Above the Law reports that Andrews Kurth has offered a $3,500 bonus to their outgoing 1L summer associates if they accept their offers to return to the firm for their 2L summers within two weeks.

The firm’s announcement, Staci Zaretsky writes:

Should you accept the return clerkship offer by Wednesday, August 16, 2017 you will receive a one-time $3,500 bonus. The bonus will be paid in two installments of $1,750.00; the first installment being paid upon acceptance and the second installment will be paid on your first day of the 2018 Summer Clerkship. If you choose not to take advantage of the early acceptance option, we follow the standard NALP guidelines regarding the deadline for acceptance of a return summer offer.

Read the Above the Law article.

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Exterro is conducting its 2nd Annual Law Firm Benchmarking Survey on law firms’ legal processes, specifically relating to project management practices and e-discovery services.

Participants in the survey will get full and early access to all of the survey results. Non-participants will only be able to see the published and edited version of the report.

Answers will be completely anonymous and will be analyzed in combination with other participants’ responses. This invitation will expire within seven business days.

Exterro will make a $20 donation to one charity of your choice out of American Red Cross, Stand Up to Cancer, Make-a-Wish Foundation.

Participate in the survey.

Above the Law reports that a 115-year-old Biglaw firm is no more, after Chadbourne & Parke announced that its anticipated merger with Norton Rose Fulbright is official.

Reporter Kathryn Rubino writes that the combined firm, which will operate under the Norton Rose Fulbright name, has about 1,000 lawyers in the U.S. , with roughly 300 of them in New York City alone.

She writes that there were concerns that client conflicts could delay the firms tying the knot, but the announcement of the merger puts those concerns firmly in the past.

Read the Above the Law article.

Bloomberg Law reports that the global law firm DLA Piper fell victim on Tuesday to a widespread cyber attack, which reportedly disabled networks at dozens of companies.

“The firm, like many other reported companies, has experienced issues with some of its systems due to suspected malware. We are taking steps to remedy the issue as quickly as possible,” according to a statement the firm posted on its website.

“But calls and emails to the firm either failed or went unanswered. The U.K.’s Legal Week reported that the attack had ‘knocked out phones and computers across the firm,’ including in Europe, the Middle East and the U.S.,” writes Gabe Friedman.

The Petya virus has been spreading, locking companies out of their networks and demanding a ransom in cryptocurrency to unlock them.

Read the Bloomberg article.

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A former associate filed a national class action against Steptoe & Johnson, claiming the giant law firm pays only lip service to gender equality, but has a male-dominated leadership that discriminates against women in pay and promotions, according to a Courthouse News Service report.

Ji-In Houck, of Los Angeles, says her starting pay at the firm as a contract attorney was barely half the $165,000 that inexperienced male lawyers made — though she had come to Steptoe with two years of experience in civil litigation.

“During her three years in Steptoe’s Century City office, her salary typically was 30 percent to 40 percent less than male lawyers with comparable experience, she says in her June 22 complaint,” writes Don Debenedictis. “When she left in March 2016, she was earning $200,000 a year, compared to the $230,000 paid to men at her level.”

Read the Courthouse News article.

Vault’s Law 100 Rankings for 2018 are are topped by a returning champion.

Cravath, Swaine & Moore is once again the most prestigious firm. It widened its lead over Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, which had previously enjoyed a 13-year reign at the top, reports Vault’s Matt Moody.

“Survey respondents called Cravath the ‘leader of the pack’ and the ‘great American law firm against which all others should be judged.’ Cravath increased its score from 8.961 to 9.056, while Wachtell, described as the ‘M&A legends,’ saw its prestige score drop slightly from 8.904 to 8.788,” according to Moody.

Vault based its ranking on scores from nearly 18,000 law firm associates surveyed earlier this year, who were asked to rate law firms on a scale of 1 to 10 based on prestige.

Read the Vault report.

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The general counsel of Marsh & McLennan Companies has started requiring the company’s biggest outside law firms to use an anti-hacking electronic communication technology known as Transport Layer Security, according to a report from Bloomberg Law.

The report quotes Peter Beshar: “What we have done here is gone out to 12 or so of the biggest law firms on the most sensitive matters and insisted, ‘You can’t communicate with us other than through TLS,’ and everyone has signed up by it.”

Beshar identified three of the firms are Cravath, Swaine & Moore, Davis Polk & Wardwell and Gibson Dunn & Crutcher.

