Howard Rice Delays Start Dates for Three Associates By One Year
San Francisco law firm Howard, Rice, Nemerovski, Canady, Falk & Rabkin has pushed back the start dates for three first-year litigation associates by one year.
The news was first reported by Above the Law and confirmed by hiring partner Jonathan Hughes, the Recorder reports. He said the new lawyers will receive a stipend and help finding jobs with public service organizations.
One of the three, it turns out, has accepted a clerkship and won’t be starting with the firm until 2010.
Hughes said the goal was not to save money but instead to ensure that all lawyers at the firm are busy. He wrote in an e-mail to Above the Law: “One of the reasons we attract the best litigation associate candidates in the country is that we give them more responsibility earlier in their careers than their peers get at many other firms. We concluded that this decision would help us keep that commitment, to our current junior associates and those who will be arriving at the firm this fall and next.”
Howard Rice had made offers to eight first-year associates, seven of them in litigation and one in business. The firm has 110 lawyers, compared to about 140 in 2002.
