Last week’s column was not intended for a particular group, other than those who enter the world of Biglaw and then wonder what has become of their work/life balance. Some accused me of whining. If that is how you comprehended my message, it speaks to a lack of either comprehension on your part, or writing talent on my part. I was not complaining, I was preaching — or trying to preach. I receive so many letters from young (inexperienced) attorneys and law students asking me about the mythical work/life balance that I took the opportunity to blow off some steam in an attempt to speak truth. I feel that I may not have been thorough, and want to further elucidate (bloviate).
Biglaw
- Associate Advice, Associate Salaries, Biglaw, General Counsel, In-House Counsel, In-house counseling
House Rules: You Talking To Me?
By David Mowry- Biglaw, Lateral Moves, Litigators, Musical Chairs, Partner Issues, Quinn Emanuel, Vicious Infighting, Weil Gotshal
Musical Chairs: Quinn Emanuel Snags Two Weil Gotshal Partners — and Weil Is Not Happy About It
By David LatTwo litigation partners in the Washington office of Weil Gotshal, Michael Lyle and Eric Lyttle, have left Weil to join the D.C. office of Quinn Emanuel. Lyle, a successful trial lawyer who also worked in the White House during the Clinton Administration, was particularly prominent at Weil Gotshal: he served as managing partner of the D.C. office and was a member of the firm’s management committee.
Quinn Emanuel has been on a lateral hiring tear, so it’s not exactly shocking when they lure stars away from other firms. And QE’s Washington office has been particularly active on the hiring front. Just last month, for example, they hired a longtime federal prosecutor, Sam Sheldon, deputy chief of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section, out of the Justice Department.
So here’s what is especially interesting about the Lyle and Lyttle departures: how Weil reacted to the news. Let’s just say Weil didn’t take it sitting down….
- Akin Gump, Antonin Scalia, Biglaw, Clarence Thomas, Fried Frank, Insider Trading, Morning Docket, SCOTUS, Student Loans, Supreme Court, Tax Law, Yale Law School
Morning Docket: 04.17.13
By Staci Zaretsky* “Yes, it is true.” Justice Scalia admitted in a speech this week that he was guided to the right by his colleague, Justice Thomas, who’s apparently “a very stubborn man.” [Wall Street Journal (sub. req.)]
* It’s about time to say so long to your ticking tax time bomb: in President Obama’s proposed budget for 2014, he eliminates taxes on forgiven loan debt under all IBR plans. [Bucks / New York Times]
* “I am the luckiest man in the world.” Larry Macon, an Akin Gump partner from Texas, had nearly finished the Boston Marathon when the bombs exploded, but lived to tell his tale. [Am Law Daily]
* Because sometimes you need to steal $374K worth of copy toner. This ex-Fried Frank staffer pleaded guilty to grand larceny, and is looking at up to 15 years in jail. [Thomson Reuters News & Insight]
* Judge Victor Marrero isn’t a fan of SEC policy, but when it comes to this civil insider trading case, SAC Capital may get to walk away without admitting or denying anything. [DealBook / New York Times]
* This Yale Law graduate is suing Brooks Brothers over a three-button suit, and wants $2K for the 90 minutes he spent arguing over it in the store. Who is the $1333/hour man? [New York Daily News]
Personal email accounts introduce possible threats to firm computers. A careless employee could open a trojan horse attachment and unleash a virus on the system. Even if the attack only infects the local drive, confidential information may be at risk.
This puts firms in a bind. Either invest time and energy teaching basic Internet skills to their employees — lessons like, “don’t open attachments from unknown email addresses” — that most of us learned when we still had Prodigy emails, or condescendingly cut off access to a modern necessity because the employees are too hopeless to understand the rules.
Yesterday, a major law firm chose the latter route…
Continue reading “You’ve Got (No) Mail! Major Law Firm Blocks Employee Email Access”
Biglaw competition is getting intense. Everyone is chasing the same clients, while also deploying rearguard actions to protect institutional clients from being poached. Forget about lateral partners taking clients for a moment. I am talking about overt approaches from competing firms regarding existing matters, bearing promises of handling things more cheaply and more efficiently. In-house lawyers, under pressure to contain costs, almost have to listen. They may not act right away, but with each such approach another dent has been made in the Biglaw client-maintenance bumper.
It is no secret that in the face of declining overall demand (especially for the profit-pumping activities like mega-document reviews that were Biglaw’s joy to perform in the past), firms need to aggressively protect market share. While also seeking to grow market share. In an environment where more and more large clients are either (1) reducing the number of firms that they are willing to assign work to or (2) embracing an approach that finds no beauty contest too distasteful to engage in. So partners, at least those tasked with finding work for everyone to do, are falling back on a tried-and-true “sales approach” — putting things on sale.
How bad has it gotten?
