DLA Piper Plans To Dump Tons Of Bonus Cash On Associates

Associates are *so happy* about this!

This time last year, Biglaw firms were still figuring out how to adapt to remote working environments thanks to the pandemic, but now, Biglaw firms are figuring out when (or whether) they’ll announce additional rounds of special bonuses to reward all of their attorneys’ hard work over the course of the past 12 months. Top-ranked firms have been announcing Davis Polk bonus matches left and right. Which one is it this time?

DLA Piper — a firm that came in at No. 3 on the most recent Am Law 100 ranking, with $3,112,130,000 in gross revenue in 2019 — thrilled associates with its special bonus announcement today. The firm has fully matched the bonus scale announced by Davis Polk. In case you’ve forgotten what that looks like, DLA’s bonus scale can be seen below (the full memo is available on the next page):

Here are some instant reactions from associates at the firm, who are all quite happy:

You love to see it. Associates are thrilled and feel like the firm has redeemed itself. DLA stepped up after just one week of special bonus mania and even before Cravath. Couple this with the recent standardization of market salaries across all US offices, and we really are competitive again.

DLA FULL MATCH!!!!! Very happy they moved fast on this after how they botched 2020 special bonuses. This news, coming on the same day I received my first paycheck at Cravath scale (because I’m in a secondary market), kiboshes my current efforts to lateral.

Bonuses at DLA Piper will be paid half in May and half in September to all associates in good standing. Congratulations to all!

(Flip to the next page to see the full memo from DLA Piper.)

Remember everyone, we depend on your tips to stay on top of important bonus updates, so when your firm matches, please text us (646-820-8477) or email us (subject line: “[Firm Name] Matches”). Please include the memo if available. You can take a photo of the memo and send it via text or email if you don’t want to forward the original PDF or Word file.

And if you’d like to sign up for ATL’s Bonus Alerts (which is the alert list we also use for salary announcements), please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the bonus alerts, you don’t need to do anything. You’ll receive an email notification within minutes of each bonus announcement that we publish. Thanks for all of your help!


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.

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