Start Dates

Quinn Defers Half of the Incoming First Years in S.F. & Silicon Valley

By

Quinn logo.jpgIf you are an incoming first year at Quinn Emanuel’s San Francisco or Silicon Valley office, you are probably on the final stretch of your CA bar exam preparations. If so, please stop reading this post right now. We don’t want to put any extra pressure on you guys.
For everybody else, you might be interested to know that Quinn Emanuel has deferred half of its incoming first year class in those two offices until January 2010.
As we understand it, the firm is not offering any kind of deferral stipend for the affected incoming associates.
Tipsters have been critical of the firm’s decision:

This is a double whammy. First, they hadn’t been deferred at all, were planning on starting in two months, so this is late notice. And second, telling people one week before the bar?!?!? that’s cold.

Well, it’s better than being told between the first and second day of the bar exam.
After the jump, Quinn Emanuel’s managing partner, John Quinn, explains the reason for this decision.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Quinn Defers Half of the Incoming First Years in S.F. & Silicon Valley”

Sign up for the Above the Law newsletter

Subscribe to our free daily email and get breaking news, commentary, and opinions on law firms, lawyers, law schools, lawsuits, judges, and more.

Weil Gotshal Defers Current Summer Associates to 2011 or 2012

By

Weil.gifBig news from Weil Gotshal today. The firm previously deferred its incoming associates to January 2010, with the option of deferring until January 2011 (with a $75,000 stipend).
In recognition of the fact that it will have some of the class of 2009 starting in January 2011, the firm is offering current summers — i.e., the class of 2010 — the option of deferring until January 2012. Above the Law received the following statement from Weil Gotshal:

Earlier today, we informed our 2009 summer associates of the following:
* We are offering each summer associate who receives an offer of permanent employment at the conclusion of this year’s Summer Program the option of deferring his or her start date from January 2011 to January 2012.
* Each incoming associate electing to defer will receive a $75,000 stipend and health care benefits. In order to receive this stipend, the deferring associate must spend 1,000 hours during the deferral year performing some form of Firm-approved public service work in the US or abroad, including interning for a judge, or working for a Firm client.
* An incoming associate may decide to travel or take a paid position during the deferral year. The Firm will only pay the stipend to those people doing public service work. However, the Firm will provide health care benefits to all deferring associates.
* As we did with the successful deferral program for the class of 2009 associates, we will assist those who elect to defer with identifying public service placements, clerkships, and client opportunities.

The earliest current summers can start at Weil is January 2011 (and that is of course dependent on whether they receive an offer from the firm). But the option to defer until 2012 is even more evidence that the class of 2010 could be worse off than the class of 2009.
Don’t even get me started on the class of 2011.
More details from the firm statement, after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Weil Gotshal Defers Current Summer Associates to 2011 or 2012“

Hogan & Hartson Pushes Back Start Dates for Current Summers to 2011

By

Hogan Hartson logo.jpgHogan & Hartson has already pushed back start dates for its incoming first year associates. The firm has laid off staff and laid off associates. And the firm has lowered associate salaries.
With all that writing on the wall, current Hogan summer associates couldn’t have been terribly surprised by today’s news. Here’s part of an internal email announcing the push back of class of 2010 start dates to 2011 for the D.C. and Northern Virginia offices:

We accordingly have decided that the offers we give this year’s summer class in D.C. and Northern Virginia will be for 2011. Deferring this class’s arrival for one year allows us the opportunity to make more offers to this year’s class than we otherwise could. U.S. offices other than D.C. and Northern Virginia similarly have assessed their needs for 2010 and 2011 and have made, or will be making, deferral decisions particular to those offices’ requirements.
The specifics of the deferral program have not yet been decided — only that the start date will be in 2011, not 2010.. The summers learned this news this morning; we hope you will make yourselves available to them to discuss the issue if, or when, they come to you for advice about their deferral year.

The firm declined to comment further on this matter.
In case they weren’t already, I hope that Hogan summers have been saving their money. It might have to last them for a while.
Earlier: Nationwide Start Date Watch: Hogan & Hartson Is Moving On Back
Staff Layoff Watch: Hogan & Hartson Lays Off 93 Staff
Hogan & Hartson Lets Go of 30 Senior Associates
Hogan & Hartson: ’1800 Hours’ Track Follow Up

Mixed Messages From DLA Piper to Incoming First Years?

By

DLA Piper logo.jpgIncoming DLA Piper associates have to feel a little queasy about the state of the firm. DLA has already laid off 180 U.S. employees (and 140 people in the U.K.). And the firm has pushed back start dates to January 2010 for some associates, while encouraging incoming first year associates to use its Public Interest Fellowship and defer until January 2011.
And the firm is moving away from a lockstep system, at some point.
We previously mentioned that DLA wanted people to seriously consider taking the full year deferral. A couple of weeks ago, the National Law Journal reported that half of DLA’s incoming first years have taken the opportunity.
But the option is still voluntary, right? A couple of our sources seem to have received mixed messages from the firm.
After the jump, DLA and our tipsters try to get on the same page.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Mixed Messages From DLA Piper to Incoming First Years?”

