Region Competes In Legal Hiring, Especially With Women
New age perks, less stressful work have young lawyers looking west
BY John O. Cunningham
Special to the Worcester Business Journal
Despite a softening economy and significant salary escalations in the Boston market, Worcester-based law firms are still scooping their share of business clients and the lawyers needed to serve them.
"Business is good. We hired five lawyers in the past month, and we've added three new lateral hires, two from large firms and one from in-house," said Louis M. Ciavarra, managing partner of Bowditch & Dewey.
He also rejected the notion that Worcester firms are handicapped in the competitive bidding for top-ranked young associates. "Salary wars have always attracted a kind of candidate that we're not interested in hiring," Ciavarra said.
Anita Bille, a placement professional and principal at Legal Search Solutions in Hopkinton, asserted that "salary is important, but it is not the only selling point in recruiting young lawyers." She added that law school graduates are growing leery of the billable hour requirements associated with starting salaries that exceed $150,000 per year at large-market firms.
"Traditionally, law firms have always thrown money at associates to recruit them, but they are very different now than 20 years ago," Bille said, noting that many young lawyers will opt for a small-market firm that offers intangible benefits, such as work-life balance or structured mentoring.
"More personal attention and more time for family, that is the mantra for young associates now," she said.
Family Law
In fact, many law schools now have chapter memberships for "Law Students Building a Better Profession," an organization which rates firms on how well they treat their employees. The organization gives points to firms that offer formal training and mentoring programs or substantial paid parental leave.
"We are paying close attention to those issues that are important to young lawyers, and especially to the challenges faced by women attorneys," said Ciavarra, who added that his firm has steadily increased its percentages of women attorneys in recent years while offering solid salaries starting at $90,000 per year.
Marciann Dunnagan of Boston, executive director of the nationwide legal recruiting firm Special Counsel, affirmed that "there are many women who have gone to Worcester to develop their practices in part because they value shorter commutes and work-life balance."
Dunnagan added, "some associates are leaving large firms because of the mounting pressure to bill more hours," noting that one Boston candidate told her recently that he felt he was "falling behind other associates who are billing more than 2,300 hours (per year)."
Recruiters also noted that monster student loans and unappealing home prices inside of Interstate 95 are factors that favor solid firms in smaller cities. "Young mothers are especially sensitive to home prices, debts and the two-hour commute into Boston from any affordable suburb now," said Dunnagan.
She said some corporations are also shopping harder for high-quality law firms with lower overhead and salary structures.
"When money is tight, we have definitely seen companies looking to hire less expensive lawyers, provided they can get the same value," attorney J. Robert Seder affirmed. The managing partner of Worcester-based Seder & Chandler added that overhead has become an increasingly significant factor in hourly rates, with Boston firms paying lease rates of $100 per square foot compared to only $20 per square foot in Worcester.
The cost of real estate and facilities development is one reason that more life science and high-tech companies are moving away from Boston to the Route 9 corridor, another trend benefiting Worcester firms, according to recruiters.
"That area has provided me with several corporate clients," said Bille, noting that "they need large affordable spaces for research laboratories and expanding workforces."
Such corporate expansions and migrations have often been funded by venture capital or private equity groups that are less affected by the financial markets crisis, and they have helped to fuel growth in specific practices in the Worcester area. "Our work in life sciences, technology, government-related practice and commercial real estate is going very strong," said Ciavarra.
Bille affirmed that she has seen growing demand for such specialties, adding that "law firms are also hiring more trust and estate lawyers who can serve the planning needs of an aging work population."
With the softening economy, some also cited a growing demand for lawyers with experience in bankruptcy, corporate reorganization and loan workouts.
But none of the experts noted any rapid increase in minority hiring that was regionally based. "Diversity hiring has been more challenging. We are in the mix with other firms but not yet where we would like to be," Ciavarra admitted.
Dunnagan suggested that one complicating factor is the intense courtship of top-flight minority candidates by big-city firms in major markets that started diversity initiatives years ago.
"We just don't focus on hiring by numbers," said Seder, who added that his firm also does not set numerical targets for billable hours. "Integrity is the most important thing we look for, and it's the only thing that you must have here," he said, suggesting that billing incentives and lack of integrity can yield "creative billing" that exploits clients.
John O. Cunningham is a freelance writer based in Natick.
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