Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer LLP - The Inside View

The old saying ‘better together’ became a cliché for a reason – and it’s often got a lot of truth behind it. It’s certainly the case for Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer, a combination of legacy firms Herbert Smith Freehills and Kramer Levin. As a result, the firm now has over 2,700 lawyers across 26 offices. “We have had a transformation as a result of our combination,” Paul Schoeman, US executive partner tells us: “Kramer Levin was very much a US-based firm but with limited visibility around the world. And now, we’ve joined forces with HSF to become a truly global firm, with genuine strength in the three largest financial markets in the world: New York, London, and Hong Kong,” nodding to its characteristic transatlantic and transpacific strengths. 

“With the merger, we’re seeing a lot of cross-pollination already.”

“The firm’s entering a pretty exciting time,” one junior associate headlined, adding, “With the merger, we’re seeing a lot of cross-pollination already.” In practice, what this means for associates is plenty of new workstreams and a whole lot of mingling with new colleagues – but more on all of that later.

Both legacy firms had a habit of performing well in our sister guide Chambers USA, so it comes as no surprise that HSF Kramer is continuing the tradition. Nationwide, the firm topped the table for its advertising (litigation and NAD proceedings), capital markets securitization, and corporate crime & investigations work. The firm also performs very well in the New York leagues with its immigration, general commercial litigation, and real estate (mainly dirt and zoning/land use) expertise.

Presently, the majority of junior associates are based in the firm’s New York office, with smaller headcounts spread across Silicon Valley and Washington DC.

Strategy & Future

Associates were pleased with the overall handling of the merger: “There’s a ton of transparency, and we were told the news before it was broken to everyone.” Naturally, post-merger, “integration is a big focus,” insiders told us. In practice, this means integrating tech and referring business to one another. “From day one, we saw work being referred into the US and from the US, which was proof of the concept that there would be demand going both ways,” Schoeman highlights.  

While firm continues to invest in its traditional practice areas, Schoeman explains there is an investment plan that involves lateral talent in select areas. For instance, “We’ve also created a real antitrust capability in our Washington, DC office. We had existing experience with antitrust, but we wanted to strengthen that in order to match the global firm’s really strong competition and antitrust practice.” This extends to include areas such as energy and infrastructure. Over in Silicon Valley, the firm looks to make further investments in the tech sector, both for cross-border tech transactions and IP litigation.  

As for artificial intelligence, the global platform has bolstered the ability to make those investments. “We have announced Legora as our enterprise AI platform; we’re rolling that out now around the world,” Schoeman shares. In addition, the firm has recently been joined by global Chief AI Officer, Illona Loginova, who leads the global AI team.  

Associates are able to raise questions and concerns to leadership via an associate committee; in turn, leadership provides associates with regular updates on firm strategy and performance through firmwide meetings and townhalls. “I feel like I have a good sense of where the firm is going,” shared one associate.  

Read our conversation with Paul Schoeman, US executive partner, under the ‘Get Hired’ tab.

Summer Program

Most summers join the firm's New York office, though the firm does take on a small number of summers in Silicon Valley who focus on intellectual property work. For one week of the ten-week program, Silicon Valley associates have the option to head to New York to meet their fellow summers.

Back in New York, summers are able to pick up work from different practices; each week, summers are able to rank their top three practice areas and receive work accordingly.

Stand-out social outings have included a Major League Baseball game, a golf simulator experience, and a boat and a bus tour around Manhattan. “They pointed out the biggest projects they’ve worked on in the city,” one participant reminisced, “I remember that… that was a highlight.”

The Work

Work assignment varies between departments and offices; generally speaking, it’s either a free-market system, an assignment coordinator, or a mix of both. “On the one hand, it’s easy to think a centralized staffing system would be ideal as you’d be automatically put on work,” reflected one associate, “But the free-market system has been alright because I’ve been able to pursue the work I really want.”

“…bigger cases and the opportunity to be involved in more complex matters across borders.”

The firm’s litigation department covers a wide range of work, from general commercial litigation, to securities, fraud, class actions, insurance, and white-collar, as well as some advertising litigation. As juniors, associates are able to pursue the work they are interested in and aren’t tied down to a certain subgroup. With the combination of the firm’s litigation practices, associates were pleased with the availability of “bigger cases and the opportunity to be involved in more complex matters across borders.”

Juniors can expect to be working across all stages of the litigation cycle, including drafting briefs, doing research, producing memos, summarizing facts, preparing witness materials, drafting correspondence with opposing counsel, and prepping clients for mediations. They’re also often in charge of keeping seniors up to date on ongoing cases.

Litigation clients: Deloitte, Sirius XM Radio, Gamma Real Estate. Represents EIG Energy Funds XIV and XV in a suit against state-owned Brazilian oil company Petroleum Brasileiro in relation to the “Car Wash” scandal.

Newbies in the corporate department spend their first few years as generalists and naturally specialize over time. This means working across M&A, private equity, structured finance, securities, capital markets, and private funds. As first years, newbies have a professional development coordinator on hand to assist them with sourcing initial assignments.

Day-to-day, juniors handle checklists, client calls, diligence, general coordination work, and often have the opportunity to contribute to ancillary documents. As they gain experience, associates are able to progress from drafting from precedents to drafting from scratch. They’re also given more responsibility over things like virtual data rooms; “It’s maybe the same content but I’m engaging with it more and reporting on it more to senior individuals,” one insider explained.

Corporate clients: BlackRock, Hiscox, PBF Energy. Advised Alliant Insurance Services in relation to its $25 billion equity recap.

