Biglaw

Biglaw Partner Takes To Begging Associates To Come To The Office

He'd really like you to come by the office.

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Every Biglaw firm — hell, most employers, regardless of industry — is trying to figure out exactly what post-COVID work looks like. Because, while remote work got us through, it’s unclear exactly how much of that will be in our future. One Biglaw partner has taken to sending pleas to attorneys asking them to come back to the physical office.

Charles “Chuck” Palmer is the managing partner of Troutman Pepper’s Atlanta office. And he’d really, REALLY like folks to be back in the office. He links it to building the firm’s culture, and assures everyone that associates are MORE than just billing machines:

We talk a lot about our firm’s culture – about how we like each other and care about one another.  Of course that is a bit extreme.  There are a few in our Atlanta office who are annoying to be around.  They know who they are.  But with those exceptions, I believe most of us enjoy seeing one another and working together.  Furthermore, while perhaps some of our more experienced lawyers may be perfectly fine working remotely, I can’t imagine what it would have been like as an associate learning to be a lawyer from home.  I don’t believe I could have done it.  It’s not simply a function of being able to bill hours.  There is more to being a lawyer than simply the capacity to bill 2,000 hours a year.

And then Palmer leans heavily into the guilt to convince people the office is where it’s at:

The future of our law firm is not the remote practice of law. I believe law firms that become too heavily remote will ultimately disappear or will lose clients to firms who are able to present a collegial and coordinated representation to those clients. Simply because technology allowed us to work remotely during a pandemic doesn’t mean human nature that evolved over thousands of years changed in a matter of months. Personal and in-person relationships matter. Unlike “You’ve Got Mail” and “Sleepless in Seattle” none of us are able to develop truly close relationships remotely. Those are movies. They aren’t real life. Tom Hanks doesn’t work here.

The email, described by a tipster as rambling (but you can see it for yourself here), ended with a stark plea: “Please come to the office.  Our future depends on it.”

And insiders at the firm say it isn’t the first time Palmer has downright begged attorneys to come back to the office. He apparently used the combination of Memorial Day and the passing of a colleague to pen a previous long missive, which relied more on incentives to convince folks to come back to the office:

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I hope that many of you are returning or considering returning to the office.  We have 550 people in Atlanta, and we are now seeing perhaps 150 of you on any given day of late.  We are having lawyer lunches on Tuesdays, summer associate breakfasts on Wednesdays, and happy hours on Thursdays.  We are giving away prizes such as Braves tickets, gift cards, etc.  But you have to be present to win!  Everyone has now had the opportunity to be vaccinated if desired, and we hope you will start coming in if you have not done so already.  We do not want to be a “virtual” law firm.  Collegiality and training are important for both our younger and older lawyers and for our staff.   Please don’t be a stranger.  More and more of your colleagues are coming in, and I hope to see all of you soon.

Striking the right balance between the office and virtual work will be an on going conversation. Folks at Troutman definitely know where Palmer stands.

Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. 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).

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