Biglaw

Biglaw Firm Gives Associates Raises, With A Side Of Increased Hours Requirements

With more money comes more billing requirements.

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Yesterday, associates at Locke Lord got a surprise memo, asking them to attend — if their schedules permit, natch — an in-person meeting about associate compensation. The firm hadn’t made any moves on the raise/special bonus front that’s been sweeping Biglaw this summer, so finding out what the firm had in mind was big news. Though some Above the Law sources weren’t about to get their hopes up:

Current rumor is that we are not matching the new scale. And an in-person meeting vs an email is never a good sign.
Once there, a chart was distributed laying out new base salaries for each class year at three different levels of billing: one at 1850 hours, one at 1950 hours, and bonuses that are available at 2050 hours. Looking at a comparison of the old scale to the new one, you can see the base compensation numbers never match the market rate for each class year. It’s only at the 2050-hour bonus level that associates can hope to catch their peers at other firms, though as most firms haven’t announced their 2018 bonus scale yet, it’s impossible to know how high-billing associates at Locke Lord will stack up against the market.

But there’s more than just a confusing chart to take away from the Locke Lord compensation meeting. With more money comes more billing requirements. As a tipster told us, the minimum hours requirement has been jacked up from 1700 hours to 1850. Yikes.

It’s important to note that the minimum billable requirement at Locke was 1700 before (2000 expected but minimum of 1700 to move forward with your class year). The new scale is going into effect January 1, 2018, so we have 3 months and change to try and hit at least 1850. And if we don’t, we could be facing a pay cut (supposedly up to 5%).

Best of luck to our readers from Locke Lord — here’s hoping your hours are plentiful.

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(Read the full memo from the firm on the next page.)

headshotKathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law. 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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