Nationwide Salary Cut Watch: Venable Uses a Magic 8-Ball
Question: Will my Vault 100 firm protect my salary despite the recession?
Answer: You must be using some other kind of 8-ball.
Venable might be Washington, D.C.’s weirdest law firm, but you can’t eat quirky. Yesterday evening, Venable announced pay cuts for everybody. Associates, counsel, staff, non-equity partners, and even equity partners will be affected.
First year associates will be taking the increasingly standard 10% pay cut. But then things get crazy! According to the firm wide memo, most associates and counsel will be taking a wacky 8% pay cut. How adorably off-beat.
* Base compensation for all other associates will be reduced by 8%, although there will be a floor of $150,000 and $155,000 for second year and third year associates, respectively.* Base compensation for all of counsel will be reduced by 8%.
As one tipster wryly put it:
I guess the salary freeze only meant frozen from going up, eh?
Senior staff will also see their salaries reduced by 8%.
After the jump, Venable partners share the pain.
Venable management seems to be hoping that eight is enough of an incentive to motivate its non-equity partners to keep their hours up.
* All non equity partners and senior legislative advisors will have a base compensation reduction of 8%, excepting those that are on pace that meet the firm’s 1800-hour billable hour standard (based on annualized performance through May 31, 2009).
If non-equity partners are having trouble keeping their hours up, what hope is there for junior associates? Stay tuned for a very special episode of Jon & Kate minus 8.
Even full equity partners could receive a pay cut. Of course, they won’t be taking as big of a hit, percentage wise, as everybody else. And final partner pay decisions will be made on a case-by-case basis. If that doesn’t seem quite fair, remember that if you want rainmakers to hang around and cut checks, they’re not going to take kindly to having their checks cut:
* The profiles for equity partners were set at 5% below last year’s earnings at the beginning of the year. The final compensation decisions for equity partners will be based on 2009 individual and firm performance.
5%? That is so boring. I thought Venable partners wanted to be cool. Venable partners should have taken a 4% pay cut and added 1% baking soda.
Just say no to drugs, and read the full Venable memo below.
Earlier: The Ballers at Venable
Nationwide Pay Freeze Watch: Venable
VENABLE — MEMO — COMPENSATION ADJUSTMENT
While the firm has had a relatively good start to 2009 — we believe that we are performing better than most of our competitors — the ongoing economic uncertainty affecting our clients requires that management act prudently to ensure that the firm ends 2009 in a manner satisfactory to all.
After careful consideration by the firm’s Executive Committee and Board, we believe that it is in the firm’s best interest to take the following actions:
1. Base compensation for our first year associates will be reduced from $160,000 to $145,000.
2. Base compensation for all other associates will be reduced by 8%, although there will be a floor of $150,000 and $155,000 for second year and third year associates, respectively.
3. Base compensation for all of counsel will be reduced by 8%.
4. All non equity partners and senior legislative advisors will have a base compensation reduction of 8%, excepting those that are on pace that meet the firm’s 1800-hour billable hour standard (based on annualized performance through May 31, 2009).
5. Senior staff will have a base compensation reduction of 8%. All other non-legal staff will be unaffected.
6. The profiles for equity partners were set at 5% below last year’s earnings at the beginning of the year. The final compensation decisions for equity partners will be based on 2009 individual and firm performance.
The compensation adjustments will be effective July 11, 2009, and will be reflected in paychecks received July 24, 2009. We will provide each person impacted by this action with a written memorandum, stating their new base compensation, within the next two weeks.
We reiterate that the firm’s first half performance has been relatively good. We remain confident and optimistic about the rest of the year. For this reason, it is our sincere hope that we will be in position to supplement the January 2010 bonus pool in order to reward high performing lawyers and senior staff who have been impacted by this compensation reduction, and otherwise restore or mitigate these reductions in compensation.
Thank you.
(72) 
Comments
first
Elie sure talks about coke a lot. Wonder what that means...
