Biglaw

Mega Firm Announces More Austerity Measures -- This Time Salary Cuts Are The Name Of The Game

The hits just keep on coming.

By  
on

Biglaw austerity measures just don’t take a break. And it makes sense since time is meaningless during quarantine, so if COVID-19 cost-cutting measures pile on ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

Mega firm Dentons has already made some COVID-19 austerity measures (they’re delaying partial payment of 2019 bonuses) and today the firm announced that wasn’t the end of their cost-cutting. Starting on May 1st, the firm will institute compensation cuts across the board for all employees making $60,000+.

So what are the exact cuts being made? In a four page memo (available on the next page) that, in addition to detailing the current cuts explains the firm’s guiding principles that they’ll use to govern during the pandemic, the firm’s Chief Executive Officer Mike McNamara explains:

• For Partners, all will see reductions in draws of at least 20%, with reductions for many including the most highly compensated Partners much higher than 20%.
• For employees, both timekeepers and business services staff, these reductions will be progressive starting at 0% and reaching 20% for those earning in excess of $190,000. There will be no reduction for team members who earn $60,000 or less.
• Consistent with our performance culture and our guiding principles, there will be a bonus mechanism process to ensure that individual high performers – lawyers, professionals and business services staff – will be able to recover some or all of these reductions, dependent on the Firm’s overall 2020 economic performance.

Good luck to the firm as it navigates these COVID-19 waters.

If your firm or organization is slashing salaries, closing its doors, or reducing the ranks of its lawyers or staff, whether through open layoffs, stealth layoffs, or voluntary buyouts, please don’t hesitate to let us know. Our vast network of tipsters is part of what makes Above the Law thrive. You can email us or text us (646-820-8477).

If you’d like to sign up for ATL’s Layoff Alerts, please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the layoff alerts, you don’t need to do anything. You’ll receive an email notification within minutes of each layoff, salary cut, or furlough announcement that we publish.

Sponsored

headshotKathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, and host of The Jabot podcast. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).

Sponsored

1 2Next »
Scissors Cut Money

Enter your email address to sign up for ATL's Layoff Alerts.

Topics

, , , , ,