Milbank/Davis Polk/Cravath Scale: NYC to 215-415k Forum

[Anonymous User]

Here's the thing. I know they never would but if Kirkland wanted to make a power move. Now is the god damn time.

They obviously won't do it but imagine if they did -- even if they just bump the scale for first couple of years and then keep the rest of the scale the same as DPW.

[Anonymous User]

What does DPW have against C/O 2021? First 202.5 and now this

Not to rehash the thread about junior availability, but if I’m a junior, I’m now even more incentivized to wait to respond any weekend and late night items until 9-5 business hours and say “sorry, my current workload does not allow for me to help with this request.”

Cool, then that junior should get fired. He/she just got a 10-15k raise (on top of their class year bump) for doing nothing more than continuing to work. He'll/she'll now make 215-250k base and maybe ~300k all-in depending on how special bonuses shake out. To essentially check commas. Junior associate worth is entirely about availability and working long hours. You're not getting paid these sums because of your great heart surgery technique.

they aren't getting paid for "availability" they are getting paid because that is what the market demands. what's "market" isn't constant availability on the part of juniors

(Guy from Kirkland's Salt Lake City office.) In all seriousness, the "market" for most biglaw firms in most cities has built in an expectation that if I e-mail you as a 27 year old 2nd year at 11pm at night you'll respond with a "will do" not a "sorry, you've reached me after ordinary business hours." That's a major reason the pay is what it is in biglaw. We all acknowledge attrition is up but it isn't up so significantly that that fundamental piece of the model has changed.

Just out of curiousity, expecting a “will do” from an email at 11pm doesn’t make sense unless your juniors have reason to know work is coming to them, right?

Not that OP but as a senior associate, if I send you an email at 11pm and you had no reason to know work was coming, I don't expect a "will do" from you that evening--the sooner you let me know I can move it from my "to-do" pile to my "follow up" pile the better for me, but I don't expect you to have stayed up just so you can say "will do" or whatever. Note that if something came in at 11 and it needs to be dealt with ASAP I'm probably not even going to ask if you can do it anyways since looping in and reviewing junior work takes more time than doing it myself -- if your track record suggests you're offline by 11pm (which to be clear can be part of a competent associate, e.g. if you're a morning person) then I'm definitely not bothering to run by you.

[Anonymous User]

DPW FINALLY matches and we're debating the merits of the 11 PM junior assoc "will do" email? Lawyers really are the fucking worst.

[Anonymous User]

No way KE raises. The chairman's latest interview suggested (to me) that the firm's financial focus will remain on lateral hiring. Plus, don't forget, they screwed us on the bonus "multiple" [freaking 2800 hours and good reviews for a mere 1.25x].

Cravath should step up after years of embarrassment and losing several big name partners to other shops. KE will send us sweet petermillar quarter zips to rock on the 6-express train though.

[Anonymous User]

What does DPW have against C/O 2021? First 202.5 and now this

Not to rehash the thread about junior availability, but if I’m a junior, I’m now even more incentivized to wait to respond any weekend and late night items until 9-5 business hours and say “sorry, my current workload does not allow for me to help with this request.”

Cool, then that junior should get fired. He/she just got a 10-15k raise (on top of their class year bump) for doing nothing more than continuing to work. He'll/she'll now make 215-250k base and maybe ~300k all-in depending on how special bonuses shake out. To essentially check commas. Junior associate worth is entirely about availability and working long hours. You're not getting paid these sums because of your great heart surgery technique.

they aren't getting paid for "availability" they are getting paid because that is what the market demands. what's "market" isn't constant availability on the part of juniors

(Guy from Kirkland's Salt Lake City office.) In all seriousness, the "market" for most biglaw firms in most cities has built in an expectation that if I e-mail you as a 27 year old 2nd year at 11pm at night you'll respond with a "will do" not a "sorry, you've reached me after ordinary business hours." That's a major reason the pay is what it is in biglaw. We all acknowledge attrition is up but it isn't up so significantly that that fundamental piece of the model has changed.

Just out of curiousity, expecting a “will do” from an email at 11pm doesn’t make sense unless your juniors have reason to know work is coming to them, right?

