Boutique Law Firms

Racial Quotas? So Ordered! (Or, Judge of the Day: Harold Baer)

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We’ve come a long way from the days when federal courts issued orders banning racial discrimination. Now federal judges hand down orders mandating, or at least encouraging, race-based discrimination.

As reported in the American Lawyer, earlier this week Judge Harold Baer (S.D.N.Y.) issued an unusual order. On Monday, Judge Baer directed two firms serving as lead counsel in a securities class action to “make every effort” to staff the case with at least one minority and one woman:

ORDERED that Co-Lead Counsel, Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd LLP and Labaton Sucharow LLP, shall make every effort to assign to this matter at least one minority lawyer and one woman lawyer with requisite experience….

If federal judges can run school districts and prison systems, law firms should be a piece of cake, right?

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Firm Seeks Experts in Alcoholic Beverages

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Usually when we report on jobs that have been posted on Craigslist, we’re talking about some kind of horrifying example of how the open market values attorneys at about the same level it values responsible high school girls. But today we have a legal job that most lawyers couldn’t have performed in high school. At the very least, one needs to be of legal drinking age to compete for this position.

The job ad is from the firm Strike & Techel. The homepage of the San Francisco-based shop claims that the firm “practices exclusively in the field of alcohol beverage law.”

So put down your tobacco and firearms, crack open a cold one, and ponder the wonders of making a living off of alcohol… and law and stuff…

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What We Talk About When We Talk About Small Law Firms

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Last week, I made the decision to jump right into the substantive portion of this column. Based on the queries and comments hitting my inbox, though, I thought I would take another shot at explaning my intentions behind this column, before returning to your regularly scheduled programming.

The following email came in earlier this week from a reader who practices at a small law firm:

Can you clarify what “small law” means? Do you mean law in a smaller city/town? Or smaller-sized firms in larger places? Or are we talking about law firms that deal with clients who have less wealth (i.e., I do divorces vs. I did Madonna’s divorce)?

Lawyers love definitional questions. So let’s get into it….

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Great Expectations? Small Firm Practice v. Biglaw Practice (Part 1)

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I graduated law school in 2006 at the same time as a close friend. We’ll call him Brian, since that’s his name. Brian went to a top five law school; I went to a… well, not a T-5. He took a Biglaw job in Manhattan; I moved home to Georgia, where I ended up in Small Law. Having used each other as sounding boards throughout law school, it only made sense that we’d continue to do so as we transitioned into our respective practices. We shared many of the same fears and growing pains. For example: Did I pass the bar exam? Am I handling this issue correctly? What work am I allowed to, or even supposed to, hand off to a paralegal/secretary?

Beyond those general issues, I was surprised at how different our worlds really were on both a macro and micro level. Most of you have heard or been a part of discussions on the general differences that Small Law is supposed to provide: better hours, less pay, more freedom, etc. I want to move past broad generalities and share some of my actual experiences as compared with Brian’s, as a means to jump start a discussion. There have been some very thoughtful comments attached to the first two posts, and I hope that trend continues here.

This will be the first of several posts dedicated to a deeper dive into the world of Small Law and how it measures up to its Biglaw counterpart. Let’s start with…

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Priorities Are a Big Deal When Moving to a Small Firm

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Welcome back to Above the Law’s coverage of small law firm practice. I was pleased with the comments and emails I received in response to Tuesday’s opening volley. After debating on the subject matter for today’s post, I decided that since Small Law attorneys are quite comfortable, often by necessity, with diving right into the deep end of things, let’s get down to brass tacks: Are there actually jobs at small law firms and, if so, what should you consider before making the switch?

The WSJ Law Blog picked up a Tuesday post from Eric Cooperstein, over at The Lawyerist, discussing one lawyer’s thoughts on the State of the Small Law Union in his home state of Minnesota:

One was a complaint about how difficult it is to attract new lawyers to join law firms in rural areas. The other was the lawyer’s prediction that in the next ten years, half the lawyers in her quarter of the state were going to retire from the practice of law.

Cooperstein follows up with his guess that this problem — or wondrous happenstance, depending on what side of the fence you find yourself — probably isn’t unique to the Gopher State. He speaks the truth. I spent my Small Law years at a firm with 20 to 25 lawyers, most of whom will retire in the next five years. In speaking with my former partners and associates, I’m told the same is true for many of their contemporaries in surrounding counties.

So what do you do if you want to be one of their replacements?

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Small Law Comes to Above the Law

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Don’t panic, you’re in the right place. This is a Small Law column on ATL — a non-sequitur to top all non-sequiturs.

This isn’t the first time Above the Law has delved into the world of small law firms, but now we’re going to attack it regularly and with passion. This column will appear on Mondays (appearing today due to the holiday) and Thursdays, as a catalyst for discussion of life in Small Law – the commonalities, the salaries, the benefits, the pitfalls, etc.

I believe that, like Biglaw, there is a certain shared culture in Small Law, one that’s part of a growing but still-fragmented dialogue in the blogosphere. It’s our hope that, in time, this column becomes a lighting rod for those who are working in Small Law — and those who want to work in Small Law. And, of course, Biglaw attorneys are welcome to stop by and express their obvious jealousy in the comments.

