‘The Model Seemed Broken to Me’ — Looking at a Law Firm Alternative

[WSJ_law_blog]

For many summer associates, this holiday weekend will mark the halfway point of their foray into law-firm life. Not enough billables logged — yet — to litigate a case or negotiate a deal. But, certainly, six weeks is plenty of time for the sharp students lining the halls of the country’s elite firms to glean something of what full-time employment is like.



Mark Harris, left, and Alec Guettel founded Axiom, a new breed of law firm.

Perhaps all the indicators are rosy. Or, perhaps, you’ve watched as your associate mentor is repeatedly pulled out of summer events to attend to a matter that he or she bemoans. Perhaps you’ve found yourself working for a partner whom you were told to avoid at all costs. And now you’re wondering, hmm, what are the alternatives to life at [firm name here]?

So please, tell us, Loyal Summer Associate LB Reader, what’s your takeaway? We ask because today we’re introducing a new column by the LB’s very own Ashby Jones. It’s called Legal Beat, and will appear, from time to time, in the WSJ’s Marketplace section. In Jones’s inaugural column, he looks at Axiom Global, an organization that offers a stable of some 220 “experienced and often-pedigreed attorneys to companies as needed, frequently at discounts to law-firm rates.”

Mark Harris, the 38-year-old law-firm veteran who co-founded Axiom, says he had his eureka moment when, as a young associate at Davis Polk, he glimpsed a client bill for a case he was working on. “It was only February, and already we’d billed an amount equal to my salary for the year,” he says. He soon realized that every dollar that he billed for the rest of the year would, in effect, either go to defray overhead expenses or into the pockets of the law firm’s partners. “The model seemed broken to me,” said Harris.

So Harris set out to attract law-firm-trained lawyers who were willing to relinquish prestige and partner tracks for temporary assignments with corporate clients. The lawyers are employed full-time by Axiom and receive benefits — but no pay — between assignments. They join Axiom to create time to explore alternative careers, or to spend more time with family. Robyn Rahbar, for an example, an eight-year Simpson Thacher vet, wanted to spend more time with her children and through Axiom currently works about 20 hours a week.

A Cravath alumn, Joe Risico, recently finished his first engagement at Axiom, a nine-month stint doing transactional work at Goldman Sachs. “I’d had my nose to the grindstone at Cravath for about five years,” says Mr. Risico, “I wanted to chill out and try something different.” The money at Axiom, according to Riscio, is comparable to what a sixth- or seventh-year attorney makes at Cravath — minus the hefty annual bonus.

Sound good, summers? Here’s the catch: Getting a job with Axiom isn’t necessarily easier than landing an associateship at Cravath. While Harris is confident that firms “are likely to continue making lawyers unhappy for years to come,” he also says that, despite the steady flow of associates in exile, it’s tough to find lawyers who fit Axiom’s bill. Harris says that, for every 100 lawyers who apply, Axiom hires one.