Tampa firm salaries after recent raises Forum

[Anonymous User]

You’re right. Top of UF is positioned well, as is rank 1-10 from UM/FSU depending on your bio factors/interviewing skills/softs.

The bolder part meant people from T30 law schools talking about Bradley Arant or Phelps like they are good firms. Getting paid 150k for 2200 hours is insanity if you can go to a large market and get biglaw.

It’s what I like about this forum rather than say, Reddit. They are hopelessly optimistic there. Here, you focus on good outcomes and positioning yourself well.

My point was really to highlight how the line is only blurry if you make it blurry. The firms worth considering are T2 firms (post above) for people who go to Top Law Schools. Otherwise the work is lame, the pay is shitty, and the hours are just the same as biglaw without the comp.

The dig at UF was juvenile but I wanted it to convey a larger point that just because UF is ranked high, you still need to be top 10% there to get a CHANCE at the T2 firms. And even then you need to be super credentialed as a top 10%er (law review, moot, journal).

There are too many T20ers targeting Florida to make UF just a slam dunk in the state.

Redditors are hopelessly idiotic about lawfirm hiring—they take the bizarre stance that just because you’re not aiming for Cravath-scale biglaw, you should be fine as there are allegedly plenty of $150K/year “midlaw” jobs for your median grads at regional schools, completely ignoring the bimodal salary distribution.

As someone who finds themselves trying to give advice on Reddit against this view point, I could not agree more. Everyone on there seems to think that if you can't land big law (and you have slightly better than bottom of the barrel credentials) there is a magic mid-law summer associate position just waiting for you

[Anonymous User]

Current 1L hoping to settle in Tampa. I’m hoping to figure out current salary data.

I’ve checked this forum and NALP, but a lot of the firms seem to have raised salaries over the past few months and that information is not available online. If anyone has intel about first-year salaries at any of the below firms (or at other firms I’m not thinking of), I’d appreciate it.

• Shook Hardy & Bacon
• Gunster
• GT
• Hill Ward Henderson
• Shumaker Loop & Kendrick
• Phelps Dunbar
• Nelson Mullins
• Bradley Arant Boult Cummings
• Trenam
• Cole Scott & Kissane
• Shutts & Bowen

I’m still in law school, and this is just information I was able to find online, so please feel welcome to correct me. I have researched it a bit because I’m hoping to end up in Tampa.

Tier 1
The only “true market” firm in Tampa is H&K (but bonuses may be off-market--I couldn’t find information on that).

Then it’s Foley, which starts at DPW scale for the first three years and then compresses afterward. The compression isn’t as stark as you’ll see at some of the other firms, but it’s between $15k-$45k less per year.

You’d think that GT would pay market, but they’re black-box everywhere except for like New York, Miami, etc. I’ve heard that they start under DPW scale in Tampa and that they’re even more compressed than Foley afterward. I don’t have exact numbers for post-DPW raises, but before then, they paid between $130k-$190k depending on market (this gives you an idea of their range).

Tier 2
Next is Akerman. It’s also hard to find salary data on Akerman. I saw a post on here or another forum or something saying that corporate folks are starting at $205k in all offices now, but that other practice groups are lower. I only found one post saying this, so who knows whether it’s true. Raises after the first year are severely compressed (again, moreso than the ones explained above).

Gunster is at $170-175. It’s compressed afterward.

According to NALP, Shook is at $170k. I’m not sure I believe that (maybe it was just an entry error in NALP?), but that’s what it says.

Tier 3
Carlton Fields is at $145k according to Vault/Firsthand.

Shutts & Bowen is around $150k for first-years in south Florida, so I really doubt they’d be higher in Tampa.

Shumaker is at $145k starting.

Quarles is at $140k starting.

Bradley is hard to find information on; all I have is that it’s between $130k-$170k depending on market. I’d expect the to fall into this tier.

Last I’d heard, Hill Ward was at $120k for first-years, but I’d expect that they’ve raised to match the other firms in this tier.

Tier 4
Nelson Mullins is between $120k-$140k in Florida. I found a thread on another forum saying that they started at $125k in Orlando two years ago.

Phelps is between $120k-$140k.

Tier 5
All of the following firms pay between $90k - $120k (and most of them fall on the lower end of that range):

GrayRobinson

Stearns Weaver

Rumberger Kirk

Trenam

Greenspoon

Stearns Weaver is definitely not in the $90-120k range, not sure where you got that information from. They are in the 160k range starting. I also highly doubt GrayRobinson is that low either. I would guess they are around 145k.

[Anonymous User]

What are bonuses like at Holland & Knight or Foley these days?