Benesch Apportunity

Law firm marketing and technology don’t always go well together. When firms try to go high-tech, the results are often mortifyingly cheesy.

To avoid humiliation, many law firms — often culturally conservative, risk-averse institutions — play it safe. But caution can also result in some of the worst law-firm websites, ones that get compared to “a seventh-grade history project” or “[s]imply a brochure placed online.”

Sometimes, however, a law firm gets tech right. Check out the new iPhone / iPad app developed by the Benesch law firm, the subject of a nice write-up in the Cleveland Plain Dealer (via Morning Docket).

What does the app, called “Benesch Apportunity,” actually do? And might other law firms want to implement similar apps?

Let’s learn more….

Benesch Apportunity's interactive desktop.

Here’s the report, from Alison Grant of the Plain Dealer:

The free “Benesch Apportunity” app from the iTunes store automatically sends out a notification when an attorney position is available at Benesch, Friedlander, Coplan & Aronoff. The 165-lawyer, seven-office firm says it has about two openings a month.

Hold on a sec. There’s an app that can actually help me get a job, an honest-to-God legal job? At a law firm? With a salary? This sounds even better than such awesome apps as Zit Picker, iBubbleWrap, and Beautiful Boobs. (And maybe even Grindr.)

Who are the folks that Benesch is targeting, in terms of geographical areas and seniority?

Benesch bucked the trend by continuing to hire during the downturn — it’s up 24 attorneys in the past 16 months. The business law firm has offices in Cleveland, Columbus, Indianapolis, Philadelphia, White Plains, N.Y., Wilmington, Del., and Shanghai.

Benesch plans to make its hiring app available on Droids and BlackBerrys, in addition to Apple iPods and iPads. It’s targeting law students as well as attorneys interested in making a lateral move from another firm.

“We’re really looking for people who are using this technology,” said Chris Reuscher, chair of the hiring committee, “and students are looking for firms that are ahead of the curve.”

Benesch is not the only law firm with its own app. Some Biglaw shops are already in the game, according to the Plain Dealer:

A scattering of firms with U.S. operations have created apps for smart phones and tablet computers.

Among them are megafirms Morrison & Foerster, based in San Francisco; Allen & Overy, a London giant with 36 offices; and Littler Mendelson, the nation’s largest employment and labor law firm, which has a Cleveland office. Several small personal injury firms also have apps.

But all of them are “rehashes” of firm web sites, with bios on attorneys and firm news, said Julie Gurney, the senior marketing communications manager who spearheaded Benesch’s app project. “I’m fairly certain we’re the only law firm whose app is not just a regurgitation,” she said.

To learn more about the Benesch app — which was designed by Bennett Adelson-Microsoft Solutions Center, a Cleveland-based IT firm — you can check out the press release below, or read the full Plain Dealer article (with quotes from yours truly).

As for Above the Law, we have not yet developed an “ATL app,” although it’s on our to-do list. We do, however, offer a Jobs Board and a Job of the Week, which we hope will prove useful to those of you who are seeking employment.

Good luck to everyone who is still in the hunt; things are improving, but times are still tough. Every little edge can help — even if it’s just an app.

Benesch uses new app to alert potential hires about jobs at firm [Cleveland Plain Dealer]
Law Firm App Alerts Job Seekers to Openings [Robert Ambrogi's LawSites]
Benesch Apportunity [iTunes]

Earlier: The Worst Law Firm Websites
Adventures in Lawyer Advertising: Pocket-Sized Legal Advice

BENESCH FRIEDLANDER — PRESS RELEASE

BENESCH LAUNCHES APP FOR RECRUITING ATTORNEYS

CLEVELAND, OH – May 18, 2011 – Benesch is pleased to announce the launch of its premiere recruiting app, ‘Benesch Apportunity™’ for iPhones and iPads, targeted toward law school students and lateral attorneys interested in a career at Benesch. Benesch’s on-campus recruiting schedule, a listing of Benesch attorneys by law school, links to the firm’s social networking sites and other resources are available through the recruiting app. A ‘push’ notification proactively sends an alert to users any time a job opportunity opens at Benesch. Users can send the job information directly to themselves or a friend via email.