1=racist
My Biglaw firm's salary cuts went to 11 percent.
Elie can eat anything.
This never happened during the glorious decade that was the 1980's.
I think what this market needs is a solid dose of cocaine -- that should get businesses to start taking risks again.
Hey guys, remember when firms had salary freezes quite a bunch of douches were calling them "salary cuts"? No, this is what you call a salary cut.
I thought this was a bocce playing firm -- billiards too?
Mystal, fuck you.
Who wants a Fresca?
i would honestly love a fresca if it's cold
http://menagealaw.blogspot.com/
Vegetttable, LLP
The ship be sinking...
"but you can't eat quirky"
Generally you can't eat any kind of adjective.
This memo should come as no surprise to firms that are suffering the consequences of an anemic economy coupled with inept governmental leadership. For those of you who voted for Barack Obama, this is what you wanted. Do more with less. This is change you can believe in.
Still nothing on the Judge Kent development, eh? Shocking.
PE was better back when he wasn't an anti-Obama troll. We've got enough of those already, and better ones at that.
Love, love, love it Mystal! What did you have for breakfast today, Mr. Onaroll?
PE's schtick is slowly and unceremoniously coming to a mediocre end. When will he quit for good? Perhaps when he starts at UPennState in the fall.
PE- you know that the market has rebounded 35%, right? I guess you probably don't since law students don't really have money to put into the market. Enjoy those federalist society meetings, though. They'll get you very far in life.
Mystal, when did you first start lactating?
If you are an associate tired of eating shit while the "rainmakers" dodge the pain, then turn yourself into a Raintaker.
Ok, puns are lame. Still, if you're offered a severance package, consider taking some clients!
Clients want to cut costs, and the partner is the best place to do that. That's how senior associates become rainmakers. Out with the old in with the new.
Junior associates, well, that's more difficult. Most BigLaw clients are/should be too large for you to reel in yourselves.
Thompson Hine - taking the fun out of fungible.
I missed rogue associate.
Now that he's back, will there be some sort of duel between him and the new intern who also wants to be V?
I actually agree with Partner Emeritis for once...
15: how about "orange"?
24,
Grand-theft schtick (aka "Swaggerjacking") is a felony level douchebag offense.
Anyone attempting it will be crushed under the weight of their own doucheyness, without me needing to so much as lift a finger.
Thanks for the appreciation - I may not be around each and every week, but it's important for someone to give partners the ole' stinkhand from time to time and I'm on the case! (Mallrats = hilarious)
-RA
That menage blog is horrible. I don't know what's worse, the color scheme or the content.
26 - only in noun form.
If there is a noun form of quirky then touche.
25 = PE = lame and sad.
Their right, the PE schtick used to be better but has gotten tired, stale and boring.
Anymore, I usually just skip them.
Has the Goat Herder ever had to cut salaries?
Hey, Elie, you fat pussy toad, did minority associates get more severe cuts than white associates? Why aren't you covering THAT story, race baiter?
In my book, PE never hit the note of that character quite right. A very respectable attempt (at first) but s/he (who are we kidding, it's probably a guy) obviously lacks the blue blood background or exposure to it needed to really shine in that role.
I think ATL should hold an NCAA style tournament of ATL characters.
It wouldn't be any more of a piece of bullshit fluff than lots of the other crap they post...
One persona to rule them all!
This is good news. The Big Law layoffs/salary cuts news had been a slow this week. More Big Law Bitches need to feel the pain before the brush fire ends. I love this recession.
This is good news. The Big Law layoffs/salary cuts news had been a slow this week. More Big Law Bitches need to feel the pain before the brush fire ends. I love this recession.
21- When you say the market rebounded 35%, you mean a 35% increase off the low. That's not the right measurement. You should be measuring the percentage we've recovered of the drop from the high -- a much lower percentage. And it's even more disingenuous than that, what date are you measuring a 35% gain from? The DOW is down year to date!
