Remember when Biglaw associates in New York got paid more than Biglaw associates everywhere else because it costs more money to live in New York than anywhere else? Yeah, those days are long gone. A few months ago, we pointed out that the NALP buying power index ranked the purchasing power of New York associates 42nd nationwide.
Maybe you didn’t believe NALP’s numbers?
Well, today we offer more evidence that if you are an associate working and living in New York, you are a chump. You are paying a higher cost of living than anywhere else in the country, and you’re not getting paid any more for the effort. In fact, if you work at Morrison & Foerster, you might be getting a smaller bonus just because you work in New York….
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Did MoFo Just Use Cravath as an Excuse to Screw Over New York Associates?”
This morning’s news that Boies Schiller is making a mockery of the Cravath bonus scale simply reinforces the prevailing view (pace David Lat) around here that the 2011 Cravath bonus scale is fundamentally unfair.
Agreeing on this point is former Kirkland & Ellis partner Steven Harper (whose apparent pro-associate stance may make him a sort of Biglaw apostate). As Harper points out, “equity partner profit trees have resumed their growth to the sky. As the economy struggled, Cravath’s average partner profits increased to $2.7 million in 2009 and to $3.17 million in 2010 … That’s not ‘treading water.’ It’s returning to 2007 profit levels — the height of ‘amazing’ boom years that most observers had declared gone forever. Watch for 2011 profits to be even higher.”
And yet associate bonuses remain stagnant at 2009 levels. Furthermore, as ATL commenter “The Cravath Cut” is so fond of noting, when viewed as a percentage of profits, bonuses appear especially measly, at least from the associate p.o.v. (The current $7,500 market rate for first-years is just 0.23% of Cravath’s profits per partner. Back in 2007, first-year bonuses equalled 1.36%.) Despite these numbers, if history has taught us anything, it is that you can kill anyone Biglaw’s rank and file will follow Cravath’s lead.
Cravath is among the most profitable firms in the world. We thought it would be interesting to see what the implications of matching Cravath are for those firms with much lower profit margins. Which firms’ partners willingly take the biggest hit by keeping up? Are these firms arguably more “generous”? After the jump, check out those firms that pay the largest percentage of PPP in bonuses.
Continue reading “Keeping Up With the Cravathians: The Ten Most Generous (or Foolish?) Law Firms”
Do you believe in life after law? More specifically, do you believe in life after Biglaw?
Many former partners at major law firms spend their post-Biglaw years living large — as well they should. After all, they worked very hard, for many years, to amass seven-figure, eight-figure, or even nine-figure fortunes. After leaving behind the life of billing 2000+ hours a year, they finally have time to enjoy the fruits of their labor.
But not all ex-partners find themselves on Easy Street. Take, for example, these two ex-partners in California — one whose civil suit against her former firm isn’t going so well, and one who might be going from Biglaw to the Big House….
Continue reading “Bad News for Former Biglaw Partners on the West Coast”
About a year and a half ago, Morrison & Foerster unveiled an insane edgy new website, openly embracing its MoFo moniker and a new “What the MoFo?” theme. At the time, we walked you through the minefield of interactive design elements that the site offered.
Now, after what I can only guess has been a year and a half of head scratching, if not outright mockery, from clients and other lawyers, MoFo has apparently decided to abandon its $1 million design experiment in favor of a more traditional approach to law firm advertising. Gone are the brainteasers and optical illusions. Gone are the indecipherable picture puzzles.
But fear not, there is still plenty of crazy to be had. Find out all about the new “MoFo mojo” after the jump….
Continue reading “MoFo Launches New, Somewhat Less Crazy Website”
The month of August brought us a slew of disasters, both natural and otherwise. At the end of the month, we faced off against the Great D.C. Earthquake of 2011. Shortly thereafter, we got slammed by Hurricane Irene.
But August wasn’t just about natural disasters — there were plenty of man-made disasters to deal with in the legal world. From the egomaniacs to the technologically-impaired, August was full of candidates for our Lawyer of the Month competition….
Continue reading “Lawyer of the Month: August Reader Poll”
A partner at Morrison & Foerster accidentally “replied all” to an email on which “List/Attorney/All” was cc’d. Emails sent to “List/Attorney/All” go out to all 1,000-plus MoFo lawyers around the world.