Apportunity™ is intended to be informative and helpful, but it is also fun to use. The look is based on a stereotypical attorney’s desk (scales of justice, legal pad, coffee, etc.) and it is entirely interactive.

Benesch’s Chief Information Officer, Karen Anzuini, said, “Apple announced last month that they have sold over 100 million iPhones and iPads to date. At Benesch, we focus on using this and other technologies creatively to collaborate and communicate with clients, colleagues and friends. Apportunity™ communicates useful, relevant and timely information to potential candidates through their mobile devices. The interface is fun and fresh, not your ‘typical’ law firm look.”

Benesch’s Senior Marketing Communications Manager, Julie Gurney, said, “What’s unique about our recruiting app is that it’s not just a rehashing of information from the firm’s website. Through strong collaboration between the firm’s Marketing, Technology and Recruiting Departments, we’ve developed something that is not only fun to use and on the cutting edge of legal industry technology, but it is also extremely practical and relevant to its intended audience.”

To download the free Benesch recruiting app, visit the Apple App Store on your iPhone or iPad (keyword: Benesch).

About Benesch

With offices in Cleveland, Columbus, Indianapolis, Philadelphia, Shanghai, White Plains and Wilmington, Benesch’s practice and industry groups include Business Reorganization, the China Group, Compensation & Benefits, Construction, Commercial Finance & Banking, Corporate & Securities, Litigation, Energy, Health Care, Intellectual Property, Labor & Employment, Polymer Industry, Private Equity, Public Finance, Public Law, Real Estate & Environmental, Tax, Transportation & Logistics, and Estate Planning & Probate. Benesch is dedicated to superior client service through its First in Service program and is focused on growth both organically and geographically in order to continuously improve its ability to serve its clients. For more information, visit www.beneschlaw.com.

# # #

We've got spirt! Yes we do! We've got spirt! How about you?

Give me an S! Give me a T! Give me an F! Give me a U! What does that spell? STFU!

Just in case you’re not aware, cheerleading is a pretty big deal in Texas. Everyone wants to be a cheerleader because it has some awesome perks. Cheerleaders get the rare privilege of ruling the school while they parade around spreading “spirt” throughout the halls. Cheerleaders hope and pray that they’ll land a football stud who will be their ticket out of town to work at the downtown dollar store.

And last, but certainly not least, alumnae cheerleader moms get to live vicariously through their daughters. And sometimes when former cheerleader moms don’t get what they want, they’ll — Fight! Fight! Fight with all their might! — sue over it.

Girls in my high school used to call each other names and claim Title IX sexual harassment and retaliation all the time. It was no big deal….

We received some tips about an awesome opinion that came down yesterday from the Fifth Circuit, on appeal from the District Court for the Northern District of Texas. Straight from the kick-off, Judge Jerry E. Smith laid down the law:

Reduced to its essentials, this is nothing more than a dispute, fueled by a disgruntled cheerleader mom, over whether her daughter should have made the squad. It is a petty squabble, masquerading as a civil rights matter, that has no place in federal court or any other court.

Now, what happened here was that the plaintiff, Samantha Sanches, a high school junior, was a member of the Creekview High School’s cheerleading squad in Texas. One of the senior cheerleaders discovered that Sanches was dating her ex-boyfriend, so she did what any wildly jealous high school cheerleader would do: she called Sanches a “ho.”

That made mommie dearest, Liz Laningham, spiral into a NO WIRE HANGERS, EVER fit of rage. Laningham emailed the coach, demanding that the current junior cheerleaders, including her daughter, be allowed to skip tryouts and get automatic spots on the varsity squad.

In the end, Sanches didn’t make the team. Oh, Lawd, the horror! The travesty! (Full disclosure: I was a cheerleader in middle school. My high school lamely didn’t have a football team, and thus, it didn’t have a cheerleading squad. I’m allowed to think all of this cheerleading garbage is dumb.)

