Stealth layoffs at Goodwin? Forum

[Anonymous User]

Heard through the grapevine that there were a couple (3-5) midlevels that were stealthed at Goodwin (M&A?). Obviously speculative, but now I'm anxious. Can anyone at Goodwin corroborate?

NY office.

[Anonymous User]

You'd think they'd have learned their lesson after the beginning of 2020. Either this is just hearsay or this is the worst managed firm in the v100. Either way, glad I escaped that place.

[Res Ipsa Loquitter]

Given the vast number of “M&A midlevels” who are terrible, I wouldn’t call 3-5 people a stealth layoff. Very few are actually capable of managing a deal reliably and doing good quality drafting.

[Anonymous User]

Also Goodwin NY, haven't heard anything like this. But 3-5 people isn't that many out of the hundreds that were hired last year.

[Anonymous User]

Also at Goodwin in corporate and haven't heard anything. Certainly possible, although the usual caveats about legit performance-related attrition that's normal as versus canning folks in good standing, i.e., true stealth layoffs.

[Anonymous User]

Also at Goodwin in corporate and haven't heard anything. Certainly possible, although the usual caveats about legit performance-related attrition that's normal as versus canning folks in good standing, i.e., true stealth layoffs.

Agree with this. All firms (literally) fire certain individuals based on performance, which is probably what this situation is. If you’re worried, maybe focus on your performance and not necessarily whether you will be part of a “stealth layoff”...

[Anonymous User]

Not at Goodwin but I have a hard time believing that any reasonably profitable firm is in layoff mode. Maybe Goodwin is particularly tone deaf / evil.

I do think it's likely that some firms will reassess staffing after the mad rush of hiring in the last year or so. There's bound to be people who don't fit in or haven't been carrying their weight.

[Anonymous User]

My friend confirmed that one of their colleagues was stealthed. Their hours stalled (but were still on track to bill 1900-2000). They were blindsided by the performance review and were given 3 months to find a new stint.

[Anonymous User]

My friend confirmed that one of their colleagues was stealthed. Their hours stalled (but were still on track to bill 1900-2000). They were blindsided by the performance review and were given 3 months to find a new stint.

There’s more to this that we’re (and you’re) not hearing. Firms don’t “stealth” associates turning in 2,000 hours billed years.

[Anonymous User]

My friend confirmed that one of their colleagues was stealthed. Their hours stalled (but were still on track to bill 1900-2000). They were blindsided by the performance review and were given 3 months to find a new stint.

There’s more to this that we’re (and you’re) not hearing. Firms don’t “stealth” associates turning in 2,000 hours billed years.

This also happened to someone I know at WSGR.

[Anonymous User]

I thought Goodwin routinely trims the fat? At least this was the rumor I heard like 5-7 years ago when I was interviewing.

I know the previous poster said their colleague was blindsided, but feedback at firms is pretty crappy so it's easy to bumble along doing meh work until you're no longer useful or can't take on more responsibility. Then they pull the rug out from under you.

[Anonymous User]

My friend confirmed that one of their colleagues was stealthed. Their hours stalled (but were still on track to bill 1900-2000). They were blindsided by the performance review and were given 3 months to find a new stint.

There’s more to this that we’re (and you’re) not hearing. Firms don’t “stealth” associates turning in 2,000 hours billed years.

This also happened to someone I know at WSGR.

I stand by the comment. I’ve never heard of an associate (without some other serious—very serious—problem) turning in a 2,000 billable (non-pro-bono) year and getting stealthed. The economics just wouldn’t make sense; firm would be cutting its nose off to spite itself.

When “stealthing” emerged during ITE back in the day it was being directed at people whose work had dried up (or never been present) and were turning in e.g., 1000, 1200, 1400, 1600 hour years or pacing for the same—maybe through no fault of their own.

Cynic in me also recognizes that people who are getting fired for legit performance reasons a/o low hour years are often going to turn around and tell people in their network how they were “stealthed” despite a “stellar year” because why the hell would you admit you billed 1,350 and were given the talk.

