The coronavirus crisis has ravaged Biglaw firms, with salary cuts, furloughs, and layoffs galore. Some firms are delaying or reducing bonuses, and others are eliminating bonuses (and salary increases) entirely this year. Given the economic fallout of the pandemic, it seemed unlikely that any firm would be offering previously scheduled bonus payouts — especially firms that had already announced a veritable pu pu platter of austerity measures.
But that’s exactly what’s happening.
Sources tell us that earlier this month, Husch Blackwell — a firm that originally slashed equity partner draws by 15 percent and reduced salaries for all managing directors and c-level executives by 10 percent before later cutting compensation for all income partners by 10 percent and implementing a round of rightsizing measures for lawyers and staff (ranging from job terminations and furloughs to salary reductions, transitions to less-than-fulltime status, early retirements, and deferrals) — paid out a special associate bonus that was supposed to be deferred until January 2021 under the auspices of the firm’s COVID cuts.
In a brief memo about the firm’s associate client development bonus (i.e., associates’ cut of work they bring in), Dean Boeschen, Husch Blackwell’s chief growth officer, had this encouraging message for associates: “Thank you for all of your hard work and efforts over the last few months. Your initiative and follow through truly helps us stand above the competition.” As with almost all other firms that have partially rolled back their austerity measures, things must be going better than expected over at Husch Blackwell. That memo is available on the next page.
Congratulations to all associates at the firm who received their client development bonuses much earlier than expected.
Remember everyone, we depend on your tips to stay on top of important bonus updates, so when your firm announces any type of bonus payment for associates, please text us (646-820-8477) or email us (subject line: “[Firm Name] Bonuses”). Please include the memo if available. You can take a photo of the memo and send it via text or email if you don’t want to forward the original PDF or Word file.
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Earlier: After Slashing Partner Compensation, Biglaw Firm Moves To Stage 2 Of COVID-19 Austerity Measures: Attorney Layoffs (And More)
Executive And Partner Salaries Are On The Chopping Block At This Am Law 200 Firm
Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.