The only solution was to get the best lawyers that money could buy. So mommie dearest hired Biglaw attorneys Harry Jones and Jessica Brown Wilson of Littler Mendelson to take on the case. The cause of action, as mentioned above, was Title IX sexual harassment and retaliation, along with a host of other civil rights claims.

After mutually consenting to allow Magistrate Judge Paul Stickney to render a final decision, the Littler Mendelson team of lawyers filed a motion with the district court to vacate the summary judgment rendered. That motion was denied, and Sanches appealed in a manner most unbecoming for a cheerleader à la U-G-L-Y! You ain’t got no alibi! You ugly! Hey, hey, you ugly!

In the last footnote of the opinion, Judge Smith went to town on Littler Mendelson’s attorneys, proving that even judges know some in-your-face cheers:

Usually we do not comment on technical and grammatical errors, because anyone can make such an occasional mistake, but here the miscues are so egregious and obvious that an average fourth grader would have avoided most of them. For example, the word “principals” should have been “principles.” The word “vacatur” is misspelled. The subject and verb are not in agreement in one of the sentences, which has a singular subject (“incompetence”) and a plural verb (“are”). Magistrate Judge Stickney is referred to as “it” instead of “he” and is called a “magistrate” instead of a “magistrate judge.” And finally, the sentence containing the word “incompetence” makes no sense as a matter of standard English prose, so it is not reasonably possible to understand the thought, if any, that is being conveyed. It is ironic that the term “incompetence” is used here, because the only thing that is incompetent is the passage itself.

And in cheerleading terms, what Judge Smith said amounted to: We’re up! You really do suck! We fight! We’re right! We really shut you up! Go Fifth Circuit!

It seems that even Littler Mendelson attorneys need to obsess over the small stuff, like proofreading. In sum, high school cheerleaders are stupid, but their lawyers are apparently stupid(er).

Ebony and ivory, billing together in perfect harmony.

We’ve talked a lot in these pages about the value of diversity. It’s important to clients, it’s important to law firms, and it’s important to the legal profession as a whole.

Given the significance of diversity, it’s not surprising that several organizations and news outlets focus on it, especially with respect to large law firms. In the past few weeks, we’ve discussed diversity data from Building A Better Legal Profession and from the American Lawyer, for example.

Today brings news of more diversity rankings, this time from the ranking gurus over at Vault. They’ve compiled a list of 25 best law firms for diversity.

Which firms made the cut? Is your firm on the list?

As explained on the Vault Law Blog, the Vault diversity rankings are based on Vault survey data:

Vault’s diversity rankings are part of our annual law firm associate survey and have been a critical aspect of the survey since its inception; the survey is in its 14th consecutive year. This year, Vault received responses from nearly 16,000 law firm associates from approximately 300 law firms. Associates were asked to rate their firms’ commitments to diversity regarding women, minorities and LGBT. Vault’s diversity rankings are unique in that they are derived from the insights and ratings of insider associates.

And here are the top ten firms for diversity, according to Vault:

1. Carlton Fields
2. Littler Mendelson
3. Ropes & Gray
4. Jenner & Block
5. Weil, Gotshal & Manges
6. Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton
7. Shook, Hardy & Bacon
8. Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison
9. Foley Hoag
10. Debevoise & Plimpton

Congratulations to Carlton Fields, which took the #1 spot for the third year in a row, as well as all the other law firms recognized for their diversity. We’ve just listed the top ten; feel free to check out the complete list of top 25 firms for diversity, over at Vault. In addition, Vault recognizes firms for excellence in diversity subcategories, namely, LGBT diversity, minority diversity, and diversity for women.

We took the Vault diversity rankings and compared them to the Am Law diversity rankings. Four firms made the top 25 on both lists:

• Carlton Fields: #1 for Vault, #20 for Am Law
• Weil Gotshal: #5 for Vault, #18 for Am Law
• Cleary Gottlieb: #6 for Vault, #4 for Am Law
• Paul Weiss: #8 for Vault, #11 for Am Law

Congrats to all four firms — and a special shout-out to Cleary for making the top 10 on both lists. And an honorable mention to Debevoise, which narrowly missed making the top 25 on both (it was #10 for Vault and #26 for Am Law).