- Bankruptcy, Biglaw, Debevoise & Plimpton, Dechert, Disasters / Emergencies, Divorce Train Wrecks, Edwards Wildman, Foley & Lardner, Guns / Firearms, Job Searches, Law Schools, Litigatrix, McDermott Will & Emery, Morning Docket, Ropes & Gray, SCOTUS, Supreme Court
Morning Docket: 04.16.13
By Staci Zaretsky* The justices of the Supreme Court gave a thumbs down to hearing a challenge to New York’s “de facto ban” on carrying guns in public, prompting members of the National Rifle Association to poop their pants. [New York Times]
* Now that Mary Jo White is the chief of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Debevoise has picked her successor to act as co-chair of the litigation department. Congratulations go out to Mary Beth Hogan. [DealBook / New York Times]
* In its latest court filings, Ropes & Gray explains why failing to give its “token black associate” a recommendation letter wasn’t an act of retaliation. That’ll surely be an interesting read. [Am Law Daily]
* A former client sues a major law firm, raising fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, and other claims. [Bailey & Glasser (press release and complaint)]
* Boston Biglaw firms — like Dechert, Edwards Wildman, and Foley & Lardner — were “really shaken” by yesterday’s blasts, but report that all employees are safe and accounted for. [National Law Journal]
* Six out of 10 of the 4,967 class of 2012 graduates from New York’s law schools were able to find full-time, long-term positions as lawyers nine months after graduation. Yay? [New York Law Journal]
* Secrets, secrets are no fun; secrets, secrets hurt… someone’s wallet. Sorry, Jamie McCourt, but all of the secret MLB documents concerning the Dodgers’ $2 billion sale will remain secret. [Bloomberg]
- Biglaw, Boutique Law Firms, Intellectual Property, Lateral Moves, Musical Chairs, Partner Issues, Partner Profits, Small Law Firms, Trademarks
Five Trademark Lawyers Take Leave of Finnegan Henderson
By David LatLateral partner movement continues in the world of intellectual property law. As we noted in Morning Docket, four partners and one of counsel are departing from Finnegan Henderson, one of the leading IP-only firms in the country.
Where are they going? What else is going on over at Finnegan? And what does the future hold for large, IP-focused law firms like Finnegan?
Continue reading “Five Trademark Lawyers Take Leave of Finnegan Henderson”
Go ahead and queue up the Luther Vandross, because we’ve reached the thrilling conclusion of our annual ATL March Madness.
Our newly expanded tournament pitted 32 teams in the hunt to be declared the law firm with the brightest future. After a string of close calls and upsets, it came down to second-seeded Paul, Weiss against fourth-seeded Gibson Dunn, the spunky underdog who’d knocked off the overall top seed Wachtell.
So who won?
Continue reading “ATL March Madness: The Law Firm With the Brightest Future — Champion”
Here’s one great benefit of blogging: Publishers send you free copies of books, hoping that you’ll review them!
I received and read, but now choose not to review, Steven J. Harper’s valuable new contribution to the literature: The Lawyer Bubble: A Profession In Crisis (affiliate link).
I’m not reviewing the book, but instead using it as a jumping-off point to discuss a tangent. Harper explains in his book two things that every sentient lawyer has noticed over the past several years: (1) students are graduating from law school buried under a mountain of debt, and many of those students can’t find jobs, and (2) many law firms have lost sight of the law’s noble history as a learned profession and are now obsessed with maximizing their profits per partner in the coming year.
Harper’s right about these things, of course, and this isn’t exactly late-breaking news to anyone who’s been following either Above the Law or Harper’s blog, The Belly of the Beast, for the last few years. Harper’s book advances the discussion, however, by exploring these issues in more detail than others have. He also proposes possible solutions to these problems, including “allowing the federal government to recover [law school loan] guarantees from a law school (and its university) whenever a student loan became the principal contributor to an alumnus’s later bankruptcy.” (Page 159.) Or encouraging law firms to release their “Working Culture Index,” which would show the percentage of lawyers billing more than 2000, 2100, 2200, 2300, 2400, and 2500 in the previous year (perhaps with separate totals being released for partners and associates). (Page 173.)
These ideas are well worth discussing, and I’m glad that Harper has taken the time to analyze these things. But I have another topic to highlight, which is an odd tangent to Harper’s two issues . . . .
Continue reading “Inside Straight: Beyond The Lawyer Bubble”
- Biglaw, Boutique Law Firms, Deaths, Department of Justice, Intellectual Property, Job Searches, Law Professors, Law Schools, Morning Docket, Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe, Paralegals, SCOTUS, Sexual Harassment, Supreme Court
Morning Docket: 04.15.13
By Staci Zaretsky‘Do you seriously expect me to feed you?’
* An attorney from Orrick with two SCOTUS clerkships under his belt will now be arguing a case before the high court. Seems standard, but the exciting part is that this guy’s still an associate. Congratulations! [Am Law Daily]
* From Biglaw to Boutique, the Finnegan edition: five IP lawyers, including a member of the firm’s management committee, will be starting their own practice. We may have more on this later. [Thomson Reuters News & Insight]
* Calling all wannabe government lawyers! Screw the sequester; the Department of Justice is planning to add more than 100 positions in 2014. Let’s hope these budget requests are approved. [Legal Times]
* “I actually felt sick working him for him.” If you were a paralegal and your boss was allegedly trying to recruit you to be his “third wife,” you’d feel the same. Expect more on this on this later. [New York Post]
* Here are 25 Northeast law schools ranked by employment rate. At least my school wasn’t ranked dead last on this list, and that’s something to be excited about… right? [Boston Business Journal]
* Maybe more people will care about law schools when their credit ratings tank. Speaking of which, thanks to a 14% drop in enrollment, Standard & Poor’s has downgraded Albany Law. [Times Union]
* Joseph Feller, an environmentalist and beloved professor at ASU College of Law, RIP. [ASU Law]
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Digital Canary in the Virtual Mine #2: What’s In Your Apps? Prying Eyes Are Ready To Discover . . .
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