What the partner wrote in the email was probably not something that should have been shared with the rest of the firm….
Continue reading “MoFo Partner Offers Cautionary Tale in Use of ‘Reply All’”
Benesch Apportunity
Law firm marketing and technology don’t always go well together. When firms try to go high-tech, the results are often mortifyingly cheesy.
To avoid humiliation, many law firms — often culturally conservative, risk-averse institutions — play it safe. But caution can also result in some of the worst law-firm websites, ones that get compared to “a seventh-grade history project” or “[s]imply a brochure placed online.”
Sometimes, however, a law firm gets tech right. Check out the new iPhone / iPad app developed by the Benesch law firm, the subject of a nice write-up in the Cleveland Plain Dealer (via Morning Docket).
What does the app, called “Benesch Apportunity,” actually do? And might other law firms want to implement similar apps?
Let’s learn more….
Continue reading “Finding a Legal Job? There’s an App for That”
Wow, it’s like White & Case’s attempt to glom on to the spring bonus trend just ticked off these other firms. First Sidley and now Morrison & Foerster have come out with real spring bonus announcements, detailing the amount of money associates can expect to get paid.
We’re running off to the We Know What You Should Do This Summer filming, so we can’t give you the full MoFo treatment. But it’s not that shocking that since O’Melveny, Latham and Gibson went with spring bonuses, MoFo kind of had to step up.
Congrats, MoFos. As one tipster put it, “Tell those bitches at GDC that Mofo makes it rain in Cali… Twenty grand, man. Plus, they gave Dude a beeper.”
Read the full memo below.
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Morrison & Foerster Matches Spring Bonuses”
On Tuesday, Ropes & Gray was sued in Manhattan federal court by a former partner, Patricia A. Martone. Martone’s lawsuit claims age discrimination, sex discrimination, retaliation, and interference with protected retirement benefits in violation of ERISA (the basis for federal jurisdiction in the S.D.N.Y.).
As you might expect from an ex-Ropes partner, Martone has some high-powered counsel: Anne Vladeck, one of New York’s top labor and employment lawyers, widely regarded as the queen of employment discrimination law. Vladeck famously (and successfully) represented Anucha Browne Sanders in her sexual harassment lawsuit against Isiah Thomas and the Knicks.
Patricia Martone is a veteran intellectual-property litigatrix, a specialist in patent litigation, with almost 40 years of practice under her belt. She made partner at Fish & Neave, the well-known patent law firm, in 1983, and then became a Ropes partner in 2005, when Ropes absorbed Fish. She’s now a partner at Morrison & Foerster, which she joined in October 2010.
Why did she leave Ropes? Let’s have a look at Patricia Martone, and her lawsuit….
Continue reading “Ropes & Gray Sued for Age and Sex Discrimination By Former Partner”
The spinning of the revolving door at the beleaguered Howrey law firm is making our heads spin here at Above the Law. Keeping track of all the partner departures is becoming quite the challenge. We’ve collected some links about the latest partner defections, after the jump.
At this rate, it’s not clear how many lawyers will be left for “rescue” by white knight Winston & Strawn. (Protip: check the armor for bedbugs.)
Here’s some new (but hardly surprising) information: Howrey has canceled its summer program. Yes, the famous Howrey Bootcamp, touted by the firm as “[f]ar more intense and rewarding than traditional summer associate programs,” and offering “an entirely unique approach to associate recruitment and training.”
Bootcamp participants received intensive litigation training — and inspirational poetry from firm CEO Robert Ruyak, which we share with you below….
Continue reading “Howreying for the Exits: More Partner Departures; Bootcamp Gets the Boot”
On Sunday, Morrison & Foerster sent around its associate bonus memo. For non-New York associates, the news is that the numbers are loosely based on the old Cravath scale, with some compression for mid-level associates. The actual bonus amount paid to any particular associate is determined based on performance factors. But in a nice show of transparency, MoFo also reported the bonus range and average bonus payment for each class year.
The numbers don’t look too bad, especially adjusting for the cost of living outside of New York City.