TLS prevents any unauthorized senders or recipients from entering and intercepting communication — protecting “data in transit” from being hacked, explains reporter Casey Sullivan.

Read the Bloomberg article.

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The iManage user conference ConnectLive 2017 will be in London at the InterContinental London – The O2 hotel on June 27-28, 2017.

The conference is all about creating connections, iManage says on its website. “Between customers and partners. Between those that are working with advanced technology – using it every day in the service of their clients – and others that are still searching for solutions to important issues in their businesses.

“Across four days and two continents, iManage will bring together CIOs and IT professionals, attorneys, legal administrators and more.”

Get more information.

Dechert’s announcement this week that it has laid off several associates after a round of performance reviews may signal a boldness and lack of concern for public criticism that could spell trouble across the industry, writes Joe Patrice for Above the Law.

“Firing first-years … that’s a firewall firms tend not to breach,” Patrice observes.

He reports that some sources believe the firings were more about hours billed than competence.

“But if first-years were really hit by these layoffs, that’s a good sign this is about hours. Because how can you fire a first-year for being incompetent? You wouldn’t have any first-years left!” he writes.

Read the Above the Law article.

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Above the Law talks with David Boies, the man author David Lat calls “the most famous practicing lawyer,” who tells the tale of how he left Cravath, Swaine & Moore to launch his own firm.

Lat writes that Boies has been involved in major litigation for the past 50 years, “from the IBM and Microsoft antitrust cases, to Bush v. Gore, to Hollingsworth v. Perry and the battle for marriage equality.”

Boies is a founder of Boies Schiller Flexner. “The spectacularly successful firm, with more than 300 lawyers across 14 offices, enjoys a reputation as a ‘national litigation powerhouse.’ And it has the financial rewards to prove it: profits per partner of $3.15 million in 2016, according to the latest Am Law 100 rankings, and associate bonuses as high as $350,000.”

The article follows Boies’ path from Yale Law School to his 30 years with Cravath, through the early days with his newly founded firm, to the present.

Read the article.

Bloomberg Law reports on a survey of nearly 400 managing partners and chairs, finding that the leaders of Big Law firms in the U.S. don’t seem to be very happy with recent changes — or lack thereof — in their firms.

“In response to survey questions posed by legal management consulting firm Altman Weil, 88 percent of respondents said they have chronically underperforming lawyers, 61 percent said overcapacity is diluting their profitability, and 65 percent said their partners resist most efforts to change how to they do business,” writes Stephanie Russell-Kraft. “This comes at a time when most (72 percent) law firm leaders said the pace of change in the legal industry will only continue to increase in the coming years.”

One of the findings is that business is moving in-house, and managing partners recognize that: 67.9 percent of respondents said they are already losing business to in-house legal departments.

Read the Bloomberg article.

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Knowledge Nomads’ Summer Legal Conference in Berlin July 23-29, 2017, will feature sessions on law in the age of hyperconnectivity, legal issues in the sharing economy, and the legal fallout from Volkswagen’s emissions scandal.

The event will be at Berlin’s Radisson Blu Hotel.

The CLE-qualified sessions will feature a diverse group of speakers, including a broad range of nationalities, backgrounds and ages.

Interspersed with the the presentations will be an arts and culture day with a choice of seven tailor-made tours, a trip to the home of Volkswagen, and a closing dinner on top of the German Federal Parliament Bundestag building.

Other side events will include guided tours, dinners, receptions, concerts, a gallery tour and more.

Register or get more information.

Labor and employment law firm Seyfarth Shaw has conducted a round of layoffs that affect both attorneys and staff, according to reports from Above the Law and Bloomberg Law.

“One source who was briefed on the layoffs said the downsizing affects 40 lawyers, including associates and counsel, as well as 27 staff members,” reports Bloomberg’s Casey Sullivan. “The cuts at least affect the firm’s New York City and Washington, D.C. office, according to the source.”

A Bloomberg source attributed the downsizing to a slow real estate practice, and said layoffs were mainly for “low billable associates,” but noted that some counsel and senior counsel were laid off in the firm’s employee benefits department.

Read the Above the Law article.

Read the Bloomberg article.

Bloomberg Law is reporting that Proskauer Rose has become the latest Big Law firm to be hit with a gender discrimination lawsuit by a female partner.

The plaintiff brought the case against her employer under a pseudonym. 

