Meeting Clients Where They Are: 2022 State of Digital & Content Marketing Report

International law firms operating in China have trimmed headcounts in China and Hong Kong as a result of the weaker economic environment. Peter Zeughauser observes that the China market isn’t for everyone, so firms need to chart their own China strategy. He also highlights a bigger common problem facing international firms in China at the moment, and that is the rise in sophistication of homegrown Chinese firms.

Corporate clients increasingly are demanding diverse attorney teams and legal advice on their own diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) efforts. Mary K. Young observes that chief marketers are increasingly tasked with ensuring companies get a diverse team of attorneys, that their diverse lawyers are being promoted in the media and retained in-house, that law firms’ internal DE&I efforts are being promoted to attract new clients, and that companies are getting the proper legal advice surrounding their own DE&I efforts.

Cravath Swaine & Moore’s move to raise associate salaries beyond the scale set by its rival Milbank pressures less-profitable firms to ponder pay bumps they can’t afford. While firms in the top tiers of revenue and profitability are likely to follow Cravath’s lead - and several already have - others in the industry are ill-positioned to do so. Peter Zeughauser observes that the prospect of Cravath-type raises will stress a lot of firms. Some will avoid such raises and suffer the fall-out of “more poaching” from firms that can pay top compensation.