Law firms seem to be making strides forward on diversity, but there’s still room for improvement. Rankings like those of Vault and Am Law are helpful because they keep the pressure on firms to maintain and enhance diversity.

As we all know, nothing motivates lawyers and law firms quite like the prospect of scoring well on rankings.

Announcing Vault’s 2012 Best Law Firms for Diversity [Vault's Law Blog]
Law Firm Rankings 2012: The Best Law Firms For Diversity [Vault]

Earlier: Which Law Firms Are Most Diverse? Let’s Look at the Rankings
New Data on Law Firm Diversity

* Obamacare’s individual mandate may be in jeopardy, and it’s all because of that stupid broccoli debate. No, Scalia, as delicious as it is, not everyone would have to buy broccoli. [New York Times]

* Biglaw firms aren’t going away, but thanks to the recent onslaught of partner defections to small law firms, their high hourly rates might soon be going the way of the dodo. [Corporate Counsel]

* The “good” news: Northwestern Law will be limiting its tuition hike to the rate of inflation. The bad news: next year, it will cost $53,168 to attend. I officially don’t want to live on this planet anymore. [National Law Journal]

* A Littler Mendelson partner is recovering from a stabbing that occurred during a home invasion. On the bright side, at least he’s not a partner at Dewey — that’s a fate worse than being stabbed these days. [Am Law Daily]

* Law school applicants are dropping like flies, but some law schools were able to attract record numbers of students. UVA Law must have some real expertise in recruiting collar poppers. [The Short List / U.S. News]

* “I have a suggestion for you; next time, keep your [expletive] legs closed.” O Canada, that’s the basis of one crazy class action suit, eh? Dudley Do-Right would never treat a female Mountie like that. [Globe and Mail]

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Tags: Antonin Scalia, Biglaw, Boutique Law Firms, Canada, Class Action, Class Actions, future of Biglaw, Health Care, Health Care / Medicine, Home Invasion, Individual Mandate, Law Schools, Littler Mendelson, Morning Docket, Northwestern Law, Northwestern University School of Law, Obamacare, Patrick Hicks, Prospective Law Students, RCMP, Sexual Harassment, Small Law Firms, Stabbing, Tuition, Tuition Hikes, Tuition Increases, UVA Law, UVA Law School

Who wants to do some document review?

We’re entering on-campus interviewing season. If you’re a law student going through OCI, or if you’re a lawyer involved in your firm’s recruiting process, be sure to check out Above the Law’s new law student career center, a repository job search resources, and our law firm directory, where law firms get letter grades in different categories.

One area that interviewees are always interested in is diversity. Diverse attorneys — okay, that’s a bad way of putting it — minority attorneys want to know where they’ll feel welcome. Even lawyers who aren’t minorities want workplaces that are open and inclusive. And corporate clients are increasingly keen on sending their work to firms that show a commitment to diversity.

So which Biglaw firms are the biggest on diversity? Let’s check out the latest rankings….

Here are the top ten firms for diversity, according to the latest Vault rankings (i.e., the 2013 rankings):

1. Carlton Fields
2. Ropes & Gray
3. Littler Mendelson
4. Debevoise & Plimpton
5. Jenner & Block
6. Shook, Hardy & Bacon
7. Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison
8. Fenwick & West
9. Baker Donelson
10. Foley Hoag

Congratulations to Carlton Fields, which took first place for the fourth year in a row. As one associate at the firm told the Vault Law Blog, “Carlton Fields has a well-earned reputation for inclusion. There is always room to improve, but compared to the industry at large, we are standard bearers — not just in terms of voicing the right policies, but in terms of actually hiring, welcoming, nurturing and promoting diverse, well-qualified individuals at all levels of firm life.”

Carlton Fields wasn’t the only returnee among the top ten. Congrats also to Ropes & Gray, Littler Mendelson, Debevoise & Plimpton, Jenner & Block, Shook Hardy & Bacon, and Paul Weiss, all of which made this year’s top ten list and last year’s top ten list.