TL;DR: Still not convinced there’s a single associate in 2022 who’s billed 2,000 hours for the 12-month and been “stealthed” short of someone sleeping with their secretary or the partner’s SO, destroying documents, committing fraud, etc.

[Anonymous User]

Cynic in me also recognizes that people who are getting fired for legit performance reasons a/o low hour years are often going to turn around and tell people in their network how they were “stealthed” despite a “stellar year” because why the hell would you admit you billed 1,350 and were given the talk.

TL;DR: Still not convinced there’s a single associate in 2022 who’s billed 2,000 hours for the 12-month and been “stealthed” short of someone sleeping with their secretary or the partner’s SO, destroying documents, committing fraud, etc.

Bingo. Who's going to tell their buddies "yeah, they fired me because my work was bad/I'm way below hours/etc."? No one.

"I didn't see it coming, I swear! I was billing 2k hours and had across-the-board stellar reviews!" just doesn't make sense. You don't get rid of someone making you money.

[BrowsingTLS]

The skepticism about stealth layoffs is good.

But let's not forget Goodwin did fire many associates the moment covid-19 achieved recognized status in the U.S.

[Anonymous User]

My friend confirmed that one of their colleagues was stealthed. Their hours stalled (but were still on track to bill 1900-2000). They were blindsided by the performance review and were given 3 months to find a new stint.

There’s more to this that we’re (and you’re) not hearing. Firms don’t “stealth” associates turning in 2,000 hours billed years.

This also happened to someone I know at WSGR.

I stand by the comment. I’ve never heard of an associate (without some other serious—very serious—problem) turning in a 2,000 billable (non-pro-bono) year and getting stealthed. The economics just wouldn’t make sense; firm would be cutting its nose off to spite itself.

When “stealthing” emerged during ITE back in the day it was being directed at people whose work had dried up (or never been present) and were turning in e.g., 1000, 1200, 1400, 1600 hour years or pacing for the same—maybe through no fault of their own.

Cynic in me also recognizes that people who are getting fired for legit performance reasons a/o low hour years are often going to turn around and tell people in their network how they were “stealthed” despite a “stellar year” because why the hell would you admit you billed 1,350 and were given the talk.

TL;DR: Still not convinced there’s a single associate in 2022 who’s billed 2,000 hours for the 12-month and been “stealthed” short of someone sleeping with their secretary or the partner’s SO, destroying documents, committing fraud, etc.

Also, you guys are conflating billing 2,000 hours, with what that individual's realized hours are. Stealthing could easily happen to someone who bills 2,000 hours, but the group only realizes 1,000 of those hours.

[Anonymous User]

My friend confirmed that one of their colleagues was stealthed. Their hours stalled (but were still on track to bill 1900-2000). They were blindsided by the performance review and were given 3 months to find a new stint.

There’s more to this that we’re (and you’re) not hearing. Firms don’t “stealth” associates turning in 2,000 hours billed years.

This also happened to someone I know at WSGR.

I stand by the comment. I’ve never heard of an associate (without some other serious—very serious—problem) turning in a 2,000 billable (non-pro-bono) year and getting stealthed. The economics just wouldn’t make sense; firm would be cutting its nose off to spite itself.

When “stealthing” emerged during ITE back in the day it was being directed at people whose work had dried up (or never been present) and were turning in e.g., 1000, 1200, 1400, 1600 hour years or pacing for the same—maybe through no fault of their own.

Cynic in me also recognizes that people who are getting fired for legit performance reasons a/o low hour years are often going to turn around and tell people in their network how they were “stealthed” despite a “stellar year” because why the hell would you admit you billed 1,350 and were given the talk.

TL;DR: Still not convinced there’s a single associate in 2022 who’s billed 2,000 hours for the 12-month and been “stealthed” short of someone sleeping with their secretary or the partner’s SO, destroying documents, committing fraud, etc.

Also, you guys are conflating billing 2,000 hours, with what that individual's realized hours are. Stealthing could easily happen to someone who bills 2,000 hours, but the group only realizes 1,000 of those hours.