Inside New York City, MoFo is taking a wait-and-see approach. As we mentioned yesterday when talking about Weil, the stand-off between Cravath and Sullivan & Cromwell over spring bonuses has paralyzed the New York bonus market. For all we know, S&C is preparing to top Cravath in old-school “bonus wars” fashion.
Wisely, MoFo has decided not to get caught up in all of that drama; it’s just going to wait until New York sorts itself out. Let’s look at the memo…
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: MoFo Admits New York Is Still Too Early To Call”
Late last night, Morrison & Foerster announced its bonus structure, kind of. The firm will be matching the Cravath bonus in New York, it hopes. And it will be matching the market in other markets, whatever that market turns out to be.
You can tell that a lawyer (as opposed to a PR professional) wrote the MoFo bonus memo. There are so many caveats and opt-outs in this baby you’d think the firm was acquiring something instead of just paying a bonus.
Let’s check this baby out. There’s one memo for the New York associates and a different one that was disseminated firm wide…
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: MoFo Promises to Match, Even in Markets Where It Doesn’t Know What It Will Be Matching”
Sorry, we’re still waiting for the Biglaw bonus shoe to drop. While you wait, here’s some good news in the Biglaw benefits area (a la Proskauer’s iPad announcement).
On Wednesday, I asked: “Remember Google’s gay gross-up? Barclays is doing it too. Will law firms follow suit?”
At least one law firm is stepping up to the plate to help domestically-partnered employees with their health-benefit-related tax burdens. The firm of Morrison & Foerster issued the following statement to Above the Law, from firm chair Keith Wetmore: “Starting in 2011, Morrison & Foerster will begin offering an additional benefit payment to assist with the tax obligation that same-sex and opposite sex Staff and Non-Partner Attorneys pay when they elect Domestic Partner health benefits.”
This is excellent news, and we commend MoFo for taking this step. Hopefully it will inspire additional firms to move in this direction. Note also that the policy applies not just to same-sex couples, but also to opposite-sex couples who are similarly situated — which might be a way of addressing the criticisms of some that the gay gross-up is unfair to heterosexual couples.
Meanwhile, elsewhere in “law firms being nice to gay people” news, let’s give some props to Shearman & Sterling….
Continue reading “Biglaw Perk Watch: MoFo Takes a Stand for Fairness”
This week, after boring myself to death listening to Lillian McEwen discuss Clarence Thomas’s “activities” on Larry King, I knocked back a couple cans of Four Loko to ease the pain and got right to work on this week’s Rundown.
Lots of free stuff available after the jump, including a free e-book on legal productivity, a newsletter on social media and the law, and a whitepaper on law practice management. There’s also a website that covers the entire history of social media from way back in the day when we had Usernets and BBS, and another article on how dubious discovery could land you in the slammer.
So let’s get on with it. Here is this week’s Rundown…
Continue reading “The Rundown: This Week in Legal Technology – 10.28.10″
Before we go hard-core with the lawyerly nuptials, we must mention a couple of recent Vows columns that are worth a look. First, this offbeat pair had three children together before finally deciding, at the ages of 63 and 39, to tie the knot. And the geriatric groom sounds way too horny: “I lusted after Nina, and still do, in a very primal way.” Yuck. If you’re over 40 and not John Slattery, Pierce Brosnan, or Captain Jean-Luc Picard, we don’t want to hear about your primal lust.
Then there’s this uncomfortable write-up, in which the couple cheerfully airs a story that makes the groom sound like a massive cad at best (he “shacked up” with someone else while she was studying abroad and failed to mention that detail in the cheesy love letters he was sending her). “I’m still pretty incredulous that she’s with me,” says the wannabe-player groom. So are we.
On to this week’s slate of newlyweds, which we believe sets a new record for number of Harvard and Yale degrees:
1. Anne Catherine Savage and Zachary Podolsky
2. Elena Lalli and Guillermo Coronado
3. Caroline Lopez and Nicholas Miranda
4. Alexandra Denniston and Caleb Schillinger
Read more about these couples — and vote for your favorite — after the jump.