Venable's (bocce) balls in yo mouf!!!
37 is right! The best way to figure out how well someone is doing is by pretending there was no problem to begin with!
If Obama can't get us back the entire house-of-cards bubble the Republicans built, then he's a failure! A healthy economic recovery should happen immediately, as every economist knows!
Stoopid librulz.
27 - 80s guy ripped off the original 80s guy about two days after I first created the screen name. I view it as an homage by a law student with a lot more time on their hands.
37 = PE = still sad and lame (and unfunny).
*Yawn*
After the great dot-goat bust of the late 1990s, our milk production sunk dramatically. The partner emeritus of our flock Stjepan urged me to cut the associates’ salaries to insulate us partners from the downturn. Instead, I secretly informed the associates of his plot. We warned the partner emeritus that a storm was approaching from the southwest. That night, as the partner emeritus crouched tightly in his sleeping pouch, the associates and I took turns “making rain” on his coverlet. It was mid-winter and a frost gripped the land. The partner emeritus froze to death. Luckily, the next week the air warmed and our goats began lactating abundantly. But now their milk only tastes of urine to me.
39, you said the same thing when Bush inherited the house of cards that Clinton built, right? Tech bubble, Nasdaq dropping by 80% starting in early 2000 while Clinton was president, recession officially starting one month into Bush's term...
You never blamed Bush for the economic woes of the early 2000s, right? Liberals are known for their logical consistency.
27,
It's "stinkpalm" - inaccurate movie quotes are douchy. Please be more careful in the future.
- Douche Police
MICHAEL JACKSON ???? what does this have to do with the MICHAEL JACKSON CATEGORY? I have read all the way through and haven't found any relevance to MICHAEL JACKSON, but the post is posted in the MICHAEL JACKSON category ... I am so confused. I always and exclusively use the category tags to determine what I will read and will not read and I am so confused now.
Hmmm... an interesting philosophical question. Are inaccurate movie quotes douchy?
Isn't the proper spelling douchey?
Doesn't correcting a mostly correct movie quote seem far douchier? (think Comic-Book-Guy from the Simpsons)...
Shouldn't the douche police be focused on douche felonies (or at least misdemeanors) rather than handing out douche warnings?
And, MOST importantly, shouldn't the Douche Police have some sort of hilarious ATL picture to go with their post?
I just don't know... it's a complicated world we live in.
Still, RA rules!
all the personas can go...seriously, what does TTT mean?
The whole "#=racist" shtick is getting old.
43, nobody with a brain blames a president for the business cycle. But comparing what Bush met versus what Obama is dealing with is such pretty absurd. Bush entered office in a recession but with a record surplus and fiscal stabilty. Which he managed to convert into a record deficit and fiscal goat rodeo with irresponsible tax cuts and ballooning spending, managed by a revolving cast of treasury secretaries who usualy quit in frustration or were pushed out when they didnt prove to be brainless flunkies. Oh, and we had a pricey War of Choice. The result, the next time the business cycle heads south, we are in desperate straits. Obama inherets the shop with an empty till. Big difference. Work on your facts and your logical consistency.
Remember, Obama has a 63% approval rating. There really isn't any need to argue with the extreme right trolls.
The biggest thing they can hope for is to make you angry and waste your time actually responding to their "arguments".
Any time you're tempted to use arguing nonsense with a troll is better spent advocating the moderate, common sense positions of the Obama administration to the rational/independent/moderate parts of the audience.
For example, without blowhard chicken hawks spouting empty tough talk and making the U.S. a convenient boogeyman, we sure are seeing incredible change in Iran!
It is nice to see adults in charge of the government again.
49, Bush turned a $100 billion surplus into a $200 billion deficit when he inherited a collapsing economy. That $200 billion was well within the historical norm of less than 3% of GDP. Obama turned a $500 billion deficit into a $1.84 trillion deficit when he inherited a collapsing economy. That deficit is larger than the entire federal budget a mere decade ago. Yes, Bush is the fiscally irresponsible one.
