Never Kid Yourself: Employers Have the Upper Hand

 It's a combination to two factors:

Inability to predict the next 12 months

Abrupt changes internally and/or externally.

The result, reports The Wall Street Journal, is that the professional who accepted a job offer is jilted. That began in tech as with Meta and Twitter. Now it has moved to industries such as insurance. The human and financial consequences are tragic. Many caught up in this had great expectations of the dream job, had turned down other offers, and had signed a lease. (Regarding the latter, it's LandLord Nation and tough to negotiate an exit.)

The question is if it could happen again in the law-firm sector.

Current associates haven't experienced a down market. Therefore, they probably cannot anticipate the ways in which law firms could and would navigate a decline in demand. They have to do what is business common sense to retain their brandname partners by not giving them the haircuts on compensation. We who were there back then vividly recall the day Latham axed 190 associates.

Now and then Subreddit Big Law alludes to the market for associates tightening. There has even been a report of a 20% reduction in salary at one law firm (not named) for associates not making their billable numbers. However, no overall fear, not yet.

What rescinded offers bring home is how fragile the employee relationship is. Despite all the media hype about the newly emplowered workforce, employers have the upper hand. They can snatch back a job offer or ax your job.  After a Reduction-in-Force in 1987 I launched my own communications boutique. As I explain in this award-winning podcast, it provides the kind of "safety" being an employee doesn't. 

Connect with Editor-in-Chief Jane Genova janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

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