Firm Announces They Will Announce Raises... On Thursday
This pre-announcement may not be good news for associates.
You’re a law firm, not Taylor Swift. You don’t need to pre-announce that you’ll be making announcements.
Maybe that’s too harsh. Perhaps the firm, Venable, just wanted to dispel any speculation that it couldn’t get its act together as soon as possible, but didn’t want to make an official announcement until it could line up a firm-sponsored cocktail party to honor the associates for their accomplishments.
Or maybe they just hope the media sates its appetite for raise stories today before unveiling less-than-attractive senior raises on Thursday.
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Here’s what we’ve heard so far:
* The firm will raise the first-year salary to $180K — that’s good.
* The firm will raise salaries for second-years and above — that’s… good, but by how much?
* All salary adjustments will take effect on January 1, 2017 — [RECORD SCRATCH]
Wha? January?!? We’ve trolled the firms who tried to push the effective date of these raises off until September, but January is ridiculous.
Remember that our last “angry associates” round up raised the spectre of a firm hoping to gather the good press of a $180K match while compressing associate salaries up the line:
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Mid level and senior associates at Venable are definitely concerned about a Reed Smith type situation happening here. We only raised to market for juniors a few years ago, but the rest of the compression situation is frustrating. No raises here yet, but if they do, I’m guessing the email will look a lot like Reed Smith’s. Frustrating especially watching Steptoe raise today.
We’ll have to wait and see whether or not these fears are realized on Thursday.
Until then, it’s safe to say that if Venable hoped to put its associates at ease with this pre-announcement, they failed.
Remember, when your firm matches, please text us (646-820-8477) or email us (subject line: “[Firm Name] Matches Cravath”). Please include the memo if available. You can take a photo of the memo and send it via text or email if you don’t want to forward the original PDF or Word file.
Earlier: Angry Associates Ask ‘Where’s My Money?’
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Joe Patrice is an editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news.
