Million-dollar question: Will Cravath fall out of the top 3?

Latham is gonna get KILLED this time around.....

Lat loves ropes

2 -- look at the gap between Cravath and S&C in both Partner and Associate surveys. It's huge, so it can't happen.

A lot of Lat postings. Did you can the fat ass?

CWT will break the top 3!

Dear 1 - Congratulations on your accomplishment.

- 1 from the Sotomayor thread.

Obama is not a failure. He is a catastrophic failure.

White & Case, number 1.....hmmm

9-

Touche.

-1

3,

Latham may get killed, but that's nothing compared to what will happen to Shearman and Stttearling.

Stay classy.

Latham NYC to #1!

Bingham's improvement in the Vault rankings should disprove the drivel that the terminated stepford secretary spewed in that email she blasted firmwide about lacking character. Well done Bingham. Now you have ammo in the event that the lunatic former secretary sues the firm.

My favorite place to work is on top of Elie's mom.

My favorite place to work is on top of Elie's mom.

does BINGHΛM get brownie points for stealing VΛULT's "orange arrow" A?

Having female associates who claim they were drugged for the purpose of facilitating date rape improves your Vault ranking? Who knew...

They should take Fish and Richardson of the rankings...it is a f*&king s&*thole that stinks of elderberry's (and female sharts in Boston).

Obama is a failure, eh?

How's that SCOTUS vote taste?

How you loving Dow 9300?

Mmmm... tastes delicious to me (and the 54% of voters that put him in office).

Nothing says victory quite like VICTORY.

Three cheers for Associate Justice Sotomayor!

'highly influential'???

vault gets what it pays for as a sponsor of atl for sure.

Our clean, articulate president has successfully appointed a wise Latina to bring superior and more empathetic decision-making to the bench. No doubt she will help wring all kinds of equalizing outcomes out of that stubborn constitution. It is, after all, what we make of it.

23 = sore loser.

Bingham's DC office has ONE black attorney. Yay diversity!

I really hope the V25 firms doing big layoffs have that reflected in lowering their rank.

I'm calling WilmerHale to V12.

Cravath will stay top 3, despite rumors of stealth layoffs.

20 - How am I loving DOW 9300?

Ummm... I dunno, not very much at all? Maybe you like the taste of a 31% decline from two years ago today... that would explain a lot. I suppose then you credit Bush for Dow 13900?

FAIL.

How you like me now?

Was I the only one to scratch firms off of my OCI list that were ranked high in "diversity?" Who gives a flying fuck about "diversity?"

30: You weren't. I've witnessed first hand how the coddling goes all the way from OCI to understanding on why assignments are late and/or of poor quality.

It's just a sad free pass.

30: You weren't. I've witnessed first hand how the coddling goes all the way from OCI to understanding on why assignments are late and/or of poor quality.

It's just a sad free pass.

30: You weren't. I've witnessed first hand how the coddling goes all the way from OCI to understanding on why assignments are late and/or of poor quality.

It's just a sad free pass.

28,

The Bush bubble burst, and the Dow went to, like, 7000 or whatever at the low.

Obama and his policies have it up to 9300. I have to imagine you and the rest of the right-wing fucktards are hating it, but everyone else is a-ok with how Obama's economic policies are going.

"30: You weren't. I've witnessed first hand how the coddling goes all the way from OCI to understanding on why assignments are late and/or of poor quality.

It's just a sad free pass."

Says the person who couldn't manage to hit the post button once.

I would like to warn NYCers away from my ex. She is a TTTer who got a pussy pass into NYC Biglaw but takes Prozac.

Skadden will certainly be ranked number 1....AS IT SHOULD BE.

34 - Hahahahahaha, "the Bush bubble burst, and the Dow went to, like, 7000."

Wow. By "everyone else" being okay with it do you mean Obama's sub 50% approval ratings? I guess you mean everyone else besides those "right-wing fucktards" who disagree with the president, because you can't do that. That's "disinformation" and needs to be flagged. Right.