The Vault diversity rankings don’t stop at the top ten. Feel free to check out the full list of 25 firms that excel when it comes to diversity. You can also see how firms ranked in various diversity subcategories, namely, LGBT diversity, minority diversity, and diversity for women.

Vault isn’t the only organization keeping track of law firm diversity. Back in May, the American Lawyer issued its latest Diversity Scorecard.

Interestingly enough — and perhaps suggesting that diversity is in the eye of the beholder, or at the very least, that there are many different ways of measuring diversity — the top ten firms for Am Law, which focuses exclusively on the percentage of minority lawyers and partners at a firm, are almost completely different from the top ten firms for Vault, which considers gender and LGBT diversity as well as minority diversity. The only firm to make the top ten in both rankings is Fenwick & West (#8 for Vault, #10 for Am Law).

If you look at the top 25, though, there is considerably more overlap. Here are the firms that made the top 25 on both the Vault and Am Law diversity rankings:

• Carlton Fields: #1 for Vault, #22 for Am Law
• Paul Weiss: #7 for Vault, #14 for Am Law
• Fenwick & West: #8 for Vault, #10 for Am Law
• Cleary Gottlieb: #11 for Vault, #13 for Am Law
• Weil Gotshal: #15 for Vault, #18 for Am Law
• Morrison & Foerster: #17 for Vault, #9 for Am Law
• Finnegan Henderson: #16 for Vault, #17 for Am Law
• Munger Tolles: #19 for Vault, #4 for Am Law
• Hughes Hubbard: #21 for Vault, #12 for Am Law
• Shearman & Sterling: #24 for Vault, #21 for Am Law
• Arnold & Porter: #25 for Vault, #24 for Am Law

Congratulations to all of the firms honored for their diversity by Vault and by Am Law. The legal profession has come a long way since the days when minorities and women were absent from Biglaw.

The nation’s top law firms now welcome attorneys of all creeds and colors. Just make sure you can generate the green.

And the Best Law Firms for Diversity Are…. [Vault's Law Blog]
Law Firm Rankings 2013: The Best Law Firms For Diversity [Vault]
Diversity Scorecard 2012 [American Lawyer]

Earlier: The Best Law Firms To Work For (2013)
2013 Vault Law Firm Rankings: Prestige Can’t Buy You Money
The Best Law Firms for Diversity (2012)

Each year, Corporate Counsel compiles a list of the firms that the Fortune 100 companies use as outside counsel. These are the firms that corporate clients turn to when they’ve got bet-the-company litigation. From Exxon Mobil to Apple to Walmart, and everywhere in between, these are the clients with the deepest of pockets, and if you care at all about the business end of the law, then this is a list that you should care about.

But this time around, the list looks a little different. Due to the state of the economy, general counsel are now looking for more ways to reduce costs, and are constantly seeking out alternative fee structures. The firms on this year’s list may have been the ones that were most amenable to such changes.

Without further ado, let’s take a look at which firms topped this year’s list….

This year, Corporate Counsel used an extremely time-consuming methodology to come up with the firms on the list. Instead of asking legal departments to self-report the data, they decided to comb through thousands of court filings. If your firm represented a Fortune 100 company in court, it got a mention on the list.

In general, this serves as a nice snapshot of who is representing our nation’s wealthiest corporations. But to be fair, if a firm was able to keep its clients out of court, it got the shaft for the purposes of this list — which might explain the curious absence of some of the usual Biglaw suspects (e.g., Cravath and S&C). An unwillingness to negotiate on fees or to explore alternative fee arrangements might also have resulted in some elite firms getting less work and therefore fewer mentions.

Here are the ten firms at the top of the list, the ones with the most mentions:

Fish & Richardson: 16 mentions
Alston & Bird: 15 mentions
Morgan Lewis: 15 mentions
DLA Piper: 12 mentions
Bryan Cave: 11 mentions
Foley & Lardner: 11 mentions
Kilpatrick Townsend: 11 mentions
Littler Mendelson: 10 mentions
Baker Hostetler: 9 mentions
Baker Botts: 9 mentions

For those of you who are obsessed with prestige, we should tell you that Skadden also had nine mentions.