Not that OP but as a senior associate, if I send you an email at 11pm and you had no reason to know work was coming, I don't expect a "will do" from you that evening--the sooner you let me know I can move it from my "to-do" pile to my "follow up" pile the better for me, but I don't expect you to have stayed up just so you can say "will do" or whatever. Note that if something came in at 11 and it needs to be dealt with ASAP I'm probably not even going to ask if you can do it anyways since looping in and reviewing junior work takes more time than doing it myself -- if your track record suggests you're offline by 11pm (which to be clear can be part of a competent associate, e.g. if you're a morning person) then I'm definitely not bothering to run by you.

Will do.

[Anonymous User]

Here's the thing. I know they never would but if Kirkland wanted to make a power move. Now is the god damn time.

They obviously won't do it but imagine if they did -- even if they just bump the scale for first couple of years and then keep the rest of the scale the same as DPW.

Why would they bump the scale for juniors? The retention issues are with midlevels and seniors. There are no shortage of juniors who have not yet burned out. The raises and bonuses of the last few years have mostly been with an eye toward “We are losing 4th/5th years faster than we can hire lateral replacements (since this is an industry wide problem), but work is only increasing.” Paying 2nd years more doesn’t address that.

[njdevils2626]

No way KE raises. The chairman's latest interview suggested (to me) that the firm's financial focus will remain on lateral hiring. Plus, don't forget, they screwed us on the bonus "multiple" [freaking 2800 hours and good reviews for a mere 1.25x].

Cravath should step up after years of embarrassment and losing several big name partners to other shops. KE will send us sweet petermillar quarter zips to rock on the 6-express train though.

You don't keep your big name partners by unilaterally deciding to dip into their pockets to give junior associates more money

[Anonymous User]

The last few pages of this thread could be cleaned up and literally submitted to a Psychology / Psychiatry journal. I feel like there's too much bad juju here now; we need to stick this in an archive under "Legal Field Mental Health" and start a new thread to actually discuss what just happened with DPW.

[Anonymous User]

Anyone got a theory on why DPW goes with these weird 500 dollar numbers?

[bigboybob]

Anyone got a theory on why DPW goes with these weird 500 dollar numbers?

Because each pound of lobster is measured in 500 $ increments.

[Anonymous User]

Here's the thing. I know they never would but if Kirkland wanted to make a power move. Now is the god damn time.

They obviously won't do it but imagine if they did -- even if they just bump the scale for first couple of years and then keep the rest of the scale the same as DPW.

No, no, no they won't. But you could imagine what it would be like if they did, right? Eh?

https://youtu.be/jdlqHO4i0dE?t=20

[Anonymous User]

Anyone got a theory on why DPW goes with these weird 500 dollar numbers?

No but I do have a theory that some seriously bad arguing happened at the very top of DPW's leadership for them to take this long only to announce ... this. There was likely a camp that was in favor of a much more aggressive re-raise and/or putting out a spring/fall bonus and they seem to have lost in favor of this conservative approach. There's no other explanation in my mind for the delay.

To speculate & try to answer your other question: I'm guessing they're applying some internal calculation and then rounding to the nearest $500. Or else they're doing the old lawyer billable trick of trying to use extremely precise numbers to try to appear more accurate.

[AureliusCapital]

Anyone got a theory on why DPW goes with these weird 500 dollar numbers?

They basically did 3% exactly from Milbank scale.

[Anonymous User]

What does DPW have against C/O 2021? First 202.5 and now this

Not to rehash the thread about junior availability, but if I’m a junior, I’m now even more incentivized to wait to respond any weekend and late night items until 9-5 business hours and say “sorry, my current workload does not allow for me to help with this request.”

Cool, then that junior should get fired. He/she just got a 10-15k raise (on top of their class year bump) for doing nothing more than continuing to work. He'll/she'll now make 215-250k base and maybe ~300k all-in depending on how special bonuses shake out. To essentially check commas. Junior associate worth is entirely about availability and working long hours. You're not getting paid these sums because of your great heart surgery technique.

they aren't getting paid for "availability" they are getting paid because that is what the market demands. what's "market" isn't constant availability on the part of juniors

(Guy from Kirkland's Salt Lake City office.) In all seriousness, the "market" for most biglaw firms in most cities has built in an expectation that if I e-mail you as a 27 year old 2nd year at 11pm at night you'll respond with a "will do" not a "sorry, you've reached me after ordinary business hours." That's a major reason the pay is what it is in biglaw. We all acknowledge attrition is up but it isn't up so significantly that that fundamental piece of the model has changed.

