This weekend, the New York Times explored the cascade of sadness left behind after massive layoffs. Aside from fear, the Times noted that there can be a productivity downgrade that shows up in real economic terms.

Too often, their anxious and overworked remaining employees become risk-averse and unproductive, or leave for other jobs. As companies hire new workers or turn to outside vendors to compensate, the short-term savings from layoffs can evaporate.

The National Law Journal also has some stern advice for layoff-happy firms. According to Bruce McEwen of Adam Smith Esq., "law firms that slash associate numbers in hopes of keeping profits-per-partner high may be headed for trouble."

What else law firms can try, beyond going to $190K, after the jump.

A recent article in IP Law & Business suggested that rumors of the demise of IP specialty law firms have been greatly exaggerated. According to the piece, intellectual property boutiques continue to survive, despite encroachment on their turf by general-practice firms.

This is not to say, however, that everything is peachy in IP land. The article notes that Morgan & Finnegan, one prominent IP shop, "has lost 10 partners in the past year, and its overall head count is down considerably." (We wonder if they included Jeremy Pitcock in the partner losses.)

The firm has been shedding associates and staff, too. Earlier this week, we heard from several tipsters that Morgan & Finnegan was laying off lawyers, technical and scientific advisors, and staff.

We confirmed the news with Pat Bowers, director of administration for Morgan & Finnegan. She acknowledged the layoffs (and even had the courage to use the "L" word, which many other firms shun).

The firm believes in "the importance of communication," explained Bowers. "It's not like we were doing it behind closed doors." Prior to informing the affected employees, administration sent out a firm-wide email explaining that the firm was "scrutinizing our direct and indirect expenses, and looking at our staffing needs in New York and D.C."

The affected employees were notified of the layoffs starting on Friday of last week and ending yesterday by close of business (so if you're at the firm and haven't heard anything, you're in the clear). Bowers declined to provide exact numbers, citing confidentiality concerns, but said that (1) the firm "laid off less than 7 percent of attorneys and staff," and (2) the cuts were centered on staff, not lawyers.

More details, below the fold.

Earlier today, the American Lawyer published a report detailing declining profit margins in the legal industry.

It is nice to see that somebody commissioned an entire report to figure out obvious facts like "the first half of 2008 looks very different from the previous six years" and "[t]he slowdown is hitting the most profitable firms the hardest." In other breaking news, Britney Spears's career has hit a bump in the road.

Instead of a simple doom-and-gloom economic report, Am Law columnist (and Biglaw banker) Dan DiPietro offers this proposed solution to all the law firm ills: fire the associates!

"There is a silver lining. A bad year (and the numbers suggest 2008 will be even more trying than 2001, when partner profits were down slightly) will enable firms to take steps that partners would resist in a good year -- winnowing out unproductive lawyers and applying greater discipline to expense control."

Silver lining?

Partners, pundits, and others who like to play McKinsey & Co. on the weekends always suggest this form of fat cutting in tough economic times. But it is a disingenuous solution.

Read why, after the jump.

Late last night, a tipster told us of "a big round of administrative staff cuts" at Duane Morris. They were centered on the Philadelphia mothership, but also included other offices. As for the extent of the layoffs, "no good sense of how many, but big enough that the local managing partner fired off an email encouraging folks to come by his office and ask questions."

This morning brings confirmation of the cuts, from the National Law Journal:

Duane Morris, an international law firm with Philadelphia roots, has cut about 18% of its marketing and business development staff, making staff reductions that echo moves at other firms in recent months.

The firm, which has about 650 attorneys, now has a marketing and business development team of 30 to 35 people, after eliminating seven managers and staff and hiring three more senior executives in the past few months, said Ed Schechter, the firm's chief marketing officer.

Most of the eliminated jobs were in Philadelphia, where the bulk of the department's staff is based, but some were in other offices, including Chicago.

