactions worth tens of billions—Advent’s $6.4 billion take-private of Maxar Technologies, the $6 billion sale of Culligan, Payoneer’s $3.3 billion SPAC merger, Providence’s $848 million Cantaloupe deal, the Giant Eagle/GetGo sale to Couche-Tard. She specialized in the intricate, multi-layered buyouts, carve-outs, and joint ventures that keep the private-equity machine turning. Clients praise her for pragmatic business solutions delivered under pressure. “Focus first on your practice and developing deep client relationships… It is impossible to lead a group of highly intelligent and highly driven lawyers without a robust practice.” Ramona Nee Legal Awards Abound Awards have followed: Private Equity Lawyer of the Year at the Euromoney Americas Women in Business Law Awards in both 2022 and 2024, Chambers “leading lawyer,” Legal 500 “Leading Partner,” IFLR1000 Market Leader and Women Leader, Lawdragon 500 Dealmakers, Forbes America’s Top Lawyers 2025. Yet the recognition that probably matters most to her peers is the quiet respect of the sponsors who keep calling her first. What sets Nee apart—and offers the sharpest pointers for any ambitious lawyer—is her refusal to treat leadership as a separate career from lawyering. In a 2022 interview she was blunt: “Focus first on your practice and developing deep client relationships… It is impossible to lead a group of highly intelligent and highly driven lawyers without a robust practice.” She learned early that “the work does not speak for itself.” She advocates relentlessly for her team, builds internal networks, and stays “the duck—calm on the surface, paddling furiously underneath.” Authenticity, she says, is non-negotiable. Outside the deal room she is equally grounded. She plays violin with the Longwood Symphony Orchestra (a Weil pro-bono client), sits on the board of Sustainable Nantucket, has run multiple marathons for Dana-Farber, and still finds time to read and play piano. The message for lawyers is clear - excellence at the highest level of law does not require sacrificing every other dimension of life. Weil’s choice of Nee signals something bigger than one promotion. In an era when firms are wrestling with talent wars, client concentration, and succession anxiety, they are betting on a Boston-bred rainmaker who has spent two decades proving she can grow an office, lead a practice, and keep the culture intact. For younger lawyers watching, the lesson is old-fashioned but still potent - that is, master your craft, look after your people, and never stop paddling.