New Biglaw Ranking Alert: Presenting The Industry Pulse Top 50 Law Firms

Did your law firm make the cut? Let's find out!

It’s a good thing lawyers love law firm rankings, because there are tons of them. Every year, there’s a whole new crop of these rankings to obsess over. Aren’t you getting tired of them? No, of course not. Lawyers love rankings more than they love money (okay, maybe that’s taking it a step too far).

You’ve seen the Am Law 100 ranking. You’ve seen the NLJ 500 ranking. You’ve seen the ALM Global 100 ranking. You’ve seen the Vault 100 ranking. You’ve seen the Vault Best Law Firms to Work For ranking. You’ve seen the Working Mother Best Law Firms for Women ranking. You’ve seen the Law360 Glass Ceiling Report ranking. You’ve even seen the U.S. News Best Lawyers® Best Law Firms ranking.

But have you ever seen a ranking of the best law firms in the U.S. from two of Instagram’s top influencers on Biglaw associate culture? Here’s your chance.

Before we get to the Industry Pulse Top 50 Law Firms, let’s discuss the creators of the new ranking, Biglaw meme connossieurs Big Law Boiz and Non-Equity Partner. Here’s what they say about themselves, in their own words:

Since their inception, @BigLawBoiz and @NonEquityPartner have existed primarily to entertain, distract and represent a voice of the shared experience of young professionals. In pursuit of that mission, we have been fortunate enough to use our platforms to provide much-needed transparency into an otherwise-opaque industry which has historically thrived on information asymmetry among its constituents. Our platforms grant us unparalleled access to many thousands of young lawyers across firms, practice areas, seniority levels and geographies. Our unique, personal access to associates allows us to measure the true “pulse” of the legal industry. It is a responsibility we do not take lightly.

And what is the methodology behind this new Instagram-based ranking? Here is a statement Big Law Boiz and Non-Equity Partner provided to Above the Law:

In our inaugural Industry Pulse List, which ranks the Top 50 Law Firms in the U.S., we attempt to provide visibility into the current competitive landscape of the legal industry. Our sincere hope is that this list provides our stakeholders — from practicing attorneys, to law students, to legal talent professionals — with a more clear picture of what to expect in the legal field so they can make more informed, empowered career decisions.

Our data-driven ranking methodology is a product of years of research based on user feedback, literature reviews, trends in our own data, availability of new data, reviewing other published rankings and engaging with leading industry professionals. We found that the rankings provided by traditional publications reflect a notion pervasive across the legal industry: “we do things this way because this is how it has always been done.” The same names continuously appear in more-or-less the same spots across all lists.

The Industry Pulse List seeks to reward firms that reject this mentality. The firms that saw the greatest variance from their entrenched positions among other ranking lists have demonstrated a willingness to innovate. Examples of influential factors include the adoption of legal technology, alternative fee structures like ‘flat fee,’ recognizing diversity of thought, authentic efforts to recognize and support attorneys’ mental health issues and a demonstrated commitment to attorney development. We hope the advent of this ranking system spurs law firms to adopt a more forward-thinking approach.

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We know you want to see if your law firm made the list, so we won’t make you wait anymore. Here they are, the top 10 law firms on the 2021 Industry Pulse ranking:

10. Gibson Dunn
9. Munger Tolles & Olson
8. Gunderson Dettmer
7. Cravath
6. Kirkland & Ellis
5. Skadden
4. Baker McKenzie
3. Goodwin Procter
2. Latham
1. Cooley

Click here to see the rest of the Top 50 Best Firms. For additional information, including future releases of Industry Pulse Lists, please follow Big Law Boiz and Non-Equity Partner on Instagram and Twitter.

Congratulations to all law firms that made the inaugural Industry Pulse ranking!


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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.