True to form, they're chalking it up to enhancing efficiency, rather than the tanking economy:

At Duane Morris, cost-cutting was a "secondary" consideration, with the firm primarily interested in building up a more experienced and leaner team, Schechter said in an interview.

Reductions in force don't sound very conductive to "building up" a "more experienced" team. But a "leaner" one, certainly.

Duane Morris cuts marketing, business development staff [National Law Journal]

Here's an idea for how Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft -- America's Firingest Law Firm™, which laid off 35 lawyers in January, and then 96 more last month -- can keep its surviving attorneys (plus all those incoming first-years) gainfully employed.

Have them work on the litigation over managing partner Robert Link's Hamptons house.

Cadwalader Managing Partner In Hamptons Real Estate Squabble [Am Law Daily]
Robert O. Link, Jr. v. Richard Sarcona: Complaint (PDF) [Am Law Daily]
3 Halsey Path, Southampton, NY [Zillow]

Earlier: Prior ATL coverage of Robert Link (scroll down)
Prior ATL coverage of CWT (scroll down)

The law firm of Reed Smith -- which, as its Google listing reminds us, is "[o]ne of the 15 largest law firms in the world" -- has been in the news a lot lately. Here's a quick recap.

Some of the news has been good, and some not-so-good. Let's get the bad news over with first.

Last month, a Pennsylvania state court judge gave the green light to an overbilling lawsuit brought by a former Reed Smith client -- a non-profit organization, no less. From the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review:

A Lawrence County Common Pleas Court judge rejected four of five objections by the Downtown law firm Reed Smith, which was sued by a youth foster-care foundation in a dispute over fees.

Bair Foundation, New Wilmington, Lawrence County, sued Reed Smith in November for billing it nearly $1 million -- in contrast to the firm's early estimate of $112,000 in legal costs -- to defend the foundation in an employment discrimination lawsuit, according to the complaint.

The $112,000 was a revised estimate; the original estimate, according to the complaint, was $50,000. And Reed Smith's client ended up losing in the underlying lawsuit.

According to Am Law Daily, "[t]he matter has turned into something of a public relations nightmare for Reed Smith.... The complaint paints a picture of a billing machine run amok." For its part, the firm denies the allegations and claims that it "will prevail."

More Reed Smith news, after the jump.

As promised, we bring you an update on yesterday's coverage of staff layoffs at Fried Frank. Here are a few additional details, from the National Law Journal (subscription):

Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson is reducing administrative staff in New York and Washington. The reductions, which a firm spokeswoman said were less than 10% of the law firm's 730 staffers firmwide, affect primarily floating secretaries, part-time assistants and paralegals and library personnel.

The layoffs, first reported on AboveTheLaw.com, resulted from the law firm's review of its administrative resources and staffing requirements. The employees will receive severance packages based on years of service, the spokeswoman said.

Update / Correction: One source questions the claim that the layoffs affected "primarily" floaters and part-time assistants. According to this tipster, many of the laid off employees were full-time, senior secretaries -- a number of them over 50, and some just a few months shy of getting their pensions. This source predicts that age discrimination lawsuits will be filed.

One tipster tells us the number of affected employees was in the range of 50 to 60, which would amount to under 10 percent of 730 staffers, and that severance amounted to one week of pay for every year of service. We also hear this:

Apparently, mail room, duplicating and facilities were told that their jobs were being outsourced by the end of the year. They could start looking for new jobs before getting laid off at the end of the year or apply with the outsourcing agencies (with no guarantees of a job or placement at Fried Frank).

New York staff were given "a few minutes to pack up and get out"; cars were provided to take people home (a nice touch -- hopefully that will become "market"). One source claims that employees were laid off without regard to their seniority or their performance reviews, whether negative or positive.

What about attorneys? A spokesperson emphasized to us that Fried Frank "doesn't do lawyer layoffs," which was reiterated to associates by firm chair Valerie Ford Jacob at a meeting yesterday.

