Nationwide Pay Freeze Watch: Winston & Strawn
Another top firm has frozen its 2009 salaries. Winston & Strawn informed associates last week that 2009 salaries will be held at 2008 levels.
It’s what we like to call around here a “Slurpee freeze,” as the firm might change its mind should our national economy pull out of its long and continuous nose dive. The freeze announcement memo, available in full after the jump, says Winston will “continue to monitor economic conditions in the coming months and will revisit this issue if and when it becomes appropriate.”
ATL will post naked photos of all of its contributors if and when it becomes appropriate, too. Of course, “if and when” is our way of saying never.
Reactions from Winston’s associates to the freeze and to bonuses outside of New York:
I’m not sure why I’m surprised given how cheap the firm usually is but we just got hit with a full year freeze (with the usual boilerplate caveat language) and much lowered bonuses (lower than half-Skadden for most of the tiers). I wish I could say I’m going to start looking. Instead, I suppose I should just be happy I have a job.
A Jenner-style half-raise would have been nice.
[I]t seems that for non-NY offices, they significantly reduced bonuses. Bonuses were about 50-60% of last year’s, even for top billers. Mine was the same as it was THREE years ago.
Winston’s memo after the jump, as well as an updated list of the 37 firms (that we know of) that have instituted a salary freeze for 2009. If you know of others, send us an e-mail at tips@abovethelaw.com.
Here’s a list of the firms with salary freezes in effect. To see a list of firms that have instituted normal class year raises, check out this open thread.
Solid Ice Freeze (2009 salaries will remain at 2008 levels)
Arent Fox
Ballard Spahr
Blank Rome
Cooley
Dickstein Shapiro
DLA Piper
Goodwin Procter
Hogan & Hartson
Latham & Watkins
Morgan Lewis
Orrick
Patton Boggs
Perkins Coie
Seyfarth Shaw
Sheppard Mullin
Sonnenschein
Squire Sanders
Sutherland
Townsend
Wilson Sonsini
The Slurpee Freeze (2009 salaries will remain at 2008 levels… for now)
Alston & Bird
Andrews Kurth
Arnold & Porter
Baker & McKenzie (will revisit June 30)
Bingham McCutchen
Bryan Cave (3 month delay)
Chadbourne & Parke
Dorsey & Whitney
Fish & Richardson
Fulbright & Jaworski (will revisit after the first quarter)
Haynes and Boone
Mayer Brown
McDermott Will & Emery (will revisit in March)
Sidley Austin (will revisit “sometime” in the first quarter)
Venable
Winston & Strawn
Womble Carlyle (will revisit mid-year)
Winston & Strawn Firm Memorandum
(56) 
Comments
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First... to say Elie is still eating donuts!
Foist!
Thanks Latham!
these firms may be freezing but i'm basking in the sun here in ann arbor! it's going to be 60 today!
*puts sunblock on nose*
-nervous T-10 1L
soon to be nervous 1L sa
Evan here, writing from Miami, packing up for another Asia trip this weekend.
So... out of curiosity, how is this a step that must be taken "to serve the clients of the Firm," when associate billing rates were raised as usual for class year? It must be code. "Clients" stands for "our own fat, greedy asses."
What were bonuses like in non-NY offices, specifically Chicago?
crap
Evan again, which body cavity is best for sneaking medicinal herbs into Asia?
Who is confident in their Paul Hastings raise now?
Does this shed any light onto what could be the cause of this ungodly pressure on my sphincter?
Not paying market for iis not sustainable over a long period of time. Sucks for 2009, but there will be an adjustment for all firms once the market levels out.
T10 nervous 1L: The weather in AA is so nice right now.
DBR didn't freeze.
Paul Hastings Bonus = stem cells from a fetus
what were bonuses in ny offices?
bonuses in NY were at market.
Frost Nixon froze.
"ATL will post naked photos of all of its contributors if and when it becomes appropriate, too."
Kash - it is always appropriate.
Can someone answer a question for me?
I am new to ATL and I see that Elie appears to make many mistakes in his posts. When the comments call him out on something, I go to check what they are talking about but the typos are no longer there.
Does he change them after he gets called out?
20 - Wouldn't you?
The ship be sinking...
21-
Yes, I would change it. Or maybe even read the post first. I understand comments having typos, but he has spell check. I am just wondering why I didn't get into HLS...
20
Blogging is a fast medium. You throw up a post first, then correct later. It's not like writing a law review article, where everything is proofread, Bluebooked, etc.
6 is right on the money. It's such transparent bullshit to say that this is somehow about clients when our rates went up 15% from December 2008 to January 2009.
I don't really have a problem with my salary freeze. In an up market, compensation increases, in a down market, it doesn't. This pay freeze IS market.
If a biglaw associate has a problem with that, he should go get a higher paying job elsewhere...oh, wait, he probably can't (darn law firms that aren't really hiring and glut of laid off associates). So why would a firm increase his salary? That crazy market!
Again, Steptoe & Johnson LLP instituted a "solid ice freeze" (as reported in this blog and elsewhere). Why is it not being listed in the running tally? It's a Vault 100 firm.
Client rates didn't really go up, not for significant clients anyway. Any large client now is insisting on 08 rates, and some are looking for and getting rollbacks to 07 rates. The rate increase at this firm and others are designed to make the firm appear attractive to lateral partner candidates with business by somehow creating the image that the firm is busy enough to push through a rate increase. Obviously, any partner considering lateralling to Winston should ask for information regarding what clients are actually paying, not what the just firm's rate sheet says.
