this is why firms shouldn't do stealth layoffs. you avoid a big pr hit upfront, but people are going to notice when the dude down the hall disappears off the face of the earth.

Once again, 操所有擂奥夫人的所的大爷

And what fool is going to believe a thing they have to say, other than the "for now" comment. Ass wipers, all of them, ass wipers.

Not disclosing the number of layoffs is actually pretty disrespectful to the associates involved. In most of my post-interview layoffs, potential employers are pretty interested in the number of attorneys that were let go. The larger the number, the better it looks. Of course, this only works if the firm has laid off many associates, but I strongly suspect that this is the case at Winston.

But at least Winston actually admitted to layoffs and used that actual word. That's more than we can say for a lot of other firms.

“Out of respect for the individuals involved, we won’t publicly disclose either future layoffs or past layoff numbers.”

WTF does that mean?! Are they dead that W&S doesn't want to speak (ill) of them?

I think I'll try injecting that into my daily life. "Out of respect for the individuals involved, I won't publicly disclose either future sexual affairs or past mistress numbers." I like that... think it'll work?

It's Psyche, you race baiting bar flunker.

2 - pr hit. that's a good one. you associates who think that a law firm's reputation in the law school community matters one lick are crazy. a donkey could do your job, and our clients don't want you around.

Far from a peer firm, W&S gets a hearty acknowledgement from yours truly for being one of the first adopters of my hybrid tough love model. As this meeting demonstrated, W&S's implementation of my hybrid tough love model has enabled them to stay afloat without the need to further reduce salaries or personnel. This is a true testament that my hybrid tough love model is an effective way to preserve a firm's economic viability while ensuring a prosperous future. Kudos are in order for the management of W&S. Well done lads.

#3 is hilarious. Recruiters and many firms wouldn't touch you unless your firm announced economic layoffs. The only one getting respect in this choice is the firm.

#5 is just stupid.

Did the Canadian Inuit hunters finally track and kill the Mystical Walrus?

any insider guesses as to numbers?

I'm getting numerous resumes from laid-off biglaw associates. I throw them all away.

Sike?

7,

This post was by Lat, not Elie. So, the error is that much more noteworthy.

13,

Everybody is throwing resumes away whether from ex-biglaw associates or not -- nobody is hiring so why hold onto a resume regardless who sends it to you?

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Perhaps W&S nearly hit the wall in the downturn? And so they had to lose a lot of people real fast. That's why they won't disclose the numbers, it would show how bad things had got?

Any W&S insiders want to give an estimate on departures over the last year?

Perhaps W&S nearly hit the wall in the downturn? And so they had to lose a lot of people real fast. That's why they won't disclose the numbers, it would show how bad things had got?

Any W&S insiders want to give an estimate on departures over the last year?

4- how is ass wiper a derogatory label? Isn't being an ass wiper much better (at the very least, much cleaner) than the alternative?

17

you won the prize- an ip ban

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Was there a box of Krispy Kremes at least??? Dunkin Donuts Munchkin Holes usually means trouble.

According to NALP, the W&S Charlotte office's corporate group had 10 partners and 18 associates/other lawyers on February 1, 2009. According to the W&S site, the Charlotte office's corporate group now has 10 partners and 9 associates. Either W&S has cut deep, or they are experiencing crazy attrition without replacement in a down economy.

A mystery meeting that was hyped over the weekend only to completely and utterly fail to deliver anything newsworthy. No updates on summer associate offer rates, continued deferments or anything else that remotely matters to associates/recent grads/pathetic law students?

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8 - A donkey is literally doing your job. I saw your wife in a donkey show last weekend in TJ. She seemed more pleased with the donkey's performance, than yours.

-Associate

This is why I love this site.

Keep it coming....

Da Spelunker

I like how associates who get laid off pretend their performance had nothing to do with it. As if performance was completely irrelevant to the decision. Like firms use a random number generator to decide who gets laid off.

If you got laid off, you were bottom 3, 5, 10, whatever%.

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@22 = Roxy Mao

I said what what?

26 and his sophomoric ilk--

Nice gay slurs, which I would most likely diagnose as the product of a megalomaniac, self-righteous schadenfreude brought about by a sub-par FTT education. Your failure to contribute anything meaningful to this forum is a symptom of the secret-handshaking, incestuous anti-meritocracy the legal "profession" has become.

Might I suggest the Westboro Baptist Church as a better forum for your asinine, ad hominem tripe? I believe ex-Rev. Fred Phelps gives a prize to his 70th follower.

@33 =racist

29 -

To a certain extent you are right. I doubt any "rising stars" have been laid off.