(Jacob also claimed that the firm has never laid off lawyers. But one source at FFHSJ begs to differ. This source claims that the firm laid off attorneys back in 1990, and then "suffered years of recruiting problems because of it," which may explain its reluctance to go down that path today.)

More detail about the meeting, after the jump.

Last week we started hearing rumors of imminent staff layoffs at Fried Frank. The rumors have now come true, as we've been hearing from multiple sources. Today appears to be the big day.

We submitted an inquiry to the firm. A spokesperson issued the following statement:

Over two years ago Fried Frank began a review of its administrative resources and staffing requirements. As part of this review process some departments were expanded and others consolidated.

Today's administrative staff reductions are part of that business review process. Those affected are in the Firm's NY and Washington DC offices. Severance and career counseling were offered to all of those affected.

We aren't sure of the numbers (and the firm has not yet responded to our request for that data). One of the rumors from last week said the number could be as high as 10 percent of total staff headcount. We hear that in the D.C. office, at least eight or nine people have been laid off, as of the time of this posting. The numbers in New York are said to be significantly higher than in Washington.

The affected employees include secretaries, paralegals, and library personnel. Severance packages appear to vary, from as low as seven weeks to as high as three months.

People are being called in and given the bad news individually. But meetings are also being held at 3:30 and 4:00 p.m. in D.C. (It's not clear what New York is doing.)

One staffer in New York was given 30 minutes to pack up all belongings and leave the premises. In Washington, however, that's not happening; one source describes that office as "more humane."

We will bring you more information as the story develops. If you have information to share, please email us.

One of the more contentious issues in the legal profession this year is whether firms are conducting "stealth" layoffs, or simply culling non-performing associates after bad reviews.

Even among firms doling out these bad reviews, many say that performance standards have gotten tougher during the down market. Other firms, however, claim that their firms' standards remain the same, and that the downsized departing associates simply didn't measure up.

In today's ATL / Lateral Link survey, we'll focus a bit more on the review side of the equation. How often does your firm give real feedback, and do you think it's actually fair?

--
Justin Bernold is a Director at Lateral Link, the sponsor of this Associate Life Survey.

Lately we've been hearing various rumors about Shearman & Sterling. Some appear to be true, and some not.

Here are the rumors, followed by the firm's responses, in blockquotes.

1. Have start dates for incoming first-year associates been pushed back?

Start dates for incoming first-year associates for fall 2008 are October 6, 20, 27 and November 3.

We don't know what the 2007 start dates were (and the firm didn't provide them), but we're guessing they were earlier. But the 2008 start dates are not particularly late. Compare them to these firms' postponed start dates.

2. Have there been any layoffs at the firm, of lawyers or staff?

There have been no lay-offs at Shearman & Sterling, of either attorneys or administrative staff.

This makes sense to us. Shearman did layoffs back in the early 2000s, which it later came to regret, when memories of the layoffs harmed the firm's recruiting efforts once the economy came roaring back. So, having learned their lesson, we'd be surprised to see mass layoffs from Shearman now.

(But we wouldn't be surprised if there have been some performance-related dismissals lately, especially on the corporate side.)

3. Did the firm make offers to all of its summer associates?

(We had previously heard, through the grapevine, that the firm had 135 summer associates and made offers to all of them.)

This summer we had 144 summer associates. There were four summer associates whose academic commitments precluded their joining the firm in fall 2009. We made entry-level offers to all but one of the summer associates available to join the firm.

Based on the high percentage of offers to summers, north of 99 percent, it seems that Shearman is doing just fine these days. But we are curious about that one SA who got no-offered.

Might there be a juicy but undiscovered summer associate scandal? Perhaps a new and improved version of the Shearman & Slur-Man? If you have info, feel free to email us.

(If it's garden-variety incompetence, that's of little interest to us. But if there's an entertaining or salacious tale, we'd like to hear about it. Thanks.)

