Herbert Smith's corporate partners face heat over revenues

The corporate department at Herbert Smith may face layoffs after its budget target by £20m last year. Some reports suggest the firm is preparing to axe 15 to 20 partners across the global corporate practice. The average profit generated by each corporate partner at Herbert Smith was £500,000 last year, comparing rather unfavourably to the firm’s litigation partners, who brought in an average profit per partner of £1.4m. Herbert Smith global head of corporate James Palmer denied that the firm was planning to take the shears to the partnership, saying: “I can honestly say there are no redundancy plans going on in corporate anywhere in the world at the moment.” However, The Lawyer reports sources who say the firm plans to quietly "manage out" corporate partners, and has already tapped around 12 underperforming partners in the last couple of years.

Herbert Smith's corporate partners face heat over revenues thelawyer.com Thu, Sep 8, 2011