You can check out Corporate Counsel’s full breakout of firms by practice area over here, and you can look at the firms that specific Fortune 100 companies use here. Is there anything shocking or surprising in these results? Send us an email, or comment. Thanks!

Who Represents America’s Biggest Companies 2012 [Corporate Counsel]
Who Reps 2012: The Fortune 100 [Corporate Counsel]
Who Reps 2012: Litigation Kings [Corporate Counsel]

Around here, one can’t mention the concept of something being “overrated” without reference to one of the weirdest and most enduring ATL comment memes, a play on the late, great Hitch’s assertion that the four most overrated things in life are “champagne, lobster, anal sex, and picnics.” So who are the, um, lobsters of Biglaw?

Last week, we had a look at what our audience considered to be the most underrated Biglaw firms, by practice area. Today, inevitably, we turn it around and have a look at what you’re telling us are the most overrated firms.

Among other things, our ATL Insider Survey asks attorneys to nominate firms with overrated practices within the respondent’s own practice specialty. Litigators nominate litigation departments, etc.

To be sure, these survey results need to be taken with some buckets of salt — we realize that, for some, answering this question might be a chance to take an easy shot at a more successful rival or competitor. Of course, there are crazy people who will tell you that such paragons as Benjamin Franklin or Tom Brady are “overrated,” but that probably says more about the person making that statement than anything else. But that said, these survey responses are a fun glimpse at which firms Biglaw attorneys think are more sizzle than steak….

Below are the top three most overrated firms in each practice area, as voted by the ATL readership:

One bankruptcy lawyer opined: “They’re the best debtor shop but they don’t sh*t Tiffany cufflinks like some people think.” No points for guessing the firm to which he’s referring.

Most Overrated Bankruptcy Practices

Weil Gotshal
Skadden
Jones Day

For our next category, “overrated” apparently means “having an impeccable white-shoe pedigree.”

Most Overrated Corporate Practices

Cravath
Sullivan & Cromwell
Davis Polk

The litigation category generated the most spirited feedback. One of the main themes: Biglaw litigators aren’t really litigators. Some representative comments:

“They send of counsel to every court appearance except for settlement conferences or trials — meaning, most of their associates never see the inside of a court building. And yet they call themselves litigators?”

“Every large firm that charges $800 per hour and spends 35 hours drafting discovery responses.”

“All of Biglaw since they don’t try cases just move paper around on their desks.”

Most Overrated Litigation Practices

“All of Biglaw”
Cravath
Kirkland

Morgan Lewis made the shortlists for both overrated and underrated employment practices:

Most Overrated Labor & Employment Practices

Littler Mendelson
Paul Hastings
Morgan Lewis

Some firm name alliteration in the tax category:

Most Overrated Tax Practices

Skadden
Shearman & Sterling
Sidley Austin

Despite Fish and Richardson’s highly lauded practices, some ATL readers don’t believe the hype:

Most Overrated IP Practices

Fish & Richardson
Finnegan, Henderson
Quinn Emanuel

This is Skadden’s third appearance on these lists. Tall poppy syndrome, anyone?

Most Overrated Antitrust/Regulatory Practices

Cleary Gottlieb
Cadwalader
Skadden

So what say you — any surprises here? Any overhyped firms being overlooked? Let us know in the comments. (If you haven’t yet, please take five minutes and take our survey here.)

* The Department of Justice has reached yet another settlement in the Deepwater Horizon oil spill case, this time with Transocean Ltd. for $1.4 billion in civil and criminal penalties and fines. [National Law Journal]

* “[W]ith success comes regulatory scrutiny.” Google convinced the FTC to close its ongoing antitrust probe by promising to change its allegedly shady patent usage and purportedly skewed search terms. [Bloomberg]

* According to Littler Mendelson, federal contractors might want to consider sending out sequestration-related layoff notices to employees in order to comply with the WARN Act. America, f**k yeah! [Government Executive]

* Governor Andrew Cuomo will have a major impact on the New York Court of Appeals when appointing new judges. It could be a partisan decision, but his father, former Governor Mario Cuomo, insists his son will leave politics at home. [Capital New York]

* When you write in defense of the value proposition of law school, you wind up in the op-ed pages of the NYT. When you tell the truth about it, you wind up in the opinion pages of the WSJ. [Wall Street Journal (sub. req.)]