Earlier: X-Summers: Shearman & Slur-Man

If you're a regular reader of legal newspapers and blogs, you might get the sense that law firm layoffs are happening everywhere. At the current time, the ATL category tag for Layoffs contains about 90 posts (and counting). It's a topic that we cover extensively -- and many readers still clamor for more.

Here at ATL, a self-styled "legal tabloid," inducing panic through sensationalism and scaremongering -- layoffs! delayed start dates! cold offers! -- is part of our job description. But are things really that bad?

With respect to lawyer layoffs, maybe not. Leigh Jones examines the topic in a very interesting article for the National Law Journal (subscription):

A look at the bigger picture shows a profession responding to the economic downturn rather adroitly -- at least so far.

Since October, some 338 attorney layoffs have been confirmed and reported by various news organizations at 12 law firms among the NLJ 250, The National Law Journal's annual survey of the nation's largest law firms.

To be sure, unreported terminations could make the layoff totals much higher. But even if stealth layoffs are twice or even three times the reported amount, the number of attorneys ushered to the exits in the last 10 months is relatively small.

More good news -- but also some bad news, namely, a list of large law firms that have laid off lawyers -- after the jump.

Earlier today, the New York outpost of TheLawyer.com, a British publication, reported on personnel reductions at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett. The report was of keen interest to us because we've been hearing rumors -- generally vague and unsubstantiated, but persistent -- of "stealth layoffs" at STB.

The folks over at The Lawyer seem to be hearing similar gossip, some of which appears in their report:

[Simpson Thacher ] has taken the unusual step of introducing a mid-year performance review for its associates. It is understood that the benchmark for associates to reach in order to keep their jobs is significantly higher than in previous appraisals.

Market sources have ­suggested that up to 30 associates have been asked to consider their positions as a result of the review. Simpson Thacher chairman Pete Ruegger denied the firm was making credit crunch-related layoffs.

This report appears to be erroneous, at least in a few respects. We spoke with Simpson partner James D. Cross, co-chair of the firm's Personnel Committee, who described it as "wildly inaccurate":

It's business as usual here as far as reviews. We have not changed our standards, and we have not changed our process. We've always had a midyear review process. I don't know where someone came up with the number of 30 [affected associates].

A second STB source echoed Cross's statement, telling us that "no new mid-year process was introduced." The firm has long conducted midyear reviews for (1) first-year associates and (2) more senior lawyers who received negative annual reviews. According to this source, "if a more senior lawyer gets a negative annual review, that person will often be slated for a midyear review so that progress can be checked after six months, not just annually, and so that the firm makes sure it is doing all it can in terms of additional training and mentoring."

Additional discussion, after the jump.

We already updated and clarified our original post, from yesterday morning. But we aren't sure how many of you have seen that update, since many readers don't go back to look at a post after reading it in the first instance (and since it seems to have gone largely unnoticed in the comments). So we though we'd do a freestanding post calling attention to, and apologizing for, our error.

Contrary to the implication of our post as originally published, Duval & Stachenfeld welcomes applicants from Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, a firm it has worked with closely in the past. But D&S is dealing with CWT and CWT refugees directly. As explained by managing partner Bruce Stachenfeld, the firm will "not be accepting resumes through legal recruiters due to our close relationship with CWT." (This is what many of you suspected, in the comments.)

You can read Mr. Stachenfeld's complete letter to ATL, which explains the situation in more detail, by clicking here. We apologize for the error.

Earlier: No Cadwalader Lawyers Need Apply?

We received over 800 responses to last week's ATL / Lateral Link survey on layoffs, and the results are not pretty.

About 30% of respondents reported at least some level of involuntary departures at their firms.

While only about 4% of respondents said that their firms were actually conducting public layoffs, another 18% accused their firms of conducting "stealth layoffs."

Of course, it's possible that some of these "stealth layoffs" are really based on performance, a standard which tends to get tougher in a tough economy. But less than 3.5% of respondents said that their firms had been asking people to leave solely based on their performance, suggesting that associates are much more likely to blame firm performance for any downsizings.

