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But large firms dominate the field. Two decades ago, Shearman & Sterling may have been the nation's largest law firm with just 160 attorneys. Today many have more than 250. While firms expand by adding partners, most of their growth comes through the addition of associates, their most profitable asset. Associates may earn perhaps $30 an hour, but a firm's clients may be charged $100 or more an hour for their services.
With profit margins like that, firms are sorely tempted to hire associates in numbers out of proportion to the increase in partners. Ratios of 7 to 1 or 8 to 1 are not uncommon, meaning that an ever smaller fraction of associates can count on "making partner," their chief goal and the prime justification for enduring the hardships of the early years. Meanwhile, the drain of recruits jumping ship after a few years has become a bottom-line issue for the firms. "At best it isn't until the third year that you begin to make money on an associate," says Roger Feldman, managing partner at Boston's Gaston Snow & Ely Bartlett.
Recognizing that the problems of their associates have increased in proportion to the bounding growth of the firms, many big firms are trying to act smaller. The legal world of Los Angeles, which likes to bill itself as a humane alternative to the sweatshops of Wall Street, is a case in point. O'Melveny & Myers, the firm abandoned by Robert Jason, now assigns individual partners to act as advisers and buddies for each of its associates. "In a smaller firm it happens naturally," says O'Melveny Partner Robert Vanderet. "Here we're trying to give it a little push."
Across town at the somewhat smaller firm of Wyman, Bautzer, Rothman, Kuchel & Silbert, associates are given some less complex cases to steer on their own. And at Latham & Watkins, which boasts one of the lowest attrition rates in the profession, associates move through several legal specialties before choosing the one they like best. They also serve on committees that make recommendations concerning raises, bonuses and promotions. "We get them involved in the management of the firm right away," says William Meeske, the Latham partner in charge of hiring. "We want them to stay." Ironically, the current salary competition touched off by Cravath may help to spread such practices. As more firms find themselves unable to match the amounts promised by the league leaders, they can be expected to lure recruits with the promise of a more satisfying work life. In the end, that may look better to law school graduates than high numbers on a paycheck.