But on the other hand, firms tend to have a few people who bill insane hours, who manage to bring in clients early on, and are really "rising stars" (say, about 10% of associates). Then they tend to have a "glut" of about 80% of the associates who bill similar hours, show similar levels of dedication, and eek by without an extraneous effort (which is not a bad thing, per se, because the "required" effort at many large firms leaves little room for "extraneous" effort). Then there always tend to be the bottom 10% laggards. These people tend to perform well enough to make it through a good performance review or two (in good economic times) because their work is solid, but they always seem to come up about 10 or 20 hours short per month. They also never set foot in the office unless they absolutely HAVE to, and they go to great lengths to avoid partners, etc . . .

In a good economic climate, the bottom-10% people tend to be "asked to find other work" over time. But it is a gradual process. THe middle 80% tend to either wander elsewhere on their own after 3 - 5 years, or eventually are given the "hint" that partnership is in their future. The top 10% people are the ones from whom partners are generally tapped.

My point to you is that beyond the obvious "dead weight" bottom 10% people, when layoffs mount, there usually are semi-"random" firings. When the head of corporate needs to make a 25% reduction, he'll knock out the bottom 10%, and then basically use (what may be) worthless indicators of who else to cut. Maybe someone took a 2-week vacation this month after 15-months straight -- but that person now looks like a prime target. Maybe someone did something "stupid" 2 years ago at a cocktail party, and that stands out in the firing partner's brain. Or maybe, a mediocre attorney is deeply entrenched in that partner's biggest case, and to retain them, the partner would rather fire a better attorney who hasn't had much work lately.

All I am saying is this:
Sure, many of the laid-off attorneys were under-performers. But in these economic times, with mass layoffs everywhere, it is idiotic to assume that every laid off attorney was "bottom of the barrel."

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lol @ 35,

protest much? look, if you got laid off you were clearly at the bottom. that's how firms decide who to layoff. they rank the associates and pick the bottom x.

That's why no one wants to hire you. You attended biglaw U and wound up bottom x%.

I thought Lat was the fat African American one.

37-

First off, I am not laid off, but I know many good attorneys who have been.

Second off, you honestly believe that when firms "rank" associates for the slaughter there is not, at least to some substantial degree, a bit of arbitrariness? Are you nuts? Have you ever worked in a large law firm?

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29 is kind of right. Big firms generally did not lay off their most valued associates or service partners. But they may have laid off associates with fantastic potential who, for one reason or another, had not begun to demonstrate. A senior partner at Cravath once told me that it took about 5 years to figure out who might be good.

Also, people could have simply been in the wrong department.

Not everybody who was laid off was not a lawyer with poor potential or performance. On the other hand that is the way headhunters and potential employers (there are none) view it. To that extent 29 was right.

39, it's no more arbitrary than grades at law school.

bottom line is this - you got the biglaw job because you were top x% at law school. You lost it because you were bottom x% at biglaw. bottom x% at biglaw makes your prior top x% performance irrelevant.

Stop fighting what is a very basic and indisputable point. If you were one of the 10% who got laid off, the firm didn't want you as much as it wanted the 90% it kept. In light of that, how dare you ask another firm to take you?

Take the severance and unemployment and go have some fun, that is if you gunners actually have a hobby outside of working.

"Can't we all.... just..... get a schlong?"

Lat

42-

You are hilarious.

So should laid off attorneys just jump off a building then?

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Law firms love to use their probono initiatives to tell others how to live. These same firms, however, can't meet these standards when it comes to how they treat their own employees. Law schools are equally hypocritical.

agree with 45, chill out 42, you are taking yourself and your BigLaw badge of honor a little too seriously

Not 45

41- I agree that it can be a little arbitrary and luck can play a huge factor

But there are lots of warning signs, and people that get laid off often don't see the warning signs and don't have a good sense of survival.

We could see the signs coming at my place for a while, and virtually everyone who was laid off should have seen it coming. My firm is not massive, so it was admittedly a little easier to predict who was going to go than it might be at some larger places.

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14, I agree.

Lat--it's "psych!" or "psyche!", as in "you just got psyched-out," not "sike."

An exceedingly rare FAIL by Lat.

42 - I don't know why I'm even jumping into this argument, as it looks like you and some of the other posters (that is, if you're not the same person as 29) are posting things just to piss people off, but here goes. For the record, there are many reasons why a firm could decide that it doesn't want people that don't have a lot to do with that attorney's individual performance. For example, a firm doesn't want attorneys is a extra slow practice group sitting around doing nothing. So they'll make deep cuts in that practice group. Sure, the partners will pick a couple of superstars or favorites to stay, but a large number of good-to-great performers will be asked to leave if there is little work for them to do. Firms may also decide that they don't want a lot of associates in a branch office that is doing poorly. So more associates from that office will be canned than from the main office or other offices that are profitable - even though these attorneys may be similar or better performers than people in other offices. Someone already stated this, but I can think of several cases where good associates were laid off because they didn't have a strong caseload at the time (not through any fault of their own, but through situations where cases settled and the partners didn't bring in any work to replace it) and other associates, who were similar performers, are still at the firm because they had active cases where the parnters still needed them.