“According to the redacted complaint filed Friday, the plaintiff, an unnamed partner in Proskauer’s Washington, D.C. office, was objectified by male partners who made inappropriate comments about her physical appearance, paid less than male partners who were similarly or less productive than she was, and excluded from projects and client development activities once she began complaining,” writes reporter Stephanie Russell-Kraft.

The defendant responded by saying the suit is “groundless” and “meritless.”

Read the Bloomberg article.

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Making sure you’re prepared on all fronts for the death of a law firm founder or influential firm attorney is something that no one looks forward to, points out Bruce Vincent in a blog for Muse Communications. But failing to take a few necessary steps beforehand is a recipe for potential confusion and consternation among the attorneys at your firm, the firm’s clients, and, importantly, the lawyer’s family.

“Although the notion of strategizing for someone’s eventual death may seem macabre, those who do so are much more likely to emerge from a terrible situation in such a way that shows their compassion and dedication to the memory of their lost colleague,” he writes.

The article discusses the initial steps a firm will need to take after the lawyer’s death, various ways of respecting the deceased’s memory, and dealing with the somewhat mundane chores that follow the loss. These can include monitoring the lawyer’s email, changing stationery, online directories and more.

Read the article.

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Harrison Barnes, managing director at BCG Attorney Search, recently posted an article advising law job applicants how to deal with not hearing back after an interview.

But, as Joe Patrice of Above the Law explains, Barnes somehow managed to describe “most legal recruiters” as women who “are quite attractive and fit,” as well as “a little ditzy and [who do] not have the other sorts of qualifications that would make them qualified for the job.”

The passages, now deleted from the company’s website, continued:

“Not only do they sometimes have more beauty and fewer brains, but they also may have more beauty and less interest in people, less ability to connect with people, and similar negative characteristics. This means they expect people to treat them as if they are special and sometimes are more focused on themselves than their jobs.

“It is not uncommon for recruiting coordinators to use their workspaces as a hunting ground for mates—and it works.”

After the inevitable uproar, Barnes announced that he was sorry and would be taking an extended leave of absence from BCG Attorney Search.

Read the Above the Law article.

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Bloomberg Law has put together a summary of five takeaways from Thursday’s release of The American Lawyer‘s annual report on the top 100 law firms, ranked by gross revenue.

In the section on revenue and profits per equity partner, the report found that Latham & Watkins took the top spot with $2.823 billion in gross revenue.

And Wachtell Lipton posted $5.8 million profits per partner, despite the firm having a decline in overall revenue and profits per equity partner.

The takeaways also covered headcount and revenue, the gap between the top 50 firms and the bottom 50, three firms joining the list for the first time, and the increase in the value of equity partnership.

Read the Bloomberg article.

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Social media offer many benefits through its hyper connectivity, but it also can cause problems in the business world for those whose viewpoints may conflict with their clients, employees or colleagues, writes Christina DiPinto of Muse Communications.

She explains that, while there are a variety of these social media ethics violators, there are three types that all lawyers should know about and avoid emulating: the double agent, the rebel, and the frenemy.

The post concludes with some helpful hints, strategies and tips to make sure a firm’s social media experience is free of ethical concerns.

Read the article.

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The invisible hand of the free market hasn’t been able to exert much control over law firm billing rates, U.S. District Judge Jed S. Rakoff said at a Cardozo School of Law panel discussion about the high cost of the legal system, reports Bloomberg Law.

Rakoff cited a 2016 report that showed average hourly rates for partners rose from $122 in 1985 to $532 in 2012, as average associates rates grew from $79 to $370.

Reporter Rebecca Beyer quotes Rakoff as asking: “Why isn’t the free market operating?” The  answer, he said, lies in the fact that the legal profession operates much like a guild, with “substantial barriers to entry,” not least of which is the cost of a legal education.

Read the Bloomberg article.

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Legal departments aren’t just asking their outside law firms to field diverse groups of attorneys — they’re asking those firms to put attorneys in leadership positions, and they’re asking for data to back it up, reports Bloomberg Law.

Facebook bow requires outside counsel working on its projects to have at least 33 percent women and ethnic minorities. In addition, the firms must show they are actively creating “clear and measurable leadership opportunities for women and minorities” in the company’s legal matters, The New York Times reported.

“Facebook’s new policy comes on the heels of HP’s announcement in February that it would start withholding fees from law firms that don’t meet diversity requirements,” writes Stephanie Russell-Kraft.

Read the Bloomberg article.

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