2009 Law Department Compensation Benchmarking Survey

We recently released the 2009 Law Department Compensation Benchmarking Survey.  This survey allows in house law departments to benchmark their compensation across comparable departments (size, geography etc) and provides a meaningful baseline against which to evaluate the equity and competitiveness of the compensation system in use.  (Full description.)

It's quite obvious how useful this information is to in house law departments and their management in reviewing salaries and bonuses for the law departments.  (HR routinely departments use similar surveys for other groups.)  But what I found most interesting though, is that we have a large number of individuals at law firms that also purchase this survey every year. 

When asked, the reasons vary from simple curiosity to use as a tool to show young associates on a partner track that the long hours and personal sacrifice is worth it (as compared to a "cushy" 9 - 5 job in house).

When I reflected more on the 'simple curiosity' answer, I realized that it's not as simple as I was tempted to believe.  One individual in particular who answered 'Oh I just like to know' struck me as a really sharp, intelligent individual who has had serious success in his business development efforts.  He obviously sees more value in this information than just idle curiosity - even if he didn't articulate or realize it.

Knowing how much (on average - since we don't publish anyone's individual salaries) your client makes can go a long way in framing any discussion around money - be it for billing rates or even for talking about what you did over the weekend.  Knowing that a GC in the Information/Telecom industry makes roughly 200K more per year that a GC in Health Care, can sometimes help frame discussions, pitches etcetera.

My point here is not to pitch the survey but to point out that any information that can help you understand your customer is valuable information - and smart business development professional look in unexpected places for that info.

Comments

[Kevin Iredell]

Hi Marcy, Thanks for you Comment. I did not intend to imply that working as an in house counsel was cushy. I use that term tongue-in-cheek; sort of an indication of "the grass is always greener..."

I don't think it's uncommon for either side to look longingly at the other. I've heard in house counsel say "That would be nice to be at a big firm because X" just as often as I've heard big firm attorneys say "I'd love to work in house somewhere."

As the saying goes "the grass is always greener on the other side."

Please accept my apology, no offense was intended.

Kevin

[Marcy]

I take offense to your characterization of my job as "cushy". I will not be buying your survey.