51,
The Bush deficit numbers are fiction because he left all of his war spending off the books. The Bush deficit in his last year was $1 trillion.
Obama's first budget has a $1.3 trillion deficit. Y'know, because it takes money to clean up all the Republican shit from when they trashed the joint.
Go back to Limbaugh for a better talking point, troll.
NEXT!
46,
Only a douche would think that contemplating whether or not inaccurate movie quotes are douchy is an interesting philosophical question. Consider yourself sentenced to a lifetime of douchiness.
ATL pictures are for douchebags - just look at PE's ATL picture (which is extremely "douchy" or "douchey", depending on how much of a douchebag English major you are).
- Douche Police
*Yawn* to 53
Looks like we have a traffic cop on a power trip.
What a douche.
54 eats shit for breakfast.
- Douche Police
52, um, no. Obama's budget deficit is expected to be at least $1.84 trillion.
http://money.cnn.com/2009/03/20/news/economy/cbo_obama_budget_deficit/
Of course, it's possible that CNN, the Congressional Budget Office, and reality all have a well known anti-Obama bias.
Can you idiots please focus on the article at hand and leave chatter at the door? Here's my input - - Venable is a pathetic Baltimore-based firm that thinks it can compete with BigLaw. They expect 2400 hours from their associates and have the attitude that associates should be grateful to work there. I would give back my license before working in that s***hole.
Douche Police, you are hereby awarded the distinguished ATL Prize for Unintentional Irony!
Enjoy!
58,
Thank you. What makes you think it was unintentional?
- Docuhe Police
Ha! How "douchy" or "douchey " of us to misspell our own name! Even the Douche Police are not immune to douchebaggery.
- Douche Police
59,
Hmmm... layers within layers? It could be...
On a probationary basis I will upgrade you from "Unintentional Irony" to the much cooler and porn-esque sounding abbreviation "DP"
Watch out for being a douche, or you'll face the DP!!!
Use it responsibly to troll people and waste their time arguing "doucheyness" with you and we'll make the title permanent!
Tentative and not entirely convinced kudos,
58
I remember when Venable was really prestigious in Baltimore and Piper Marbury was an also ran that when an acquaintance you see at a cocktail party annouces they're headed to Piper you would try to say in a really sincere voice "that's a good firm, congratulations". Now Venable appears to be a footnote and DLA has become a McDonald's franchise -- not sure which is worse anymore.... "they're both good firms, congratulations" with sincerity... now I'm going to ease away and look for someone more interesting to talk to at the cocktail party
Fuck PE, I miss frat stud and 3500 sqft wives.
Another one bites the dust....ugh, ugh, ugh....and another one, and another one, and another bites the dust.
Yet another example of a third rate garbage disposal regional firm getting kicked in the nuts in this market. Maybe now they'll realize they should keep their mouths shut and stay hidden in the lame Baltimore market.
28 - you're a huge dipshit.
about the content.
the color scheme is not so good.
the blog itself is enjoyable
28 - you're a huge dipshit.
about the content.
the color scheme is not so good.
the blog itself is enjoyable
How the hell is no one giving Goat Herder any props? Easily the best new ATL personality.
67 - Agreed. I gave him props in an earlier thread, but it bears repeating.
Why isn't anyone discussing the upcoming LAYOFFS at Cadwalader? Yes, they are coming next week, BIG TIME. Some people are saying 30 casualties. Some people are saying 70. Either way, it will be a total BLOODBATH and will probably start a fresh round of layoffs across BIg Law.
Lets start talking about this immediately!
I'm with you, 67 and 68 - Maor Goat Herder
One of the settlement conference rooms in Denver's new courthouse has a magic eight-ball and other devices to help parties engage in irrational decision-making. I would hope, but don't know, that the jury deliberation rooms are not similarly adorned.
Wouldn't it be great if ATL had some sort of arrangement with law shucks?