Despite complaints from naysayers, Biglaw firms seem to have successfully shifted from their pandemic-era remote work policies into hybrid office attendance policies. In fact, according to a recent survey from Thomson Reuters of 350+ law firm employees across 100+ large law firms, Biglaw’s office attendance policies have been “embraced … with startling enthusiasm.” As noted in the survey results, more than half of employees at large law firms — 57%, to be exact — were “satisfied” with their office attendance policies, while 29% were “neutral” on those attendance policies. Just 13% of respondents said they were “not satisfied” with what their firms had mandated as far as office attendance is concerned.
“There was a lot of consternation around return-to-office policies. You heard a lot of concern around law firms coming back and enforcing very strict back-to-the-office and full-time policies,” Bill Josten, strategic content manager for Thomson Reuters, told the American Lawyer. “And what we found was, the majority of law firms aren’t forcing people back to the office full time (and are) not being particularly strident in their enforcement, and lawyers are saying, ‘Oh, this strikes a good balance.’”
Biglaw firms are actually getting even more in-office engagement than they planned for. While most survey respondents (71%) said their firms require at least three days of office attendance each week, a “surprising” number of lawyers are heading to their firms more often than what’s being mandated. “While only 15% of law firms require more than three days in the office,” the survey results state, “46% of respondents say they are showing up to the office four or more days per week.”
Biglaw consultants believe that the these office attendance policies are finally being accepted due to their overall flexibility and “light-touch” enforcement. Here’s more from Am Law:
“What I’m hearing is that there’s sort of an acceptance at this point,” said Laura Terrell, an executive coach/consultant and former Big Law partner. She said one immediate challenge for firms was employees who had moved away from metro areas and from their main office.
“But firms made the transition more gradual for people, and there are still firms where people would tell you the requirement is three days or four days, but they’re allowed to be more flexible, and as long as they have a couple days they’re not required to be in, they’re fine with that,” Terrell said.
Yes, while several Biglaw firms have threatened to clip associate bonuses based on their office attendance — including Ropes & Gray, Sidley, Davis Polk, Cahill, Simpson Thacher, and Arnold & Porter — the majority of Thomson Reuters survey respondents (about 95%) say enforcement of those attendance policies has been “passive” or “moderate,” with just 5% saying in-office attendance policies are being “aggressively” enforced at their firms.
Biglaw associates and partners have now accepted their in-office fates in a post-pandemic world, and it seems unlikely that any further hybrid work policy changes will be coming — to do so at this point would almost certainly upset the apple cart to which large law firm employees have become accustomed.
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‘Acceptance’ of Return-to-Work Policies Permeates Big Law [American Lawyer]
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 X/Twitter and Threads or connect with her on LinkedIn.