35: Blame that on this websites shitty comment framework, not on my ability to click post.

30 - Run from "diversity firms" like the plague. They will be the first to cut pay for all associates so that they can keep paying a few quota associates to occupy recruiting materials and little else. No thanks. Nobody likes doing the work for the wise latinas or other clean, articulate associates.

The Vault rankings are worthless. I've done the survey and I know nothing about most of the firms I've voted for. I just ticked randomly. I assume a lot of people do this even if they don't admit it. How the hell can I judge other firms if I know nothing about them. The vault is just gossip ranking, nothing more. And yes, I work for a v10, if that means anything.

Another ATL post about race. I, for one, am shocked.

Sure, 39.

#41 is exactly right -- I have no idea about most and just rank firms highly where I have friends working. Factors like this also probably help to explain why larger firms like Skadden do so well -- they have so many lawyers, more people will have friends there or will have worked with them, and therefore will have some basis for ranking them.

LaTTTham out of the V10 for sure. Probably Kirkland too.

13

Are firms competing for most first year layoffs?

LATTTHAM to number 1!

I don't understand why you don't understand ==> Latham laid off first years!

An exhaustive list of the top 20 firms that have laid off a majority of first years in one office:

1) Latham

That is all.

Exhaustive list of top 20 firms that have laid off 40-45% of associates in one office:

1) Latham

K&L GaTTTes will drop out of the top TTTwo hundred because it's a shiTTThole.

38 - check your numbers. Obama's approval is 55%. He won the election with 54%. Ergo, his winning coalition is holding together just fine.

Fucktard.

who gives a flying f--k about diversity?! seriously. is that something to brag about?

28 - The DJIA closed at 7,949.09 the day Obama took over the reins from Bush. It closed at 9,256.26 today. So yes, I do blame the massive decline of the stock market on Bush (although I’m not the prior commenter). Hard to blame Obama for something that happened before he came into office. Since he has been in office, the DJIA has increased by over 1,300 points. From the lows where we were earlier this year and when Bush left office, 9,300 looks pretty dang good. I also credit Bush with getting the DJIA to 13,900—through lax oversight and shortsighted economic policy that rewarded excessive risk. The difference between the two is that now we are in a recovery period where the DJIA is starting to creep up to a somewhat realistic number that reflects the true value of companies. Things are slowly but surely starting to get better after the worst economic crises since the Great Depression (thanks Bush!). I believe your post qualifies as an EPIC FAIL.

38,

I guess you make up your own statistics because you're not smart enough to Google something like "presidential approval ratings."

Nice job going full retard though.

53,

Yes, Obama did not reverse the Bush freefall overnight. I accept your point that it takes Democrats a little more than 30 days to reverse the trajectory of colossal Republican fuck ups.

You credit Bush with getting the Dow to 13,900? Moron, it was a house of cards. It doesn't matter how high he built the house of cards.

You're an idiot. Declare my point an epic fail all you like (you're so trendy). Results speak louder than your empty declaration.

Obama took the reins in a freefall, and things promptly (but not immediately) turned around, and now we're up 40%.

Dow starting to creep up? It's up 40% from the low in less than 6 months.

That's in 6 months. Pace yourself, you've got 3 and half YEARS of Obama left.

Chump.

you know you only get rated based on how many bankers boxes are stacked within the firm when the ghost shopper visits? (disguised as a lost messenger)

54,

Republicans are incapable of grasping the fact that an unsupported assertion is < statements supported by facts.

For them, saying there is no evolution is of equal to weight to the evidence that there is.

Stating there is no global warming (better yet, claim cooling!) is just as good as reams of scientific data showing warming.

What's left of the Republicans just can't tell the difference. Sad but funny, isn't it?

All the smart moderate Republicans are now Independents, and they are voting Democratic more often than Republican (Obama still has a +40 favorable rating from Independents - Research 2000 Poll).

