dewey has a different bonus policy than dewey?

but what was Legacy Dewey's policy?

Gallion OUT!

9:23, 9:25 - Huh?

it originally read:

The new policy reconciles differences between the pre-merger firms. "Legacy Dewey" essentially gave billable-hours credit for all pro bono hours and firm-related activities (dubbed "Accountable Hours," and including work on client alerts, business development, article research, summer associate recruiting events, etc.). "Legacy Dewey" had a policy that was somewhat less generous, with limits on how much pro bono and firm-related work could be counted towards the hours cutoffs for bonuses.

Hartford associates got NO BONUSES for 2007 and got their office closed!!!!!!!!! This affected 15 associates. Write about that Lat!!!

Lat is planning to, 9:34:

"Speaking of D&L, we're going to be writing about their closing of a few offices. If you have any info on that front, please feel free to email us."

Ummm .... yeah ... how about reporting on all the D&L stealth terminations? Dozens accross all departments.

Not ALL departments...mine wasn't hit. Haven't heard of ANY on my floor, either, 9:42.

Hartford office is in trouble.

Dewey Schmewey

Dear 1, 2 & 3Ls (aka most readers):

There is no such thing a market driven layoff. People say a firm is so nice when they don't couch layoffs as performance based, but rather as market layoffs. This is proof that 90% of the people reading this blog are students. Do you think, when they go to cull 5% of the associate ranks, they cut the stars or the best performers? Do you think they do it by random choice, maybe dart board style? No, firms look at the weakest associates (in their opinion) and fire them. Other firms understand this. They don't look at a former associate of firm X and say "Oh, they were only let go because of market conditions. They were probably the best associate in the practice group." The best option for a former associate at a "Biglaw" firm is to look at firms one notch down. But don't kid yourselves, there are no such things as non-performance based layoffs. If an associate is a star, they will pay him/her through the slow times or shift them into another group before laying him/her off to reduce the ranks by 5%.

Grim Reaper

Maybe Marc Edelman (Attorney, Author, Professor) will use his bonus to upgrade his clipart.

grim reaper--some lay offs are due to comparative performance differences--if the firm could maintain its current headcount, they would not fire the person for poor performance (i.e., the performance is at least adequate to perform the work, but is the least adequate of all associates)
Think about it like a baseball team with a 25 man roster that then has to trim to a 23 man roster--the two worst players are terminated, but it doesn't mean they weren't good enough to be on the 25 man roster or that they weren't performing as expected.

Where is the TPW info? We know they laid off associates yesterday!

10:05 -

I understand your analogy, and it is valid. However, there is still a stigma attached once you are let go, for whatever reason. Think about the players in your analogy - what are there chances of having much, if any, success in the pros. The answer is very little. If there are 100 associates, and you are in the bottom 5% of those, that it is not a good sign.

For students at the so called "TTT's" I have some good news. No one will care where you went to school after you start working or when cut time comes. Partners don't look at alma matters when deciding who should be let go. They look at quality and quanity. Lazy Yale grads are less valuable than hard working grads from (insert school ranked 15-50).

Grim

TPW sucks!

9:51 not just students, I assure you!

If the entire practice group is being gutted due to the practice group being, oh, securitization, that may be a true market-driven layoff.

Not that that necessarily helps securitization specialists find new work in this environment.

Apart from Hartford, which other D&L offices are closing???? spill the beans now! Cant wait for Lat...what can i say, curiosity....

It is very likely that D&L will close either its San Francisco or Palo Alto office, or both. The firm has publicly stated that both offices are "second tier". The two offices have shrunk to a fraction of their former size, and have no local clientele. Morale is extremely poor in both offices as a result of partners and associates being pushed out the door, and the head of the two offices, Jim Woods, is a baboon.

Austin Business Journal reporting that D&L closing their Austin office.

Me can has job now?

Dewey has an office in Beijing, but all legacy Dewey people upped and quit. Leboeuf has an office in the Republic of Kazakhstan and that stays open... Borat is happy.

I heard that the Jacksonville office is closing. Is this true?

Source on Austin office closing:

http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/stories/2008/04/07/story3.html

Who is this DiCarmine character? Does Dewey recruit at California Western?

Ok . . . 9:42am ... perhaps I exaggerated: D&L stealth layoffs were in Corp. & Litigation. Significant numbers of associates (juniors and seniors). No one is talking about it because as part of the severance plan they are still "employed". But after 3 mos. you'll see the fade away.

Grim: You're a dope. This IS market related. Low hanging fruit goes first because they do not want to be in a position to rescind summer offers, which were made before the market slowed down. Sure, they also have a golden opportunity to dump some under-performers, but the numbers are greater than mere lazy dolts. A lot a good performers were let go too.

Sorry that you were laid off 1:16, but Grim is spot on. While I conceed that some of the associates that get laid off are "good performers", they were still not as good as the associates who weren;t kicked to the curb.

Re: D&L Layoffs.

I call BS.

the only people "stealthily" laid off that I've heard about were (1) something like a 12th year associate who probably got the message and left voluntarily, and (2) someone who went nuts and didn't come into the office for months.

The latter was surprising given D&L's apparent policy of quietly accommodating the crazies.

Also, I wish things were a little slower for me. I could use a vacation.

to Grim Reaper and Anonie-
You have valid points that stars don't get laid off when things are slow, but assessing associate performance has a lot to do with how well liked associates are, which may or may not have to do with their performance. Some partners watch out for their associates and are forgiving of mistakes. A particularly well liked associate may make an error that gets laughed off, but that same error is cause for serious doubts if made by another associate who is not as well liked. Obviously some associates stink, and some are amazing. For the vast majority that fall in between the strength of the relationships they have with decision makers is very important when layoffs are decided. A critical partner who needs to trim the fat can almost always find a reason for those who fall into the category of average biglaw associate. They can simply say X associate lacks judgment, is not the right fit, etc. Assessing performance at law firms is not as objective a process as your posts suggest. So while I'll concede superstars don't get laid off, "underperformers" are not the only ones let go in economic downturns. As often as not they may be associates who lack protection within the partnership ranks for reasons other than the quality of their work.

2:20: There were definitely more than 2 people let go. Although I don't know if they were technically fired or laid off, there were at least two from the class of 06 that were let go from the corp dept. I also heard that 5 midlevels were let go in litigation.