Ropes & Gray: Defers Current Summers to 2011

By

ropes gray logo.JPGIf the class of 2009 is like the main cast on Lost, then the class of 2010 is starting to look like the Tailies. Ropes & Gray has decided to defer its current summer class until “Sometime, 2011.”
Here is the firm-wide memo that all Ropes & Gray associates received last week:

As we recently communicated to summer associates, we will be making offers to them according to the usual standards and in the same numbers as in the past. We have not set a definite start date for them, but it will be no earlier than January 2011. We are encouraging current summer associates to consider pursuing a clerkship or NAP fellowship.

Just like Cravath Skadden, Ropes is promising that its summer offer rate will be commensurate with past years. However, just like Cravath Skadden, Ropes makes no mention of any kind of incoming first-year deferral stipend that it intends to offer to the class of 2010.
UPDATE: We now know what kind of stipend Ropes will be giving to the class of 2010. See here.
In March, Ropes announced its New Alternatives plan, which deferred the class of 2009 to January 2010. Now the firm is encouraging its current summers (class of 2010) to seek a public interest fellowship between law school graduation and the new start date at the firm.
At least current Ropes summer associates should come out of this summer with offers in hand. There are a lot of Biglaw summers that would sign up for that, regardless of when they can actually start after graduation.
Read the full Ropes & Gray memo, after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Ropes & Gray: Defers Current Summers to 2011″

Pillsbury Incoming Associates Still Waiting to Hear When They Can Start

By

Pillsbury logo.JPGBack in May, we reported that Pillsbury Winthrop wanted some of its incoming first year associates to defer until January 2010, some to defer until 2011, and others to take $60,000 to go away entirely.
The firm couched all of these options as “voluntary.” But notwithstanding the firm’s choice of language, we reported that Pillsbury needed at least 22 of its incoming class of 54 associates to take the go away money, or defer for a year.
Pillsbury said that it would announce which associates were starting in January 2010 on June 26th. That was Friday.
But according to my iPhone “date and time” application (how people did anything before the iPhone, I do not know) it is Monday, June 29th. And there is still no word from Pillsbury. Here’s one tipster’s report:

As of this AM, still no news from the firm. Yet again, evidence they can’t be trusted – or don’t care about incoming associates. Their written letters to us said we would know by by Friday. I hope this is not how the firm conducts business with clients.

Should Pillsbury associates expect the firm to actually tell them when they can start? Or should they just start hanging out on the Acela and hope to catch a clue on the wind?
More reactions after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Pillsbury Incoming Associates Still Waiting to Hear When They Can Start”

Deferred Associates Cause Ethical Dilemma and the Booting of Clerks in Massachusetts

By

massachusetts superior court.jpgLast week, the Massachusetts Trial Court got approval for a unique solution to address its budget shortfall, reported Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly:

The Supreme Judicial Court’s Committee on Judicial Ethics has approved a proposal by Chief Justice for Administration and Management Robert A. Mulligan that would allow deferred law-firm associates to work for the Trial Court as “volunteer interns” while on the payroll of the firms that hired them.

Great for the court — it doesn’t have to pay for clerks. Great for deferred associates — they get valuable experience during their deferral year. Great for BigLaw — their incoming associates get clerkship experience. Everyone’s happy, right?
Well, not the 24 clerks who had been slotted to get those positions whose offers have been withdrawn. And not those troubled by the ethics of corporate-sponsored clerks in the courtroom. Though approving the arrangement, the Committee on Judicial Ethics admitted that there’s something a bit troubling about it:

The CJE acknowledged that allowing law firms to pay the salaries of clerks implicates portions of the Judicial Code of Conduct that require judges to avoid impropriety and appear unbiased. It also stated that the plan raises the issue of whether the volunteer interns are a “gift” or “favor” to the judges of the Trial Court from the law firms.

The CJE had a solution for that. Keep it all secret!

“Structuring the program in such a way that the law firms’ involvement is unknown not only to the public but also to the judges who will be ‘employing’ the volunteer interns will negate any impression that those law firms are in a special position to influence the judge,” the CJE panel wrote.

Members of the public might not be aware of the connection when they have a case before the court, but the general news-consuming public of Massachusetts knows about the plan now. It’s in the Boston Globe and is currently the newspaper’s number four most e-mailed story.
What do you think about the ethical hullabaloo? Vote in our poll, after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Deferred Associates Cause Ethical Dilemma and the Booting of Clerks in Massachusetts”

Profitable Law Firms Don’t Do Deferrals … For the Most Part

By

This isn’t going to come as a galloping shock to most people, but it turns out that the firms that are making the most profit aren’t feeling the need to defer their incoming first year associates. Am Law Daily reports:

The only top ten firm that is making deferrals mandatory this year is Schulte, Roth & Zabel, which is requiring all new associates to start in 2010.
But the rest of the top ten most profitable partnerships are taking a different path. Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen and Katz; Quinn Emanuel Urquhart Oliver & Hedges; Boies, Schiller & Flexner; Sullivan & Cromwell; Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison; Kirkland & Ellis; and Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton are starting all of their associates next fall as originally scheduled.