It's pathetic what is left of the Republican party. It's like facing the best special olympics debate team.

Mayer Brown to V10!!!!!

Highly influential? Highly influential to who? First-year law students at Vanderbilt and junior associates at slave-driving New York law firms?

Has anyone here actually ever gone to dinner with a prospective client that had more than $20 to his/her name?

LOL!

S T R O O C K !!!

55 - Read my post a few more times--you appear to be a little slow. The line about lax oversight and rewarding excessive risk was pointing out that it was all a house of cards. Where did I say that it was a good thing that the DJIA was at 13,900? I also later said that it was now approaching a more realistic number, implying that 13,900 was not realistic. And you are insane if you think that the stock market is going to continue to surge like it did from the end of March until May and then again through part of July for the next three and a half years of Obama's presidency. I like Obama a lot (despite the impression your poor reading skills left you with), but that is just unrealistic. Stocks were way undervalued because people were scared. Now they are starting to approach more realistic values. Once they get there, do you really want prices to keep shooting up to unrealistic values like they did under the Bush administration? That would simply be setting us up for another economic disaster. Also, you really need to brush up on your reading comprehension buddy.

Who gives a shit about these rankings. Useless and irrelevant to the real world.

Milbank is below 50. you heard it here first.

My office smells like rancid farts right now.

This site needs to start requiring registration to post comments. I've never seen a bigger collection of d-bags.

ropes blocked comments on atl from inside its firewall ... good thing they handed out gift cards to survey participant before they shitcanned a bunch of people ...morale sucks

41 is right on!!!

They did not hand out gift cards (R&G Associate).

If there is a big shake-up in the upper echelon of the rankings, I predict that sales of Extenze will sky rocket in Midtown and Lower Manhattan.

I'm sure the R&G summers who were deferred love to hear its a great place to work--if they will ever get to start there...

the managing partner at one of the firms that do really well in these bullshit rankings trolls the hallways every evening the week before responses to the surveys are due and stops by every midlevel's office to impress upon them the importance of doing well in the rankings. this is also reinforced through multiple officewide emails. whoever takes vault seriously deserves everything that's coming to them.

Rankings give my life meaning.

The Dow is still 369 points below where it was on Election Day 2008. Nasdaq is up 193 points and the S&P 500 is up 45 points.

I honestly thought that Latham distributed the vault voting stuff right before the big layoff. Should we still expect Latham to fall that much? Or am I thinking of something else?

Fortunately, I feel like most people that matter, specifically clients and potential future employers, know that these rankings are meaningless. Law students use them, and they are helpful to them because they don't really have many other good sources of information, but nobody out there in the real world pays too much attention to all this.

Law students - Use the rankings, but don't let it be your deciding factor. Use other sources of information as well. Talk to anyone you know in the field, read up on firms on AmLaw, use the career center here (actually not terrible, surprisingly), etc.

Also remember that as far as rankings go, these are not even the most important. It's more important to try and get into a practice group ranked well in Chambers & Partners. It doesn't matter how highly ranked your firm is if you're in a joke group within that firm, you won't meet any good clients and won't build any kind of name for yourself. Conversely, getting into a well regarded group in a lower Vault ranked firm whose people you actually like might save you a little bit of heartache in terms of ridiculous hours and expectations, and may even improve your chances at making partner, if that's what you're into, while allowing you to build just as good a rep as you might at a super highly Vault ranked firm.

So essentially, use the rankings as a jumping off point, they can certainly be handy, but don't get too wrapped around the handle about them. Five or ten years from now you won't even know where your firm is ranked, because it really doesn't matter all that much.

THE LEGAL PROFESSION IS THE ONLY ONE SNOBBY ENOUGH TO HAVE TO RANK THEMSELVES AND GIVE THEM A PAT ON THE BACK. INVESTMENT BANKING IS A PARTIALLY SELF-REGULATING INDUSTRY, AND HAS RANKINGS IN TERMS OF RAW STATISTICS BUT NOTHING IN PROPORTION TO WHAT THE LEGAL FIELD DOES.