IME that's the managing and relationship partners' problems not the associates. The expectation is that the associate turns in the 2,000 hour year and it's the partners who are supposed to ensure that they have healthy client relationships so they're able to realize the time being billed. Corollary is if there's a problem with realization rates, at least when I've seen it, the blame falls more on the partners not the billing associates. Not to say some mercurial partners (at a firm with a shitty culture) might not take it out on an associate anyway, but it's very rare for associates to get talked to about their realization rates because it's recognized that's sort of out of their control.

[veers]

Hours isn't really the right metric to look at, at best it could serve as a lagging indicator that partners have decided you are incompetent and are done with you. You definitely have up and out firms (think S&C or Cravath) who are very happy to tell a 9th/10th year associate billing 2k hours that things haven't worked out, partner/counsel isn't on the cards, and it is time to get out, even if they are perfectly good at their jobs.

Even at lower ranked firms, like Goodwin, you could have a pretty bad midlevel associate who has already burned bridges with multiple partners, but is still getting 2k hours of (reluctant) work from the remaining partners. Those remaining partners may themselves be unhappy with the associate and consider him/her pretty incompetent, but are just waiting for the other associates in the group to develop a bit more before cutting off bad associate. At some point those partners may decide that they have enough competent bodies around to get rid of bad associate without meaningful consequences. That can happen rather suddenly, and happen well before hours have crashed, especially if there are already multiple "incidents" of poor performance by said associate.

For example, I know of associates billing 2200+ who were shown the door for making too many mistakes and causing angry phone calls from clients to the head of the group, including for misstating clear points of law, among other things. No "fireable" offenses, but just generally too many mistakes made at inopportune times, and a general lack of precision and carefulness.

Long and short of it is to focus on actually being good at the job and being the 1st choice associate for the important partners. Just showing up and grinding out hours is not a guarantee of job security. Problem is that some people don't have very good self awareness, and think they are a top 15% associate when in reality they are a bottom 20% one. No cure for that but experience.

[Anonymous User]

...
When “stealthing” emerged during ITE back in the day it was being directed at people whose work had dried up (or never been present) and were turning in e.g., 1000, 1200, 1400, 1600 hour years or pacing for the same—maybe through no fault of their own.
...

Sorry, what is ITE?

[Anonymous User]

Hours isn't really the right metric to look at, at best it could serve as a lagging indicator that partners have decided you are incompetent and are done with you. You definitely have up and out firms (think S&C or Cravath) who are very happy to tell a 9th/10th year associate billing 2k hours that things haven't worked out, partner/counsel isn't on the cards, and it is time to get out, even if they are perfectly good at their jobs.

Even at lower ranked firms, like Goodwin, you could have a pretty bad midlevel associate who has already burned bridges with multiple partners, but is still getting 2k hours of (reluctant) work from the remaining partners. Those remaining partners may themselves be unhappy with the associate and consider him/her pretty incompetent, but are just waiting for the other associates in the group to develop a bit more before cutting off bad associate. At some point those partners may decide that they have enough competent bodies around to get rid of bad associate without meaningful consequences. That can happen rather suddenly, and happen well before hours have crashed, especially if there are already multiple "incidents" of poor performance by said associate.

For example, I know of associates billing 2200+ who were shown the door for making too many mistakes and causing angry phone calls from clients to the head of the group, including for misstating clear points of law, among other things. No "fireable" offenses, but just generally too many mistakes made at inopportune times, and a general lack of precision and carefulness.

Long and short of it is to focus on actually being good at the job and being the 1st choice associate for the important partners. Just showing up and grinding out hours is not a guarantee of job security. Problem is that some people don't have very good self awareness, and think they are a top 15% associate when in reality they are a bottom 20% one. No cure for that but experience.

Right, but also don't forget that if you're a 5th year billing 2k hours of junior work on only maters that are so busy they'll staff a dead body, then the firm could absolutely drop the axe.

