The week after Thanksgiving is understood for being sort of a drag, however nothing lightens the temper greater than Biglaw corporations asserting that they’re handing out bonuses on high of bonuses on high of bonuses. Which agency is the most recent to announce its year-end bonus scale?
That might be Sidley Austin, a agency that took in $3,439,646,000 gross income in 2024, placing it at No. 6 on the most recent Am Legislation 100. The elite agency not too long ago let associates know that it could be matching the Cravath scale, full with Milbank’s summer bonuses, for individuals who have met their 2000-hour billable requirement. Those that weren’t in a position to meet the minimal “could also be acknowledged with partial bonuses.” Right here’s what the bonus scale appears like at Sidley:
Associates who’ve gone above and past — i.e., those that have “increased productiveness and/or distinctive efficiency” — will probably be rewarded with much more cash. Listed here are the main points:
As in prior years, we additionally acknowledge associates who’ve increased productiveness and/or distinctive efficiency with further bonuses that exceed the bottom bonus quantities, leading to these associates receiving greater than the bottom bonus for his or her class yr, and in some instances greater than 50% above base bonus.
Bonuses will hit financial institution accounts previous to December 31, 2025. Congratulations to everybody at Sidley!
Keep in mind everybody, we rely in your tricks to keep on high of compensation updates, so when your agency broadcasts or matches, please textual content us (646-820-8477) or email us (topic line: “[Firm Name] Bonus/Matches”). Please embrace the memo if obtainable. You possibly can take a photograph of the memo and ship it through textual content or e-mail for those who don’t need to ahead the unique PDF or Phrase file.
And for those who’d like to enroll in ATL’s Bonus Alerts (which is the alert record we additionally use for wage bulletins), please scroll down and enter your e-mail deal with within the field beneath this submit. In the event you beforehand signed up for the bonus alerts, you don’t have to do something. You’ll obtain an e-mail notification inside minutes of every bonus announcement that we publish. Thanks on your assist!
Staci Zaretsky is the managing editor of Above the Legislation, the place she’s labored since 2011. She’d love to listen to from you, so please be at liberty to email her with any ideas, questions, feedback, or critiques. You possibly can comply with her on Bluesky, X/Twitter, and Threads, or join together with her on LinkedIn.
