What practice areas are expected to become seriously in demand in the near future? Forum

[Anonymous User]

Title says it all.

[Anonymous User]

Title says it all.

Also interested. Any insight on demand in litigation?

[jotarokujo]

Title says it all.

Also interested. Any insight on demand in litigation?

broadly speaking, litigation is countercyclical. it doesn't go up like corporate during a boom, but doesn't go down or even goes up during a recession

[nealric]

Title says it all.

Also interested. Any insight on demand in litigation?

Litigation has generally faded a bit as far as biglaw revenue earners are concerned. Companies are increasingly willing to pay 7 figure legal fees on an 9 figure transaction, but they aren't willing to pay 7 figure legal fees on a 7 or 8 figure dispute. And there aren't nearly as many 9+ figure disputes as there are 9 figure transactions. Increased automation in discovery has stopped the mass doc review gravy train to a large extent.

That said, legal disputes will exist as long as there is a legal system. As trials become more rare in large corporate matters, those who actually know their way around a courtroom but can plausibly handle a complex commercial dispute will be in high demand. There are more and more biglaw litigation partners out there that have never handled a real trial.

[dyemond]

As a non-tax lawyer, if I could do it all over again I'd do tax, doesn't matter where the economy is, you need solid tax lawyers.

[Anonymous User]

Anything regulatory is always a solid bet since the federal government is not going anywhere.

Space and weed are two areas that seem emerging, although the former is a little speculative.

[nealric]

As a non-tax lawyer, if I could do it all over again I'd do tax, doesn't matter where the economy is, you need solid tax lawyers.

As a tax lawyer, I'm a bit more ambivalent about that statement. Biglaw tax is mostly about deal work. There's some planning that is purely internal (no underlying deal), and some controversy, but it's the deal work that really brings home the bacon. That's just a cyclical as corporate. On the other hand, firms tend to hang onto their tax folks more readily as their specialized expertise is harder to replace, and their high billing rates mean they can be profitable even with lower billables.

[dyemond]

As a non-tax lawyer, if I could do it all over again I'd do tax, doesn't matter where the economy is, you need solid tax lawyers.

As a tax lawyer, I'm a bit more ambivalent about that statement. Biglaw tax is mostly about deal work. There's some planning that is purely internal (no underlying deal), and some controversy, but it's the deal work that really brings home the bacon. That's just a cyclical as corporate. On the other hand, firms tend to hang onto their tax folks more readily as their specialized expertise is harder to replace, and their high billing rates mean they can be profitable even with lower billables.

Yep, I don't disagree with that in a vacuum--I am thinking of the shops with top-tier BK/distressed depts that heat up during the countercycle, when the tax teams are just in demand then to walk through all the angles of the BK plan. If you're at certain shops whose corporate practices are just limited to pubco/strategic M&A, then yeah, your tax teams will slow down during the other side of the cycle.

[Anonymous User]

Exec comp. Even in downtimes, companies need to pay their employees or figure out creative ways to restructure existing comp arrangements. For transactions, boom is more M&A and offerings and recessions bring more bankruptcies. Either way, there is always something to do.

[giganto67]

With renewables becoming a bigger deal would project finance be seen as a growing area?

[diglaw]

With renewables becoming a bigger deal would project finance be seen as a growing area?

I would imagine so, yes. Anything related to renewables/sustainability is here to stay/grow

[nealric]

As a non-tax lawyer, if I could do it all over again I'd do tax, doesn't matter where the economy is, you need solid tax lawyers.

As a tax lawyer, I'm a bit more ambivalent about that statement. Biglaw tax is mostly about deal work. There's some planning that is purely internal (no underlying deal), and some controversy, but it's the deal work that really brings home the bacon. That's just a cyclical as corporate. On the other hand, firms tend to hang onto their tax folks more readily as their specialized expertise is harder to replace, and their high billing rates mean they can be profitable even with lower billables.

Yep, I don't disagree with that in a vacuum--I am thinking of the shops with top-tier BK/distressed depts that heat up during the countercycle, when the tax teams are just in demand then to walk through all the angles of the BK plan. If you're at certain shops whose corporate practices are just limited to pubco/strategic M&A, then yeah, your tax teams will slow down during the other side of the cycle.

Even if you have a big BK shop, few firms have a BK side that rivals the corporate side in scale. My old firm had a decent BK shop, but things were still slow in tax back in 2009-10.