* Remember Danae Couch, the Texas Tech law student who was crowned as Miss Texas? She’ll compete for the Miss America title next weekend. If you’d like to help her become a finalist, you can vote for her here! [KFYO]

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Tags: Andrew Cuomo, B for Beauty, Beauty Pageants, Beauty Queens, Biglaw, BP Oil Spill, Chris Fletcher, DaNae Couch, Deepwater Horizon, Department of Justice, DOJ, Federal Trade Commission, FTC, Google, Google / Search Engines, Law Schools, Law Students, Littler Mendelson, Miss America, Morning Docket, New York, New York Court of Appeals, New York Times, Oil Spill, Patents, Sequestration, State Judges, Texas Tech Law, Texas Tech University School of Law, Transocean, Transocean Ltd., Wall Street Journal, WARN, WARN letters, WARN notices, Worker Adjustment Retraining and Notification (WARN)

The law firm of Littler Mendelson is embroiled in a pretty nasty lawsuit with a former receptionist. The Washington Business Journal reported on the suit brought by the former Littler Mendelson receptionist, Rebecca Landrith: According to the July 27 lawsuit the receptionist filed — on her own behalf — against her old firm, Littler provided…

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Tags: Joseph Harkins, Joseph P. Harkins, Labor / Employment, Lawsuit of the Day, Littler Mendelson, Rebecca Landrith, Secretaries / Administrative Assistants, Thomas Flaherty, Thomas J. Flaherty, Tom Flaherty

This is quite the bridge-burning departure memo. Can you believe it was sent by a prominent employment lawyer?

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Tags: Biglaw, Departure Memo, Departure Memos, Don Prophete, Donald Prophete, Employment law, Farewell, Goodbye, Kim Ebert, Kim F. Ebert, Labor / Employment, Litigators, Littler Mendelson, Ogletree Deakins, Ogletree Deakins Nash Smoak & Stewart P.C., Partner Issues, Partners With Issues, Weirdness

Which firms demonstrate a true commitment to diversity? Check out the latest rankings from Vault and from Am Law.

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Tags: Alston & Bird, Am Law, American Lawyer, Baker Donelson, Biglaw, Bowman and Brooke, Cleary Gottlieb, Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, Curtis Mallet, Curtis Mallet-Prevost, Davis Polk, Davis Polk & Wardwell, Debevoise & Plimpton, Diversity, Feminism, Fenwick & West, Finnegan, Finnegan Henderson, Finnegan Henderson Farabow Garrett & Dunner LLP, Foley Hoag, Fragomen, Gay, Gender, Hughes Hubbard & Reed, Irell & Manella, Jenner & Block, Kenyon & Kenyon, Law Firm Diversity, Lewis Brisbois, Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith, LGBT, Littler Mendelson, Minority Issues, Morrison & Foerster, Munger Tolles, Munger Tolles & Olson, Paul Hastings, Paul Weiss, Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison, Racism, Rankings, Ropes & Gray, Schiff Hardin, Shook Hardy & Bacon, Vault, Vault rankings, White & Case, Wilson Sonsini, Women's Issues

Which firms do Fortune 500 companies turn to when facing bet-the-company litigation?

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Tags: Alternative Fee Arrangements, Alternative Fees, Biglaw, Contracts, Corporate America, Corporate Counsel, Corporations, Fortune 100, future of Biglaw, General Counsel, In-House Counsel, Intellectual Property, Jackson Lewis, Labor / Employment, Litigation, Litigators, Littler Mendelson, Money, Morgan Lewis, Morgan Lewis & Bockius, Ogletree Deakins, Ogletree Deakins Nash Smoak & Stewart P.C., Outside Counsel, Rankings, Seyfarth Shaw