PERHAPS IF ATTORNEYS CONSIDERED MANAGEMENT ABILITY AND UNDERSTOOD HOW TO RUN AN ORGANIZATION IN TERMS OF THE REAL BALANCE SHEET SO THAT THEY COULD AVOID THE MESS WHICH ALL OF THESE "ELITE" LAW FIRMS GOT INTO, THEN MAYBE THEY WOULD DESERVE A PAT ON THE BACK.

Foley & Lardner is lucky the news of the pop price increase came out after the vault rankings were finalized. A 150% increase in vending machine prices has to knock them down a few slots...

I COULDN'T HEAR YOU BECAUSE YOU WERE SHOUTING

White & Case def out of the V30, and deservedly so. Whereas in years past they went out of their way to increase their Vault ranking, they did nothing but the opposite this year.

White & Case + Latham = biggest drops for sure.

Ropes is just pissed that all of its female associates have no control over their sharting condition.

Deez pretzels make me eighty-firsty.

20- Your lack of knowledge concerning the Dow is astounding. While it is not presently at its lowest, rock-bottom point, It should be 5,000 or 6,000 points higher.

I'll put it in sports terms because you may understand this better- it would be like a pro football team coming off a bad season hiring a new coach and going 0-16 one year, and then going 2-14 the next year. Sure 2-14 is an improvement on 0-16, but it's fans would not be saying "How you like us now?" Rather, they would be trying to fire the coach who went 2-30 in his first two seasons.

And shame on you to 73- the Dow SUCKS. It is the fault of a lot of people, just like a 2-14 season is the fault of a lot of people- players and management- but the coach is the one who usually gets skape-goated and fired in the pros.

LOL at Bingham.

Their NY office gave offers to 2 out of 9 summers. 22% offer rate. 7 careers ruined because they simply chose the wrong miserable firm.

Yet AboveTheLaw goes and glorifies that piece of shit.

SotomayOR's best work was as Nien Nunb in Star Wars

http://www.irtguild.net/cobb/nien_nunb.jpg

Obama has been a fucking disgrace. Under Bush, big law prospered. Under Obama, big law is witnessing a bloodletting of epic proportions. Which is due in large part to the economic melt down spawned by toxic mortgages which Barry Obama, Chris Dodd, Barney Frank, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and countless other democrats fought for on the basis that every American should own a home. Once elected, Barry pushed for a trillion dollar stimulus which was to create shovel ready jobs... Obama is now using threats and fear to try to push universal healthcare through Congress. The same universal healthcare, which is an epic failure in Canada. Moreover, Prime Minister Putin, I mean President Obama, wants all fishy emails concerning his universal healthcare plan to be sent to the White House. Could you imagine if Bush tried to round up emails from every left wing loon who circulated anti- Bush emails. Democrat truly is the party of hypocrites. Obama lied, jobs died. Obama = one and done. How you like me now?

Obama has been a fucking disgrace. Under Bush, big law prospered. Under Obama, big law is witnessing a bloodletting of epic proportions. Which is due in large part to the economic melt down spawned by toxic mortgages which Barry Obama, Chris Dodd, Barney Frank, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and countless other democrats fought for on the basis that every American should own a home. Once elected, Barry pushed for a trillion dollar stimulus which was to create shovel ready jobs... Obama is now using threats and fear to try to push universal healthcare through Congress. The same universal healthcare, which is an epic failure in Canada. Moreover, Prime Minister Putin, I mean President Obama, wants all fishy emails concerning his universal healthcare plan to be sent to the White House. Could you imagine if Bush tried to round up emails from every left wing loon who circulated anti- Bush emails. Democrat truly is the party of hypocrites. Obama lied, jobs died. Obama = one and done. How you like me now?