Congratulations to the incoming first years lucky enough to be heading one of these firms in the fall.
But it’s time to learn an important lesson about the difference between “revenue” and “profit.”
More after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Profitable Law Firms Don’t Do Deferrals … For the Most Part”

Cravath Offers Voluntary Deferral to Class of 2009 — and Delays Class of 2010 a Full Year

By

animated siren gif animated siren gif animated siren gif drudge report.GIFThe venerable firm of Cravath, Swaine & Moore has entered the building, and it’s asking up to half of its incoming first-years to take a year off.
Cravath is offering a voluntary deferral option to its incoming associates, according to multiple Above the Law sources (as well as Bloomberg News). If the incoming associates are willing to take a year off, they will receive an $80,000 deferral stipend, health care coverage, and $1,000 a month in loan repayment assistance. This appears to be the top of the deferral stipend market, more generous than both Weil and Latham.
A tipster reports that there are no strings attached to this deal:

[T]hey don’t have to do anything but sit on their ass. No public interest, nothing. And they are assured a job in fall 2010.

But wait, weren’t the current summers at Cravath right now — the class of 2010 — supposed to start in fall 2010?
We detail their fate after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Cravath Offers Voluntary Deferral to Class of 2009 — and Delays Class of 2010 a Full Year”

Shearman & Sterling Start Date Watch: You Better Hurry

By

Incoming first years at Shearman & Sterling have been trying to figure out when they can start at the firm. A couple of months ago, the firm said that December 2009 would be the earliest start date. But Shearman also encouraged its incoming first years to defer until September 2010, while promising those deferrals that the incoming class of 2010 would not be starting on time.
Was the firm’s ambiguity about its regular start date a subtle attempt to get more people to take the year long deferral?
We don’t know how many incoming first years took the year long deferral option. But today, we have news that Shearman has confirmed its regular start date(s). But you’d better hurry to secure your space now.
More details after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Shearman & Sterling Start Date Watch: You Better Hurry”

Fish & Richardson Puts One-Third Of Its Incoming Associates On Ice

By

Fish Richardson logo.jpgLast week, Fish & Richardson laid off 120 people. It was the second round of layoffs from the firm this year.
But that wasn’t the end of Fish’s cost cutting measures. Yesterday, the firm effectively “cold offered” one-third of its incoming first year associate class. Another third of the class will start on time, and the rest have been deferred until October 2010. Above the Law has obtained this statement from the firm:

While approximately one-third of our 2009 associate class will start on time, we are deferring the majority of the class to October 2010. About half of those deferred will receive a stipend of $5,000 per month for twelve months, along with reimbursement for health insurance. We have informed the other half of those deferred that, given current economic conditions, it is unlikely that we will have a position for them next fall, and we have advised them to seek other opportunities. That group will receive a stipend of $5,000 per month for six months, along with reimbursement for health insurance, and we will revisit their situations in mid-2010.

Isn’t it a bit late for firms to cold offer incoming associates? It’s almost June, yet a third of the first year class just found out that there were essentially out of a job.
Tipsters weigh in, and an update on how the decision was made, after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Fish & Richardson Puts One-Third Of Its Incoming Associates On Ice”

Skadden Summers: Welcome to the New Market
Class of 2010 start dates pushed to 2011.

By

Skadden logo.JPGSummer associates started at Skadden yesterday, and it doesn’t look like the firm hid the ball when it came to talking about market realities. We have news about expected offers and start dates for the class of 2010 — and it’s not even Memorial Day.
At one of the summer associate welcome meetings, summers were told something like “the offers are there, but you have to earn it.” At that point, the collective sphincter-tightening among summers in the room made an audible noise. As one summer puts it:

They said the usual bs about how if they brought us in it’s cuz they wanna offer us, how we’re not competing against each other, there’s room for everyone, etc, But what wasn’t said is as remarkable as what was said. They didn’t point out the 98 percent offer rate the year before, they didn’t even ever explicitly say they expect to give most of us offers. They only said that we’re all eligible to earn an offer based on merit, as every year. The room got VERY quiet and awkward the whole time the guy was speaking, and other partners felt the need to interject with reassurances throughout.

But other sources have told Above the Law that Skadden does plan on making offers commensurate with previous years. The specific “you have to earn it language” was apparently on a PowerPoint slide — the same slide that is shown every year. We’ve heard rumblings that some firms will have summer offer rates of 50% or less, but none of that talk is coming from Skadden. Our understanding is that Skadden fully expects its offer rate to remain unchanged.
So, as long as you can breathe out of your nose instead of your mouth, things should be okay.
But after you get your offer, when can you start? After the jump, we have a clear indication from Skadden.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Skadden Summers: Welcome to the New Market
Class of 2010 start dates pushed to 2011.“