Continue reading “Legal Eagle Wedding Watch: Badgered”
You know how violent felons treat pedophiles particularly bad in the prison system? I wonder if fraudsters reserve special scorn for people who use their disabled children as part of the scam? A former partner at Morrison & Foerster may soon find out. He’s been arrested for defrauding the state of California out of hundreds of thousands of dollars by way of scam utilizing his autistic kid. The San Francisco Chronicle reports:
A former partner at a well-known law firm and his marketing consultant wife were arrested Wednesday on felony charges of bilking the San Francisco school district and private insurers out of about $400,000 via fraudulent bills for treatment of their autistic son, officials say.
The San Francisco couple, Jonathan S. Dickstein and Barclay J. Lynn, both 43, surrendered Wednesday and are expected to appear in court this morning for arraignment on 30 counts of fraud, theft and conspiracy, authorities say.
We can and will blame the alleged perpetrators of this fraud. But where was the government oversight?
Continue reading “Former MoFo Partner Accused of Major Fraud”
With the summer coming to an end, we are almost done updating the summer associate profiles for all the firms listed in the Career Center. Along with Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman and WilmerHale, Morrison & Foerster was another one of the firms that encouraged their 2010 summer associates to share their experience with us.
Summer associates at MoFo definitely noticed the amount of transparency at the firm and appreciated how the firm “openly communicate[s] with summers regarding expectations.” If you end up summering at MoFo, don’t be surprised if you get to discuss regulatory matters with clients or draft portions of a brief about to be submitted to the U.S. Supreme Court. While every assignment may not involve earth-shattering issues, summer associates are given the opportunity to participate on various pro bono matters throughout the summer.
When MoFo summer associates aren’t busy selecting assignments in different practice areas or attending training sessions, they get to experience “just the right amount of social events to provide a contrast to the work.” In 2010, summer associates would end the workday sailing the Chesapeake Bay, mediating with a Zen Monk, or touring the Museum of Modern Art. In addition to real work experience and quality social events, MoFo had a not-too-shabby offer rate of almost 100% for the 2009 summer class.
Get more details about the summer associate experience at MoFo and other firms by going to the Career Center. Keep an eye out for future posts as we will be publishing the rest of the summer associate survey results in the next week or so.
We’re rolling through the Vault 2011 list of the “prestigiest” firms in the land, so that you can comment on what it’s like to actually live, work, and breathe those firms (when you’re not choking on all the prestige in the air).
We’ve covered #1-10 and #11-20. Here’s the next round-up. Now it’s time for the London-based Magic Circle firms to join in the elite fun:
21. Arnold & Porter
22. Shearman & Sterling
23. Boies, Schiller & Flexner
24. O’Melveny & Myers
25. Ropes & Gray
26. Morrison & Foerster
27. Munger, Tolles & Olson
28. Hogan Lovells
29. Clifford Chance
30. Linklaters
What do associates have to say about the ups and downs of life at these firms? Here are some excerpts from their Vault listings…
Continue reading “Fall Recruiting Open Threads: Vault 21 – 30 (2011)”
Lawyers have been all up in The Tonight Show’s grill this year, thanks to the Jay Leno – Conan O’Brien smackdown. But the lawyers were relegated to an off-screen role. Jay Leno never name-checked Gibson Dunn (that we know of) for repping NBC and helping to put him back on his throne.
Another Biglaw firm did get a shout-out from Leno on Monday night, though. During his headlines bit, Leno got laughs thanks to Morrison & Foerster.
What funny business did they get up to?
Continue reading “Jay Leno Drops a MoFo”
Alfred Steiner, artist and MoFo associate
Morrison & Foerster tends to attract quirky types. The firm is demonstrably offbeat, from its mildly bizarre website to its embracing the moniker “MoFo.” So we were not particularly surprised when an artist type auctioning off a piece of conceptual art on eBay turned out to be a lawyer from the firm.
Alfred Steiner is a tech and IP lawyer in MoFo’s New York office. He described the piece to us thusly:
In a conceptually reductive context where works are increasingly defined more by an agreement between artist and collector (whether written or oral, tacit or explicit) than by the tangible manifestation of the work itself, what would a work become if it were reduced to be coextensive with that agreement, that is, if that agreement were the work itself?
Yup, the piece of art is a contract. What we were surprised by was how much a contract from a Morrison & Foerster attorney went for on eBay…
Continue reading “A MoFo Attorney Tries to Capitalize on the Art of Contract Law”
