Karen Sloan

2012-02-28 12:00:00 AM

Four years after the onset of a painful recession, the first-year associate hiring picture at large law firms looks much different than during the glory days of 2007.

The most prestigious law schools still dominate when it comes to placing graduates. But the percentage of 2011 law grads at the nation's elite firms continued a decline that began in 2009. It seems that large firms have yet to regain their appetite for robust first-year associate classes.

The 20 law schools most popular with hiring firms in 2007 sent a combined 55 percent of their graduates to NLJ 250 firms — the nation's largest by attorney headcount. For the class of 2011, that percentage was 36.

Few observers predict a major uptick in entry-level hiring in 2012, given that the legal industry has yet to rebound to its prerecession strength and that this year's summer clerk classes are largely the same size as last year's.

The latest client advisory from the Hildebrandt Institute and Citi Private Bank warned that "the legal market ended 2011 with fairly sluggish ­overall performance" and that growth in demand for legal services has been modest. Overall, the advisory predicted "limited growth for the legal market."

"Subject to a drastic slowdown or heating up of the economy, I don't see things changing too much next year," said Jim Leipold, executive director of the National Association for Law Placement. "Law firms are hiring very carefully and very specifically. I don't think any firms will go back to those big class sizes."

As recently as 2007, most graduates of the top U.S. law schools landed associate jobs at NLJ 250 firms. Columbia Law School sent three-quarters of its graduates to those firms that year, while more than 70 percent of the graduates of Northwestern University School of Law, the University of Chicago Law School and New York University School of Law snagged those jobs. In 2011, no single law school sent more than 57 percent of its graduates to NLJ 250 firms.

This year, Ropes & Gray will host about 110 summer clerks, down by nearly one-half from the peak 200 it hired during the summer of 2009, hiring partner Richard Batchelder said. Keeping the size of its summer class relatively small helps ensure the firm will be able to extend job offers to all of its clerks, he said. "I continue to believe that demand for services will drive decisions about how many people to hire," Batchelder said. "It's hard to contemplate getting back to a summer class of 200 for a firm of our size."

RETHINKING THE MODEL

The model of bringing in armies of new associates each year may be on the way out, said Mary Young, a law firm consultant with the Zeughauser Group.

"Some firms won't need as many new associates as they used to because the nature of the work is changing," she said. "Some of that more routine legal work that used to be handled by a lot of associates is now being done by contract attorneys or outside providers."

Some firms are introducing entry-­level, nonpartnership attorney tracks, helping to reduce the overall number of traditional, partner-track associate positions, Leipold said.

Summer-associate hiring is the best indication of where the large-firm associate job market is headed, because firms generally make permanent job offers to prospects who complete their summer programs, and Ropes & Gray is hardly the only firm taking a cautious approach.

NALP has yet to release its statistics for summer class hiring for 2012, but Leipold said the average law firm summer class size remained at 15 for 2012 — the same as during 2011. That's better than the average summer class of eight during the depths of the recession, but is only half the prerecession average class size of 30, he said. There was a "modest uptick" in firm recruiting last fall, but that resulted in no significant increase in the number of summer offers.

McKenna Long & Aldridge is among the firms that have scaled back their summer classes, said Jennifer Queen, the firm's chief recruiting and development officer. Instead of hiring between 16 and 21 2Ls as it has in the past, the firm will hire 10 this summer.

"I think it will be slow to go back to the levels it was at before," she said. "But when the economy does turn around, if that's a possibility, we could have a shortage of midlevel associates. Firms are cutting their programs in half, and for the big firms hiring 130 or 160 associates, that's a significant decrease in the number of associates."

PERSONALITY TESTS

Because firms are hiring fewer summer associates, it's especially important that they hire wisely, Queen said. In 2007, McKenna Long began subjecting summer and lateral hiring prospects to a personality-assessment test. Following an on-campus interview, but before a callback interview, prospective summer associates complete the 20-minute online assessment to provide a better idea of their strengths and weaknesses. The test helps hiring partners figure out what to ask the prospective hires about during their next interview, Queen said.

"The questions help you determine if they are an introvert or an extrovert, if they are a team player or more independent," she said. "We're looking for people who take initiative and have drive. Of course we want team players. We don't want people who are going to be passive."

Gibson Dunn & Crutcher is always on the lookout for people who demonstrate life experience and the right personality traits in interviews, said Steven Sletten, chairman of the hiring committee. The firm is bucking the national trend and boosting its summer class this year — 165 summer clerks, compared with 117 last summer. And although it might seem a buyer's market, given the reduced number of summer-associate positions available and the large number of students clamoring for those spots, competition among firms for the very best prospects remains stiff.

"We've seen very intense competition for the top candidates among our peer firms," said Sletten, noting that Gibson Dunn has done its share of follow-up recruiting, including telephone calls, e-mails, lunches and dinners. "It's very intense. We've had to pull out all the stops to get the best people."

Batchelder agreed that the competition among top firms for high-performing law students is "as robust as ever."

For their part, law students recognize that the dynamics of the job market have shifted. They have responded by being more careful about where they apply and arriving for interviews better prepared and with more polish, according to a number of recruiting partners.

"I do think that law students are approaching it differently," Sletten said. "Obviously, there is a lot of concern in the marketplace, and even the best and brightest are nervous about their prospects. It seems, by and large, that they are more serious. There's even a different attitude among the summer classes. They seem more serious about their goals and what they are trying to achieve."

Largely gone is the sense that law students can wing their on-campus interviews or will snag summer jobs based solely on the prestige of their law schools or impressive grades.

"I think the student mindset is, 'I'm not coming into this entitled.' And that's refreshing," Queen said. "But I think there's a lot of fear on the part of students. They are coming into these interviews like, 'Game on.'"

Karen Sloan is a reporter for The National Law Journal, a Legal affiliate based in New York.

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