So who am I, and what are my qualifications? Let the judging begin…

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A Hot New Trend: Leaving Biglaw to Start Your Own Firm

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People are talking about an interesting Slate article entitled “Leaving Big Law Behind: The many frustrations that cause well-paid lawyers to hang out their own shingles.” It’s currently the most-read piece on the site. But it’s actually quite similar, even down to some of the sources, to an article that appeared a few days earlier in Crain’s New York Business:

A lawyer’s hourly billing rate used to be a badge of pride — the higher the number, the more valuable (and supposedly brilliant) the lawyer. But over the past 18 months, a strange phenomenon has been sweeping the legal arena: Partners at major law firms are quitting because they want to be able to charge less for their services.

This is, of course, not a new development. Kash and I wrote about it in a December 2009 cover story for Washingtonian magazine, in which we interviewed a former member of the $1,000-an-hour club who left a large law firm and started his own shop so he could offer clients better value. But all the recent coverage — in Crain’s, Slate, and elsewhere — suggests that the trend is picking up steam.

Which kinds of lawyers are leaving Biglaw to hang up their own shingles? Why are they doing it? And how’s it going for them?

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Musical Chairs: BuckleySandler Snags Talent from Mayer Brown

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The financial services boutique of BuckleySandler, which launched just a little over a year ago, is expanding at a rapid clip. At the time of launch, it had about 50 attorneys (most of them from the firm formerly known as BuckleyKolar); now it’s approaching 100.

The two latest hires are noteworthy. From the BLT:

BuckleySandler is continuing its push to recruit top-level lateral partners. Today, the firm brought on David Krakoff, who previously co-chaired Mayer Brown’s white collar litigation practice, and Christopher Regan, also a former Mayer Brown partner.

Let’s learn a little more about them, shall we?

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  • 15 Jun 2010 at 4:23 PM

Musical Chairs: Internet Boutique Spun Off from Sonnenschein Goes on Hiring Spree

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Back in February, we reported that Marc Zwillinger and Christian Genetski, who previously headed up the internet practice group at Sonnenschein, were leaving to start their own firm, Zwillinger Genetski LLP. The firm is only a few months old, but it’s already at seven lawyers — and growing.

The Blog of Legal Times reports:

New Internet law boutique Zwillinger Genetski is bulking up with the addition of three attorneys, including Yahoo! Inc. associate general counsel Elizabeth Banker. The new hires nearly double the size of the three-month old Washington-based firm, bringing its headcount to seven.

The usual migration is from a law firm to an in-house job (often for lifestyle reasons). But sometimes we see moves in the reverse direction. E.g., Daniel Cooperman, who went from Apple back to Bingham McCutchen; Bear Stearns refugees, who wound up at various firms.

Elizabeth Banker is just one of the three new hires at Zwillinger Genetski….

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White Guy Gets a Promotion — And Suddenly It’s News

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Here’s a headline from the ABA Journal this morning:

African-American Law Firm Elects Unusual CEO

Unusual, you say? Well, when you click on that link, aren’t you expecting something really outside the box? Maybe they picked a CEO with no private sector experience? Maybe they picked a CEO who used to be in the CIA? Maybe they picked Triumph the Insult Comic Dog? You know, something “unusual.”

But no, here’s the interesting twist to this story:

Detroit-based firm Lewis & Munday, which was founded in 1972 by David Baker Lewis and two African-American partners, named partner Blair Person as its new president and CEO this month… some might find it curious to learn that Person is white.

That’s it? A law firm elected a white guy to be CEO. That’s news? That’s unusual?

Wait, let me back up a second. Aside from the fact that black people founded the place, what the hell makes this an “African-American” law firm? I don’t think you’d see a headline in 2010 calling Wachtell a “Jewish” law firm. And what in God’s name is unusual about black owners selecting a white person to run their business? In short, what the hell is going here?

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Musical Chairs: More About Lanny Davis’s Departure from McDermott

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In yesterday’s post about the departure of D.C. power broker Lanny Davis from McDermott Will & Emery, a firm he joined a little over six months ago, we put out a request for more information. That request was promptly answered — by none other than Lanny Davis himself.

The drama lover in us was hoping for an epic tale of office intrigue and power struggle at McDermott Will (and commenters were happy to speculate). As it turns out, however, the parting of Davis and MWE is quite amicable — and far from total. As Davis explained to us, he’s setting up his own shop, but he will continue to work closely with McDermott lawyers, serving McDermott clients. In fact, Davis isn’t even leaving the building (so no office exorcism necessary).

What’s going on here? Information from our chat with Lanny Davis, plus the complete press release mentioned previously by the Washington Post, after the jump.

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When Paralegals Burn Bridges

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Here at Above the Law, we’re used to seeing funny and fiery departure memos. But the one we were forwarded last night is truly a special treat.

Here’s the set up. The memo comes out of a small firm in the Atlanta area. It was written by a paralegal — we’ll call her “Blaze of Glory.” She had some very pointed things to say about one of the associates, who we’ll call “Attila.” A partner at the firm, “My Name is Pitt,” is also referenced in the memo. All the rest of the backstory comes from a tipster:

I am told that the ENTIRE firm was blind copied when this email was sent. Now there’s only about 20 or so attorneys at this firm, however, the firm also includes about [a much larger number of] paralegals/legal assistants. A few words cannot describe this email; you just have to read the email to believe it.

Oh, this is going to be fun …

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