Survey Responses: Is your firm conducting layoffs?

See who's getting hit where, after the jump.

In case you missed the big news, last week Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft laid off 96 lawyers. This is, as far as we know, the largest lawyer layoff of the current economic cycle.

When combined with the January layoffs, which hit around 35 lawyers, CWT has axed upwards of 130 attorneys. This makes it "America's firingest law firm." (We can't claim credit for that turn of phrase, which was coined by a tipster, but we will try to popularize it through frequent usage.)

As we reported earlier this week, résumés from Cadwalader refugees are flooding the market. But will they find a welcome reception?

Maybe not. Here's an email that a boutique law firm in New York sent to a legal recruiter who tried to submit CWT résumés for an opening:

CORRECTION: Actually, the email was sent to the recruiter UNSOLICITED, not in response to anything. It was apparently sent, out of the blue, to a group of legal recruiters.

Sent: Tuesday, August 05, 2008
To: [Legal Recruiter]
Subject: FW: Resumes

Good Afternoon,

Thank you for staying in touch with our firm. Please note that we are not going to be accepting resumes for Cadwalader candidates.

Thank you,

[Recruiting Contact]
Duval & Stachenfeld | 300 East 42nd Street New York NY 10017

Ouch. Are Cadwalader lawyers now the Untouchables of the law-firm caste system?

Note that this slap in the face comes from Duval & Stachenfeld LLP, which is far from snobby in its hiring practices. It draws heavily from non-top-tier law schools and pays $60,000 starting salaries to its associates.

(It should be noted, however, that the Duval firm is more elitist when it comes to its lateral hiring. As discussed here, for entry-level hiring, the firm looks well beyond the top-tier law schools. But for midlevel and senior associates, it tends to poach from the Skaddens and Lathams of the world -- and pay accordingly.)

P.S. For a more upbeat take on Cadwalader, see Ashby Jones's Legal Beat column in the Wall Street Journal (via the WSJ Law Blog).

UPDATE / CLARIFICATION: We have received a letter from Bruce Stachenfeld, founding partner of Duval & Stachenfeld, clarifying the situation. An excerpt:

When I (the managing partner of D&S) heard about the CWT layoff news my immediate reaction was that I felt very bad for my friends at CWT. It is a great firm suffering from some market turmoil and all of us running law firms know that adverse market forces can happen to any of us.

My other reaction was that since we are hiring junior lawyers a possible win/win/win would be for us to talk to CWT directly about whether we could hire some of their adversely affected people. This would permit us to find some super-star-high-quality associates - would permit CWT to help its people locate new jobs - and would permit some of the adversely affected associates to get new jobs promptly.

So I did the logical thing and contacted one of my friends at CWT to discuss this. After my discussion I sent a letter to be sent to some of the associates who had the requisite background to fit into our real estate group. It remains to be seen if we will end up hiring CWT associates. My hope is yes.

Since resumes had started to come in (through legal recruiters) I instructed our recruitment coordinator to inform legal recruiters that I would not be accepting resumes through legal recruiters due to our close relationship with CWT. I thought it appropriate to let the legal recruiters know this promptly to avoid misunderstandings with them about recruitment fees.

You can read the full letter after the jump (or click here).

Earlier: Attention Tier Two Grads: Duval & Stachenfeld Wants You
Prior ATL coverage of Cadwalader (scroll down)

Cadwalader and Lawyer Cuts: Pursuing a Clear-Eyed Plan? [WSJ Law Blog]

And now, some layoff news from the other side of the pond, courtesy of TheLawyer.com:

DLA Piper is conducting a firmwide review of staffing levels, resulting in five redundancies in the firm's technology, media and ­communications (TMC) group.

The layoffs, which were all in London, include three assistants, a legal director and an associate.

The cuts, which were all voluntary, coincided with the loss of IP partner Richard Penfold, who left for US firm Heller Ehrman. A DLA spokesperson wished Penfold good luck. He joins Heller's year-old City office as its eleventh partner.

