Smooth Sailings On The Lateral Partner Market

The lateral partner market remains steady yet again.

Michael Allen

Ed. note: This is the latest installment in a series of posts from Lateral Link’s team of expert contributors. Michael Allen is the CEO of Lateral Link. He is based in the Los Angeles office and focuses exclusively on Partner and General Counsel placements for top firms and companies. Prior to founding Lateral Link in 2006, he worked as an attorney at both Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP and Irell & Manella LLP. Michael graduated summa cum laude from the University of California, San Diego before earning his JD, cum laude, from Harvard Law School.

In contrast to the chaos predominating the New York Times headlines over the last year, the lateral partner market remains steady yet again.

Corporate and Litigation practices make up the bulk of the movement given their comparative sizes, and both are up significantly, both by about 20 percent. Tax attorneys seem to in a holding pattern as they wait to see how Trump’s late 2017 tax revisions impact their practice. The Bankruptcy lateral partner is also significantly more active. Interestingly, bankruptcy filings are not up compared to the six-month period last year.

Partner departures from Biglaw has also decreased over the last year by 18 percent. Fewer partners are retiring or leaving Biglaw, which can create logjams for senior associates hoping to make partner as we’ve discussed before. This jam could break at any moment though, creating a massive void and greatly increasing the demand for lateral partners in the coming years, but so far, things are holding steady.

Only 45 firms brought on more partners than they lost through retirement and lateral poaching in 2018. However, the year prior, only 32 firms performed the same feat. Akerman was the winner this year, growing their partner ranks by a net of 15 through the lateral market. On the other end of the spectrum, Hunton Andrews Kurth had 48 more partners depart the firm than they brought in, not surprising in the wake of their recently consummated merger.

Overall, DLA Piper had an impressive year, bring in 35 lateral partners, 4 standard deviations above the mean of 6.1 lateral acquisitions for Am Law 200 firms. However, they also lost 41 partners through lateral attrition, retirement, and more, but managed to quell their losses well. Polsinelli, Lewis Brisbois, and Akerman also had impressive years, bringing in 33 lateral partners each.

We expect the second half of the year to bring more moves, but not quite at the same frenetic pace as the first half of the year. Typically, we see lateral movement drop from summer to winter as partners hold on to collect year-end bonuses, which also makes it one of the best times to move. Firm demand for partners exceed the lateral supply in the second half of the year given bonus and profit distribution season, making it the most viable time to lateral to your dream firm. If you are looking to make a move our team at Lateral Link will leverage our contacts and market knowledge to get you to the firm you need to go to.


Lateral Link is one of the top-rated international legal recruiting firms. With over 14 offices world-wide, Lateral Link specializes in placing attorneys at the most prestigious law firms and companies in the world. Managed by former practicing attorneys from top law schools, Lateral Link has a tradition of hiring lawyers to execute the lateral leaps of practicing attorneys. Click ::here:: to find out more about us.