Look, I don't think anyone is saying that there were a lot of superstars laid off, even in this economy. But to suggest that the associates laid off were automatically in the bottom 10% of the firm as a whole, and the remaining 90% are better attorneys, is preposterous. Particularly when partners at my firm went around announcing that one pratice group was so busy that they were keeping even the poorest performers, while good associates in other groups were being laid off.

Firms have very few superstars, and very few people are going to fit the mold of a partner at a large law firm. As a general rule, most of us won't be legal superstars. If you think that you are one simply because you're still employed, there's a good chance that you are wrong. The problem is that just because some of these people weren't superstars at their first firm they ever went to doesn't mean that they should never be able to work in the legal field again - particularly when a large law firm turns out to be a bad fit for so many people. Corporations seem to understand that different companies and positions fit different people. I don't understand why many in the legal field can't grasp this concept as well.

Lat is gay
Elie is fat

Why aren't they allowing comments on the ATL Rooftop party thread.

I want to make fun of all the weirdos and ugly people in the pictures.

Gah. I forgot a "?" at the end of the first sentence in my post.

-54.

WE NEED COMMENTS TO THE SLIDESHOW THREAD!!

Kash, you still got it.

49 - I don't think that the problem was that people didn't see the warning signs. I think the problem was that even with the warning signs, there weren't a lot of places to go. Calls from recruiters dried up for me in the spring of 2008, and although I was applying to other firms and places, nothing had worked out by the time the firm told me I was finished. Believe me, I wasn't hanging around that place, thinking that I was going to make partner.

No, it's "sike":

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=sike

Try Googling "psych!" (with an exclamation point). One of the top results is the Urban Dictionary entry for "sike."

42 = Still a law student and probably the kind of person who hid books in the library at school because "it's all about the rankings."

Office politics play a part in all firms, and arguably even moreso at large firms where one doesn't work with everyone on a day to day basis. The idea that you can "rank" associates in a firm in any sort of meaningful way is silly. Of course nearly all firms do some ranking in terms of production numbers, but that's a far cry from any claim of quality.

20, you have a point. I should have said ass sucker. WS is a total bullshit firm. I've worked with partners there for over 35 years. Some of them are good, but many are just pure shit. As for the associates, as near as I can tell they never let them out of the box.

When the slang term "sike" in New York in the 1970s, it was spelled the way Lat spelled it. Only douchebags would argue about whether a slang term is spelled correctly. It's slang.

I hate lawyers so much...

3, 22, stop posting in gibberish.

Is Kash in the blue shirt?

I take it that Elie is in the black suit with light pink shirt, yes?

@63 - Yes. Mystal is the fat dude in a men's wearhouse suit eating the person next to him.

Kash has put on a little weight? Still kute, but maybe should hit the real tennis court instead. Or, perhaps Elie is fattening her up for the holidays?

I like a little "chunk" in my "bunk."

Know w't I mean

to 56--Yes, it would be nice to comment on the slide-show, but ATL seems to disable comments on threads that involve its sponsors.

So, we have to use other threads to do that.

finally grown -ups posting here. thank you 52 and 59

@68 =racist grownup

Who moved my $160k?

Truestory #1: Layoffs in Chicago have over the course of a year amounted to about 20% of attorneys in the office (even some equity partners were forced out)

Truestory #2: Winston doesn't like to admit that the economy has caused the layoffs. Instead they choke the hours of associates they want to get rid of and then tell them that they weren't billing enough hours.

Truestory # 3: One summer associate who used the n--- word and made other inappropriate racial remarks in front of other attorneys was given an offer. Firmwide offer rate was about 60% with some offices going well below 50%.

Truestory #4: There is a prominent litigation partner who likes to come to work drunk and then berate his litigation associates.

This is exactly what Latham did before they sent a TON of first year attorneys packing.

52 refuses to face the truth ==> only the worst got canned.

24, I don't know about the Charlotte office, but I heard from a friend that they leave profiles up for some time after laidoff attorneys depart. Fifty percent seems steep, but there could be more it seems.

Any summers from last year have any insight on layoffs in overseas offices?

Agreed 73. It's just a coincidence that a disproportionate number were in securities, m&a, corporate, etc.

Fool.

A clear, cogent, and concise analysis...but please tell me - how does this affect the babysitting law practice group at WILDMAN HARROLD?