It seems that Winston may lose 3 of its bankruptcy partners: http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-tue-law-notebook-02-10feb10,0,1904127.story
http://www.winston.com/index.cfm?contentID=30&itemID=1820
"ATL will post naked photos of all of its contributors if and when it becomes appropriate"
** So you're sayin' there's a chance!!! **
Glad I left. Last year the NY bonus was about 2x the DC bonus. What are associates in DC even getting after taxes? Probably enough to buy dinner. Good luck, suckers!
Add Reed Smith, Fenwick & West and now Freshfields as well.
Add Reed Smith, Fenwick & West and now Freshfields as well.
SkaddenLA? Please tell me it is a joke.
What's all this talk of "top firms" freezing? I thought only two V20 firms have frozen - Latham and Sidley?
WinsTTTon and STTTrawn
-intelligent comment of the day
WinsTTTon and STTTrawn
-intelligent comment of the day
35 - SkaddenLA is a joke.
winston doesn't even belong where it's ranked on most of these lists... chicago firm with ny firm envy..
There is a pattern developing here - non-NY firms with NY offices are getting owned big willy style.
WHY ARE YOU CALLING THIS A FREEZE??? LAST YEAR SECOND YEARS MADE $170. THIS YEAR SECOND YEARS MAKE $160. W&S IS NOW GETTING SECOND YEAR WORK FOR THE PRICE OF FIRST YEAR SALARY, AND CHARGING CLIENTS SECOND YEAR RATES.
You suckers bought into L&W's BS lingo. The laugh is on you!
30 -- the managing partner says "most" of their Charlotte practice is focused on asset-based lending?? As I understand it, only 2 or 3 of the partners in that office really practice that work which is fairly niche (see web bios), with maybe 2 or 3 associates focused on it also.
42-if you made $170 last year, you are making $170 this year. The only way that your comp goes down is if you lateral from a firm that didn't freeze to one that did. What's the point of arguing semantics?
W&S is doing stealth layoffs firm-wide, definitely some in DC.
You must be a REAL loser if you would rather go back to law school than high school. High school was more fun and less work. You also had your entire future ahead of you. In law school, you are pretty much locked in to a boring and possibly dead-end career.
Plus, you read so much as a lawyer that your face actually starts to sag.
I've always wondered why people value excessive money over health, and then I slap myself in the head for actually doing it myself. I woke up after a couple of years and realized that I had lost my true identity. Now I'm looking to get out.
Does anyone else here think that law sucks the life out of you?
How about the partners? Was it worth it? How is life just as a partner, regardless of the work it took to get to that level? You still have high billable hour requirements, so it can't be that great. But let me know.
Any news out of Winston DC?
I know W&S DC office was slow and that it had some serious problems in retaining partners, particularly those that were purchased from other firms. I think a bunch of int'l people left for Hogan or something a year or so ago.
It seems like Chicago has the same issues, oddly enough. I remember when those bankruptcy guys came over from Jenner. The firm spent a pretty penny on bringing them over. It also touted them as "big catches." I even think this was in that Vault crap we get pressured to fill out ever year.
The thing is: Winston went through a big change of guard a few years ago and has set its sights on being more than a well regarded Chicago firm with an outstanding litigation practice. It wants to be a Kirkland. If they aren't careful in how this expansion is accomplished, they might be in the same boat as Latham.
Back to the story.
So, they canned all of the service income partners that were veterans of the tobacco wars, starting pushing IP litigation and higher yield practices, and tried to beef up its practices through the hiring of lateral partners and acquiring firms and practice groups in other cities (LA, SF, Charlotte, and Hong Kong for instance). That's its historical growth model over the past ten years. Like most firms, I guess.
A lot of money was spent landing these groups and entering into new markets. I don't know how successful it's been, aside from (thankfully) avoiding massive exposure to those high yield corporate practices that crashed.
Here's the rub about Winston, though--there are a still a shit ton of income partners who generate no business and are purely service partners. It's a relic of the 1990's when Winston had huge partner classes (and a great reputation as a quality place to work, funnily enough).
If the firm has been making good bets and the new partners and groups have been bringing in business, then it should weather the storm fine, but from what I've heard and seen, it's been slow across the board and there is a partner glut.
There have been a few outstanding partners who are doing well. They are going to push for more points, power, and compensation. An IP lit. guy comes to mind, but there are a few corporate people that fit the bill too. They are also going to push for some serious cost cutting in order to keep their (new) share of the pie. If I was a service partner, I'd be worried.
My guess, re layoffs? "Performance terminations" that are basically stealth layoffs in the slow, slow groups over the new two or three months. Then in March there is going to be some drama in the partner ranks. Look for more layoffs there before it hits the associate ranks. That's where serious money is going to be saved.
48- why must you scare me
Serious question...how does a firm freeze salaries in mid-February? Haven't some 2009 paychecks already gone out? If so, then wouldn't this info have gotten out weeks ago? If not, how do associates live when they get paid every 6 weeks (or however long in 2009 we already are)?
50 = EPIC FAILURE OF A SERIOUS QUESTION.
Wow. The attorneys obviously have to write a check to the firm.
50 - Our fiscal year ends January 31....
What's going on in their Charlotte office? I've heard it's terribly slow but that most of the partners have two-year income guarantees that expire at the end of 2009.
Wow. What a dead thread. People at W&S must either be relieved to be working or completely lacking in any interesting dirt.
This thread is dead, but that is a good thing in this market. Sometimes no news is good news.