Associate Bonus Watch: Morgan Lewis Pushes Back Bonus Decisions

A central theme running through this week’s bonus speculation was that bonus decisions would be made much later this year than last year. As first reported here, Cravath kicked off the bonus season last year on October 29th, 2007. But in 2006, Milbank didn’t get the ball rolling until December 8th.

The first solid information that bonus decisions could be made a lot later this season came in today from Morgan, Lewis & Bockius. MLB associates were notified that bonuses would not be paid before the holidays via a firm wide email.

Read the email after the jump.


A tipster shared the following email with ATL:

As we do every year, we are conducting our annual evaluation and compensation process. I am sending this e-mail to let you know about a change in the timing of two aspects of this process.

Beginning this year, we are moving our annual evaluation meetings from December to January. Incentive bonuses will also now be paid in January instead of December. As in past years, base compensation adjustments will continue to be effective as of January 1 and will be reflected in your January paycheck.

Please do not hesitate to contact me or your local Practice Group Leader if you have any questions regarding this change or would like to discuss it further.

But one upside of the move could be job security for associates at least through the holidays. “Stealth layoffs” happen under the guise of performance reviews. If the “annual evaluation meeting” isn’t happening until January, then arguably nobody is going to get fired on the down-low until January at the earliest.

As many people have pointed out, actually having a job is fine holiday present — whether or not the job comes with a bonus.

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Update (2:48): Morgan Lewis sent us an email explaining their new bonus timeline:

We decided on a one-month payment deferral from December to January for two very practical reasons. First, it has become increasingly difficult to provide substantive evaluations during December due to a number of factors, including year-end deadlines. It has long been our view that compensation announcements should not be divorced from the evaluation process itself. The deferral simply provides additional time for these discussions. Second, it relates to our desire to obtain the most current market information before we announce bonuses.

As we’ve said before, we believe a lot of firms will be trying to figure out what is happening with the economy before they make bonus decisions.

Morgan Lewis also clearly stated that layoffs were not on the table:

We are not discussing and have not discussed layoffs at any point this year.

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We’ll see if other firms follow the Morgan Lewis lead.

Earlier: Open Thread: Associate Bonus Speculation