Biglaw

Biglaw Firm Reopens With Eventual Plans To Have Office As 'Primary Workspace'

Let's just make believe the pandemic never happened....

By  
on

When it comes to law firms’ reopening plans, some just wish that they could return to the way things were before the pandemic ever happened. While the majority of firms seem to be leaning into the flexibility that working remotely has introduced to employees by ending the five-day, in-office workweek, others seem to want real-life face time (not the app) — and lots of it — from their personnel.

It looks like the latter is what’s going to be happening at Cadwalader, a firm that took in $452,572,000 gross revenue in 2020, for 85th place in the most recent Am Law 100 ranking. According to sources, during a presentation earlier this week, Patrick Quinn, the firm’s managing partner, emphasized that while Cadwalader would not forget the lessons learned during the pandemic (i.e., the firm will remain “flexibile” going forward, and no one will be required to be in the office every day in 2021), the office will be the “primary workspace” for attorneys and staffers in the new year. But which new year are we talking about? Here’s a relevant slide:

Cadwalader includes the best typo ever here, noting that “[b]eginning on Jan. 1, 2020” the firm will “[r]esume operations with the office as our primary workspace.” It’s almost as if this Biglaw firm is longing for a time machine so that everything can go back to the way it was before COVID-19. Personel at the firm may not be so eager to jump into the DeLorean to go back to the future.

Here’s what we heard from Cadwalader insiders about this plan:

• People at the firm seemed to have been looking for a stronger statement in favor of flexibility and continued WFH, but the message is pretty clear that we’ll all be expected to return back to the old way of doing things.

• According to Patrick Quinn, although the firm did hear that there were some advantages of working from home, the consensus was that the downsides (fewer mentorship/training opportunities, difficulty separating home and work lives, and fewer opportunities to be together and with our clients) outweighed the positives. But he did stress multiple times that the firm would not forget that we are capable to serving clients at the highest levels no matter where we are, and that the “flexibility” they are looking for in 2022 and beyond is still a work in progress.

Best of luck to Cadwalader associates and staffers in 2020 — er… 2022. Let’s hope some flexibility remains at the firm as it hops through time.

Sponsored

What has your firm announced as far as a reopening plan is concerned? The more information is out there, the more likely it is that firms will be able to establish a market standard for a return to work.

As soon as you find out about the reopening plan at your firm, please email us (subject line: “[Firm Name] Office Reopening”) or text us at (646) 820-8477. We always keep our sources on stories anonymous. There’s no need to send a memo (if one exists) using your firm email account; your personal email account is fine. If a memo has been circulated, please be sure to include it as proof; we like to post complete memos as a service to our readers. You can take a photo of the memo and attach as a picture if you are worried about metadata in a PDF or Word file. Thanks.

Staci ZaretskyStaci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

Sponsored

Topics

, , , ,