Those Brits can be so confusing sometimes. The headline refers to five lawyers being made "redundant," but some of those job titles -- "assistant," "legal director" -- sound like positions that would be held by non-lawyers in the United States.

And the "cuts" are described as "voluntary." What does it mean for layoffs to be voluntary? Isn't their involuntary nature the whole point of layoffs?

DLA review sees five TMC lawyers redundant [The Lawyer]

This shouldn't come as a huge surprise, but résumés from refugees of Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft are all over the street right now. One recruiter, at an outside headhunting firm, described receiving "a flood" of CWT résumés in the past week. An in-house recruiting coordinator at an Am Law 100 firm agreed, noting that, interestingly enough, a number of the CWT submissions appear to be from lawyers in departments largely untouched by the layoffs. People at Cadwalader seem to be heading for the exits, in droves -- even lawyers in "safe" practice areas.

We can hardly blame them. When it comes to career planning these days, being proactive and playing defensively is smart. If you think there's even a chance you might be laid off from your law firm (or that your law firm might dissolve), start exploring your options early. As the conventional wisdom goes, it's generally easier to find a job when you have a job.

To be sure, five months of severance, which is what Cadwalader is giving the 96 lawyers it axed last week, is generous (but justified -- lawyers who survived the January layoffs were told they'd have jobs at least through the end of the year). But five months goes by more quickly than you'd think -- and the job market, as everyone knows, is crappy not great. As reported by Am Law Daily, ten of the victims of the January layoffs at Cadwalader have yet to find new jobs, some seven months later.

Perhaps surprisingly, however, Cadwalader continues to bring on new people, even as it sends almost 100 attorneys into the unemployment wilderness. We got our hands on an email that was sent around firm-wide today, without even taking the dismissed attorneys off of the distribution, announcing the arrival of a new bankruptcy associate.

Check it out, after the jump.

Nope, we're not done covering yesterday's bloodbath over at Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft. If the powers-that-be at CWT think they can lay off almost 100 lawyers and have everyone forget about in a day, they're sorely mistaken. We intend to stick with this story for quite some time (in part because you can't get enough of it, judging from our traffic logs, the robust commenting, and the continuing inflow of tips).

As many commenters have noted, memories are long when it comes to lawyer layoffs. Prospective recruits will hold this against Cadwalader five years from now -- assuming CWT is still around then -- just as people still remember which firms laid off lawyers in the last downturn, in the early 2000s.

We have some additional info to pass along, based on reports from summer and incoming associates. Yesterday afternoon, Cadwalader held a meeting for its summers, led by chairman Chris White and hiring committee chair Paul Mourning (yup, "Mourning"). Former chairman Bob Link attended, but had a non-speaking role.

White told the summer class essentially what he told the WSJ Law Blog (down to quoting the same numbers, and stressing that the layoffs were mostly in real estate finance and asset securitization). Mourning focused on issues particular to the summer class:

He didn't say what people wanted to hear (that everyone could still expect an offer). Instead, he said something like "the firm will continue to use the same evaluation criteria that it has used in the past" and that some people will get offers without knowing what exact practice group they will be in. The latter is likely a reference to people who chose corporate or capital markets as their top choice but will likely have to do litigation until the market picks up.

This is in contrast to Chris White explicitly saying in his opening day speech to the summers (after addressing the previous 35-lawyer layoff) that the firm expected to extend offers to all summer associates.

Paul also mentioned that the firm doesn't expect to rescind any offers to the incoming first-year class. Some summers found it unnerving that he even mentioned that.

Speaking of incoming first-years at CWT, one of them forwarded us the email the firm sent to the group -- check it out, after the jump -- along with this commentary:

Just wanted to send along the email I got yesterday. First thing I read when I got home from the NYS Bar Exam! I have to believe that they powers that be at CWT were completely clueless that yesterday was the NY Bar. Why not wait another week? What a drop-kick to the gut.