No, 65, Kash is still just right. If she looks different than before it's just Mystal's gravity hitting her relativity-style.

this would never happen at WILDMAN HARROLD!!

74,

A lot of firms are leaving the profiles of departed attorneys up. They are doing this in order to hide the effect of the recession on their practices. However, it is not without some risk to the firms. Thelen (RIP) was sued for doing just this by an associate who had left the firm. (The claim was that the firm had harmed the associate by misrepresenting his or her affiliation with the firm.) I heard the associate got a settlement. Plus, this is not a claim that would be released as part of a severance package, as the claim would not accrue until after you left and the firm kept your profile up.

Who knows, it might be a good way to add to your severance package?

Latham was worse than this.

"You People"

--- Don Draper

Did they lay-off an monkey fucking scribes?

Did they lay-off any monkey fucking scribes?

i think the meeting although boring was a nice gesture - if you dont like it here quit.

i think the meeting although boring was a nice gesture - if you dont like it here quit.

71. Awesome sauce.

I think I know who you're talking about. And yes, it's hilarious.

71. Awesome sauce.

I think I know who you're talking about. And yes, it's hilarious.

The monkey scribe guy is a real estate partner now.

57-
That is a very good point and I was in the same boat. By the end of 2008 I was pretty sure I was on the chopping block (last hired, first fired in economic meltdown- don't forget the plight of laterals who had no real chance to make the correct impression on the right people in the absence of a steady dealflow). However, being in NYC, there were not a whole lot of options at the time other than praying I would be spared. I wasn't. I recently started doing something a little different and so far, so good. But, it's a rough world out there.

88 - Every single person that was let go in my satellite office was a lateral or a transfer from another one of the firm's offices. No joke. In some offices of some firms, the loyalty is always to the associates who summered at that office and started there as first-years. Obviously, there are reasons for this, but I honestly can't believe that there were serious performance problems with every single lateral or transfer. If there were, clearly the firm needs to work on lateral interviewing skills and should just stop allowing associate transfers period.

71,

If there have been 20% layoffs in the Chicago office, then W&S is hurting real bad.

What is going on at Paul Hastings?

20% sounds high, but not that much higher than other big chicago firms.

How is keeping salaries down at a "freeze" level (2nd years making $160k) "competitive? Or are they "unfreezing"? What are they paying first years?

It doesn't seem to have been noted, but W&S started the layoffs back in January 2009. At the time they told the laid off partners and associates (and even support staff) it was performance-based and not that not the truth, which was that it was they brought in way too many people at once. It is nice to hear they finally admitted that it was layoffs and economic factors that led to a lot of people losing their jobs all of a sudden.

(Was one of the laid off corporate associates; ended up moving to Tokyo with her spouse who graduated from b-school and landed a gig at a bank - now studying Japanese for a year since there seems to be no jobs to pursue in America or Japan)

Well, 94, at least you'll have something really interesting to put on your resume - and you can probably cover up the layoff quite nicely because it will look like you just moved to be with your spouse. W&S isn't the only firm pulling this stuff. I know that my old firm has started picking off people one by one again - after a brief lull for the summer program. Hopefully, all of these types of firms will eventually be exposed.

Here's a fact for you. According to Winston's NALP Directory page, in February 2009 the Chicago office claimed 277 associates and 194 partners. Currently, their website shows Chicago has 193 associates and 180 partners (and that's not accounting for people who may have been laid-off but still have bios on the page). That means the Chicago office alone is down at least 98 attorneys. That's a 20% reduction of their attorney numbers. Scary, folks. Scary.

3 Geeks and a Law Blog has their own take on ATL articles like this:

http://www.geeklawblog.com/2009/10/are-above-law-and-law-shucks-layoff.html

Unlike at normal firms, Latham NY did not keep top performors but kept top douchebag suckups who fake billed hours and went to TTT schools but had a connection or sucked it really really hard. Also, it randomly fired 50% of their unassigned associates - they laid of people they had to rehire afterwards because clients told them to, that's how random it was. What a horribly managed firm. It makes sense that it fall out of top 25 or even top 50 next year. It's crouching along based on its old reputation and few partners, but most will move on once market stabilizes. Die, rats of New York.

Currently there are no first years because all the first years got deferred to January. But pay is supposed to be 160k.

Not sure, but I think the NALP numbers include summer associates. Since firm websites obviously do not include summers, you'd have to subtract the number of summers to get the right number.

scratch that.

36 - Lat didn't pick Elie, We the Readers picked Elie (in a blogging competition called "ATL Idol").

60 -70 Associates February 2009
30 - 40 Partners August 2009

Not a good thing, and 60 or so secretaries since May 2009.

60 -70 Associates February 2009
30 - 40 Partners August 2009

Not a good thing, and 60 or so secretaries since May 2009.