I work in lit, so I'll use that as an example. A 5th year might be doing almost exclusively doc review without ever having volunteered to run any depo prep, run M&Cs, or write key briefs could absolutely. Not bad work, just not ambitious. That's 100% going to show up on your review, so when the department meets to discuss how everyone is progressing and sees that the bro is a failure to launch, they could absolutely say cya. You don't need to have any major mistakes or partners with a vendetta (though any of those would be icing on the cake), just little to no prospects for development. You're not going to have prior bad reviews per se either since you haven't really done much.

I agree firms could go the other way on this - they are still making money so they don't NEED to hand out the pink slip. All I'm saying there's a reason to trim the fat like this.

[Anonymous User]

Hours isn't really the right metric to look at, at best it could serve as a lagging indicator that partners have decided you are incompetent and are done with you. You definitely have up and out firms (think S&C or Cravath) who are very happy to tell a 9th/10th year associate billing 2k hours that things haven't worked out, partner/counsel isn't on the cards, and it is time to get out, even if they are perfectly good at their jobs.

Even at lower ranked firms, like Goodwin, you could have a pretty bad midlevel associate who has already burned bridges with multiple partners, but is still getting 2k hours of (reluctant) work from the remaining partners. Those remaining partners may themselves be unhappy with the associate and consider him/her pretty incompetent, but are just waiting for the other associates in the group to develop a bit more before cutting off bad associate. At some point those partners may decide that they have enough competent bodies around to get rid of bad associate without meaningful consequences. That can happen rather suddenly, and happen well before hours have crashed, especially if there are already multiple "incidents" of poor performance by said associate.

For example, I know of associates billing 2200+ who were shown the door for making too many mistakes and causing angry phone calls from clients to the head of the group, including for misstating clear points of law, among other things. No "fireable" offenses, but just generally too many mistakes made at inopportune times, and a general lack of precision and carefulness.

Long and short of it is to focus on actually being good at the job and being the 1st choice associate for the important partners. Just showing up and grinding out hours is not a guarantee of job security. Problem is that some people don't have very good self awareness, and think they are a top 15% associate when in reality they are a bottom 20% one. No cure for that but experience.

I agree with what you've said here but it also needs to be put in context: You're talking about outlier situations (it isn't every day that an associate gets clear points of law wrong to the point that a client is calling up the lead partner; that may not be quite the fireable offense of document destruction but it's a major fuck-up). Also, most firms have gone away from the "8 and you're done" model. For 99% of associates, doing decent work and turning in at least 2,000 billable hours means job security. And if anything your hours I think are a *leading* indicator of where things are going for you reputationally, not a lagging one. Being able to assemble 2,000 billed hours in a year is a good proxy for the question "do I have at least a decent reputation for doing good work"; it's when you stop being able to do that, whether from internal or external factors, that you need to start worrying.

[Anonymous User]

...
When “stealthing” emerged during ITE back in the day it was being directed at people whose work had dried up (or never been present) and were turning in e.g., 1000, 1200, 1400, 1600 hour years or pacing for the same—maybe through no fault of their own.
...

Sorry, what is ITE?

Jesus we're getting old ....

[Anonymous User]

...
When “stealthing” emerged during ITE back in the day it was being directed at people whose work had dried up (or never been present) and were turning in e.g., 1000, 1200, 1400, 1600 hour years or pacing for the same—maybe through no fault of their own.
...

Sorry, what is ITE?

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=18478

[Anonymous User]

They did it pre COVID in 2020. They fired some associates and a whole operation team. That's a known fact.

[Anonymous User]

Sorry, what is ITE?

In this economy (specifically, post 2008)

[Anonymous User]

I knew someone who said they got stealthed last year from Cleary lit as a 4th year, on track for 2,000+ hours who said there were no performance issues, just that work was slowing down. This never made sense to me though and I think lends more support to the idea that you can't always trust the explanations people give for why they were let go, so unless you see a clear pattern of "stealthing," not to get too nervous about it if your work is good and your hours are reasonable.