Bingham McCuTTTchen is going to no-offer a shitload of their Boston summers. Fucking shithole.

82 - Upon what measurement do you base that the Dow should be 5,000 to 6,000 points higher? How do you compute the intrinsic value of a company's stock? Football analogies don't make your argument any stronger, but facts do. Not being able to spell “scapegoat” also diminishes your credibility--not to mention not knowing the difference between it’s and its, or an em dash and a hyphen.

So when the Dow is up under Bush it's a "house of cards" but when it's propped up by crazy Obama policies it's suddenly sound business management? Like what, cash for clunkers?

Holy shit people. I hate both of these Presidents, but arguing over which president is responsible for the stock price of 3M or ATT is the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

If you're going to just pick an ideological team and root for them like sycophants then you might as well stick to college football.

GO NOLES!!!! ROLL TIDE!!!!!

89 - Are you unaware of a little thing called economics? There is a reason why the whole market has declined precipitously and not just certain stocks. While the quality of the management at 3M or AT&T determines how well those companies perform compared to other companies in their respective sectors, economic policy has a profound impact on how well the market as a whole performs.

my friend worked at at vault 4 firm--
his life and existence was a void--
lateraled to a 3 and is a self-actualized,
well adjusted person.

Anyone with half a brain realizes the lunancy of these
rankings--except to those whose existence is defined
by an arbitrary--unscientific slave-shop cardinal ranking.

can anyone confirm 83? awful if true.

I'm sure Fried Frank took #1 in in the cafeteria category. The food at Eaterie 25 is pure yumminess :))

liberal ATL commenters = some of the dumbest motherfuckers imaginable.

83!!! woof

Anyone who chooses a firm because its ranked 23 over another firm ranked 25 is an idiot. Vault is not the be all and end all of anything.

But that said, rising 2Ls, if a firm is generally ranked at 15, I wouldn't discount that against a firm generally ranked at say 30 or 40. Not because Vault is a science, but because its a poorly administered popularity contest.

Reputation generally sorta matters in our chosen profession.

19 = TTT

PLEASE NOTE THAT LATHAM PURPOSELY LAID OFF PEOPLE RIGHT AFTER THE VOTING FOR VAULT HAS CLOSED - THUS THE HIT MIGHT NOT BE THAT BAD SINCE ONLY FIRST ROUND STEALTH LAY OFF HAD A CHANCE TO VOTE

Latham - even though you laid me off, I still wrote the truth about you since the link was open. All of us did, so fuck you.

The rankings are clear indications of the prestige of the firm. When you first years get laid off from BigLaw because there is not enough work - it will be easier for you to find work elsewhere if you worked at the Lathams, Skaddens and Cravaths of the world than if you worked at the Bingham and Pillsburys of the world.

to everyone who has shown concern over Elie's absence, I have figured out the reason:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32131045/ns/us_news-msnbc_wire_services/

OK - listen up 34 & 38 (and whatever other posts you made). A significant factor that IS related the financial market meltdown can be traced back to the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act. What it is NOT about is who the President happens to be at the moment.

The argument that either Bush caused the problem (or the run up to 1300+), or that somehow Obama has fixed it in his short tenure in office is specious.

Neither side can show causality. You want to look at who does have the influence, take a look at your banking and finance committee members.

Much as you would like to turn the economic cycle into some sort of political endorsement (or club), you have not demonstrated a true, direct cause an effect. That would be like saying I took an aspirin this morning and then urinated 20 minutes later, ergo the aspirin caused me to urinate.

I apologize for my ignorance, but I am older and pretty entrenched in my job and have not been scanning the market for a few years- But when did this Pillsbury place become a firm?
Aside from frequent bashing on ATL, I have never heard of it- At first I thought people were talking about inhouse lawyers at that cookie company.

WilmerHale Boston gave full (or nearly full) offers to summers yesterday, deferred to at least January 2011.

