It’s officially bonus o’clock at yet another Biglaw firm. One by one, members of the Am Law 100 have made their own bonus announcements, matching the prevailing market bonus scale (and sometimes beating it for associates whose performance in 2021 was extraordinary in terms of billable hours and/or client service).
The latest firm to share the wealth with associates and counsel through its year-end bonus program is Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe. The firm brought in $1,152,850,000 gross revenue in 2020, putting it in 35th place in the most recent Am Law 100 ranking. Orrick’s bonus schedule should look quite familiar if you’ve been following Above the Law this bonus season.
That’s a Cravath/Davis Polk match, and according to Orrick’s memo, its hardest working associates and counsel will be eligible for additional bonus amounts. The firm has also committed to pay special bonuses to its career associates and analytics project attorneys.
The firm’s 1950 hours baseline for bonus eligibility includes up to 100 hours of a combination of training, DEI, business development, innovation, and other forms of firm and self-investment; pro bono hours; as well as up to 40 hours of time devoted to unplugging (i.e., time for attorneys to take care of themselves and their families and to invest in their own mental health and wellness). As noted in the firm’s memo, Orrick calls its “Unplug on Us” program “an important reflection of what we collectively value.”
Congratulations to everyone at Orrick on their year-end and special bonuses!
(Flip to the next page to read the full memo from Orrick.)
Remember everyone, we depend on your tips to stay on top of important bonus updates, so when your firm matches, please text us (646-820-8477) or email us (subject line: “[Firm Name] Matches”). 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.
And if you’d like to sign up for ATL’s Bonus Alerts (which is the alert list we also use for salary announcements), please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the bonus alerts, you don’t need to do anything. You’ll receive an email notification within minutes of each bonus announcement that we publish. Thanks for all of your help!
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.