This individual asked for advice:

Should I start spamming the resume now, or wait until September when I start at CWT? (There's the old adage that it's easiest to find a job when you've already got one).

Should I contact Career Services, or is that window closed to me, now that I'm an alum?

Uncharted territory, for sure. I'd love to here from the peanut gallery.

So, commenters, whaddya think?

Our advice: start your job search as soon as reasonably practicable -- maybe after your bar trip, if you're taking one -- and continue it after you arrive at Cadwalader. Feel free to call upon Career Services; they're usually eager to help alums (although we understand that some law schools, at the height of fall recruiting, limit the services they provide to alumni).

Don't let yourself be buffeted by the winds of fate; take charge of your career and your life. Don't be a Pollyanna, thinking that things will probably get better. They probably won't -- at least not anytime soon.

Of the people who stuck around at CWT after the January layoffs, thinking they would just "ride it out," 96 of them are now headed for the unemployment line. They could perhaps be excused for buying the firm's reassurances back then, before the past few months of terrible economic news, especially with respect to the real estate and credit markets.

But you have no such excuse; the writing is on the proverbial wall. Remember the saying that George W. Bush famously mangled: "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me." Do yourself a favor -- as well as a favor to the firm, and to those who remain there -- and get the hell out, if you can. Voluntary departures will reduce the number of people to be laid off in round three.

Two memos -- the email message that CWT sent to its incoming associates, and the email message the firm sent to the career services offices of certain law schools -- are posted after the jump.

Back to the big story of the day: the massive lawyer layoffs, almost in the triple digits, at Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft. We thought now might be a good time to put up a fresh post, since the prior thread is getting a bit unwieldy (with 200+ comments -- selected excerpts, after the jump).

So what's there to add to the story? Let's see.... Cadwalader issued a statement in response to our inquiries. It's not terribly exciting -- most of it repeats what CWT told the WSJ -- but you can check it out, if you're bored, after the jump.

We're not career counselors, but you don't need to be an expert to know that CWT is probably best avoided for the upcoming round of fall recruiting / on-campus interviewing. Generally you should run away from, not into, burning buildings (unless you're a firefighter).

If for some reason you are still interested in working at Cadwalader -- well, good luck with that. The firm is withdrawing from on-campus interviewing at a number of law schools. E.g., Rutgers - Newark (memo after the jump). The Rutgers memo states that CWT "will contact students independently to schedule interviews if they are selected." In other words, don't call them; they'll call you.

Cadwalader cutting back on OCI isn't terribly shocking. The firm has less manpower to cover fall recruiting, having laid off so many lawyers. It probably wants to reduce expenses related to fall recruiting (which can be a costly process for firms, especially if overnight travel is involved). And maybe the firm has concluded that the last thing it needs right now are more people on its payroll.

Finally, here's a little tidbit we received by email:

At CWT in Charlotte, the attorneys who were fired came in this morning to find envelopes on their chairs breaking the bad news. Dicey move.

Dicey? We're not so sure. The ginormous layoffs are already a PR disaster -- and Cadwalader arguably wants to make itself seem like a less appealing place to work, at least in the short term.

But classy? Not very.

**********************
Remember, there's more stuff after the jump: highlighted comments from the last thread, Cadwalader's official statement on the layoffs, and an example of a law school career services memo announcing CWT's withdrawal from on-campus interviewing.

Last month, an ATL / Lateral Link survey found that roughly 28% of associates were afraid that they could lose their jobs this year, up from just 10% of associates in December.

That number might be even higher today, given recent events.

But should 28% of associates be afraid? On the one hand, there are relatively few firms listed in Bruce MacEwen's layoffs table. On the other hand, that table doesn't track "stealth layoffs", and there are rumors of stealth layoffs at several firms around the country.

So, today's survey will try to add a little more granularity. Is there really bad news afoot at your firm?