My wife worked at Ropes for 2 years before going in house. I think the Vault ranking reflects reality. In her time time there she got a lot of good work, didnt run into a single dickhead partner (or so she says) and managed to lead a quality life at home. She seemes to genuinely enjoy it. Only reason she left is bc she got an offer she couldnt refuse.

As far as "telling the deferred summers"... I dont think they really mind. So they are deferred for a few months, maybe longer. Gives them time to get their lives in order, do something different. Maybe a couple will get married, or work for some public interest group in Hawaii. I think the firm gives a 20K salary advance to help manage debt load.

The ones that really get the shaft are the incoming potential summers who dont get an offer in the summer class, because it, like probably every class in a firm instituting a stop-gap measure, will be significantly smaller than previous classes. But they wont know what they are missing anyway. Sort of like the unborn. ATL abortion debate... GO

Bingham's full of a bunch of WASPs who hate minorities.

102 nailed it.

@ 105 your wife slept with half the partners...

confirmed

To 105:

You nailed it. I can't speak for all incoming associates, but most of my friends and I are OK with the delayed start date and know that the layoffs just reflect natural attrition, except now, with the economy sucking, in-house jobs aren't there for the people who get the "you might want to look somewhere else" talk during a review. Things aren't great out there, but it's not as bad as all the 2L's posting on this blog make it out to be.

The rankings should start at V11. No one is worthy of V10.

108-
how old are you?
Im thinking 18. It's time to grow up, or head back to xoxohth.

WHEN are the human being rankings coming out?!?!

I need to know how I stack up!!!

@111

STOP WHINING!

-Kindergarten cop

106-

That's the thing about WASPs, sport. Love animals, hate people.

74 & 89: you're wrong.

74: you must be a law student. You don't have to work at Latham to rate Latham in the Vault survey. Lawyers at any of the hundreds of firms to which the survey is distributed can vote on all firms. (This is why the Vault rankings are so worthless; I vote every year on firms I know absolutely nothing about or about whom my knowledge comes only from ATL.)

89: I filled out the survey after the Latham layoffs and after Cravath killed the bonus marked. I dinged both firms big time.

Top Ten Vault Firms for 2009

1. Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz (New York, NY)
2. Cravath, Swaine & Moore (New York, NY)
3. Sullivan & Cromwell (New York, NY)
4. Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom (New York, NY)
5. Davis Polk & Wardwell (New York, NY)
6. Simpson Thacher & Bartlett (New York, NY)
7. Latham & Watkins (Los Angeles, CA)
8. Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton (New York, NY)
9. Weil, Gotshal & Manges (New York, NY)
10. Kirkland & Ellis (Chicago, IL)

Latham Seven Secure! Woot

nyc to 190!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey the extremely prestigious Vault anatomy rankings came out, and once again my cock is the most prestigious place to work. Congratulations!

116, that's last year's list.

120 - this is the 2009 list. Last year Latham ranked No. 8 and Cleary ranked No. 7.

It's great to work there if you work there. What about the 106 staff members laid off earlier this year and the associates and staff after that?

just have to change the tense. It WAS a great place to work. Simple as that.
and 108 definitely needs to grow up.

Gibson is clearly stronger than Latham in California (As are Irell, Munger, and arguably O'Melveny). If the Vault rankings don't reflect that, they are bullshit. Watch how recruiting pans out this years.

Additionally, how does Skadden remain so high when it gives offers to anyone?

121, read the ATL post at the top. The "2009" list is last year's list. The list that's imminent is the "2010" list. Don't ask me why Vault is so retarded. It's marketing!

Latham is a special kind of hell

Where's DLA this year?

Cravath to 190!

Has anyone heard anything about when the rankings are coming out???

Where are my Vault rankings? I thought they were supposed to be out by August 10.

seriously. what the hell, vault?!

Ditto.... why the huge delay....