You sound miserable to work for. Other juniors, don't let people tell you you're worth so little. Unless you want to make partner. Then you have no worth and should grind until you can't take it.

Source -- Second year in good standing with great reviews, who would either ignore your email until the morning or reply with a "will look in the morning."

I'm a 2nd year in litigation and the only time anybody has ever emailed me at 11 PM was because I forgot to check a doc back in.

[Anonymous User]

Alright; Party’s over, kids. The rest of the firms will match, no more raises. Debate is over. /thread

[Anonymous User]

Anyone got a theory on why DPW goes with these weird 500 dollar numbers?

They basically did 3% exactly from Milbank scale.

To me that indicates some argument occured and 3% for seniors was the compromise result

[ElCuervo]

This thread lacks nothing.

[Anonymous User]

KE will send us sweet petermillar quarter zips to rock on the 6-express train though.

I am sorry to nitpick, but 6 . . . express train? Are you someone pretending to live in NYC, or is it just you haven’t been on the subway since March 2020?

To get back on topic, I would bet good money that at least one firm (if not CSM, then someone else) will “clean up” the scale by eliminating the .5Ks. And the people saying that special bonuses are coming down the pike (from DPW at least) are coping hard.

[Anonymous User]

Alright; Party’s over, kids. The rest of the firms will match, no more raises. Debate is over. /thread

Stop being a Karen and let us vent.

[Anonymous User]

I'm a first year ('21) and I've drafted a lot of secondary docs, and have been on deals with 2d/3d years drafting primary docs. I also fix commas and do various diligence stuff, and of course we have a lot to learn. But the notion that we are useless is outdated and dumb.

First years are not practicing law.

Name one thing a first year does that a good paralegal couldn't do?

HE JUST SAID "I ALSO FIX COMMAS." CAN YOU READ???

[Anonymous User]

If this thread dies, TLS dies. Don't kill it.

[Anonymous User]

Whether you are useful or not as a junior that’s not really what they’re getting at - it’s whether you’re fungible. A lot of firms are struggling in the lateral market to find those vintages, so it does make sense they would step up on retention.

Also, there is no such thing as a useful first year - it’s the third years getting screwed by this IMO.

[Anonymous User]

CSM/Kirkland are going to re-raise. I feel it in my bones.

I think there's a real chance CSM bumps juniors a little and cleans up the other figures. There's 0 chance Kirkland does anything. People need to get this through their heads re what's happened to the culture there. The wealthier the partners get there the cheaper they get. They're like the opposite of Milbank / DPW. If they're going to spend money they do it through targeted lateral hires, practice group buy outs, insane equity partner deals. They do not give a fuck about general associate comp.

Although I am also disappointed with the bonus multipliers, when it comes to raising general associate comp they have never been a leader. It’s not part of a new trend, it’s just the way they’ve always done it. Dutifully match whatever market is, sprinkle a little extra for bonuses (even if that extra is now kinda meh), and pump all the money into laterals - that’s been the game plan for many years and anyone who thinks Kirkland might make a first move hasn’t been paying attention.

I would LOVE to be wrong. Love it. But Kirkland doing anything other than a match would be a complete departure from history.

[Anonymous User]

Just gonna point out that anyone billing 2000 hours is *useful*, just by, if nothing else, definition. They are doing shit that needs to get done. I send juniors assignments that absolutely must get done well (eg, priv review) that if not for them I’d have to do. Is it as important as other shit like drafting dispositive briefs? Probably not, but nothing any of us do is that fucking important.

[VentureMBA]

Just gonna point out that anyone billing 2000 hours is *useful*, just by, if nothing else, definition. They are doing shit that needs to get done. I send juniors assignments that absolutely must get done well (eg, priv review) that if not for them I’d have to do. Is it as important as other shit like drafting dispositive briefs? Probably not, but nothing any of us do is that fucking important.

You ever used a bathroom in a building without janitors?