Intellectual property work at the firm focuses largely on patents, and involves representing patent owners and often asserting and defending claims before the US Patent and Trademark Office and similar international agencies. “In Silicon Valley, we have a smaller team really focused on patent litigation, so we’re getting lots of hands-on work,” one local associate relayed. That said, there’s also a fair amount of cross-office collaboration between New York and Silicon Valley.

Juniors get exposure to all stages of the work, with seniors providing juniors with as many opportunities as possible to have a go at the first draft. Partners often engage in the editing and finalizing process and, with a flat hierarchy, juniors are encouraged to approach partners with any questions they may have.

Intellectual property clients: Sirius XM Radio, Acceleration Bay, Centripetal. Represented W&Wsens, a small startup company founded by two semiconductor engineers, in a patent infringement suit filed against Samsung.

Career Development

Upon joining the firm, newbies are assigned a buddy, a mid-level or senior associate mentor, and a partner mentor. Juniors are encouraged to meet with their mentors frequently and are given a budget to do so.

Newbies are also encouraged to develop informal mentors, and this often happens naturally as associates work with partners. Juniors are also able to utilize a portion of their allocated training hours towards shadowing opportunities. Various departments also host lunch and learns on key topics and trends in the industry.

Naturally, the merger has brought some uncertainty around what exactly the path to partnership will entail for the current crop of junior associates, but sources were reassured that “if you’re doing good work, they want you to stick around and move up.”

Hours & Compensation

Billable hours: 2,000 target

Associates’ 2,000 hour target includes an uncapped amount of pro bono and up to 100 hours of professional and business development. While insiders noticed a bit of a dip in their hours over the past year – partly due to market conditions and a slowdown in work as the merger settled – they noted that the allowance for pro bono and professional and business development were welcome pillars of support in progressing towards their hours targets. Overall, of the target, interviewees noted: “It’s a lot of hours – there’s no denying it – but you know what you’re getting yourself into when you join BigLaw.”

For their toils, associates receive market scale compensation. “It’s pretty fair for the amount of work we’re doing and how much we’re expected to be available – and it’s a great salary. There’s really nothing to complain about!” summarized one associate, reflecting the general sentiment among all our interviewees. In the broadest terms, lawyers are required to hit their hours target and be in good standing with the firm to be eligible for a bonus. Partners also have discretion to award additional merit-based bonuses.

Associates also receive a budget every month to spend on their wellbeing (which the firm refers to internally as a 'lifestyle spending account'), such as a gym membership, acupuncture, or a massage. One said: “I really like that. It’s like $100 per month or you can save it and some people get a Peloton or something at the end of the year!”

Culture

At a BigLaw firm, there’s no doubt your professional development will be bolstered, but it’s also important to pay attention to personal development. Thankfully, for associates at HSF Kramer, this was no concern: “They really do care, not just about my professional life, but also my wellbeing.” In fact, the theme of seniors looking out for junior’s work-life balance was a recurring one in our interviews with associates. The general sentiment was that “people are really respectful of your time.”

“Approachability is a big thing here.”

With big mergers often comes the concern of maintaining a cohesive culture, but, according to associates, the firm is already one step ahead. “All the offices seem to have similar cultures,” one insider observed, “I think that was done intentionally.” Others agreed: “The firm really focuses on the community culture; even though it’s now a very large firm, people still really want to get to know each other.” This seems to be instilled from the top down, with sources noting: “I think that’s a big testament to the partners who try to engage equally with everyone, including the junior associates. Approachability is a big thing here.”

Pro Bono

Our sources were big fans of the flexibility around pro bono at HSF Kramer. For instance, associates explained, “We do clinics where you can just drop in that day and help out with pro bono work without necessarily having to contribute on a regular basis.” This came in handy for those going through busier periods who didn’t necessarily have the time to commit a large number of hours towards pro bono work. Equally, those with the time to commit are able to count an unlimited number of pro bono hours towards their billable target.

Once a month, associates have the opportunity to attend a pro bono clinic in Harlem to assist small businesses with legal queries. “That is a really great opportunity because you’re working directly with clients,” one participant told us. Corporate associates are also able to flex their skills by assisting non-profits with entity formation or gaining tax exemption status.

Across all offices, associates can work on asylum, divorce, domestic abuse, veterans and housing matters. Work can be found through the designated pro bono coordinator and, on occasion, the pro bono team will reach out to offer assignments that fit an associate’s interests. “For the most part, when you’re a junior on a pro bono case they let you run with it,” one insider informed us, “I’ve been able to draft briefs and do a lot of that work. That has been really exciting.”

Pro bono hours

• For all US attorneys: undisclosed
• Average per US attorney: 93

Inclusion

“The firm really values inclusion,” one insider told us, citing the firm’s various inclusion groups as examples, which include women, first-generation attorneys, parents, and LGBTQ+. These groups are open to all associates to join regardless of background or identity.

The professional development team also sends out emails every Friday with suggestions for how attorneys can better their wellbeing and career.

Get Hired

The first stage: recruitment on and off campus 

Hiring partner Kerri Ann Law tells us, “We participate in pre-recruiting programs at our target law schools, participate in OCIs at approximately 7 schools, and actively review resumes that candidates send to us directly or through formal resume collections offered by law schools. The firm also hires law clerks every year.” Associates assured us, “The firm’s not elitist and people here have more diverse school backgrounds than other firms.” Naturally, an interest in the firm’s specialist practice is essential during interview. Law adds, “When we participate in OCI, interviews are typically conducted by a partner or a very senior lawyer at the firm. We also try to send alumni when possible.” Law says the firm is looking for students “who have performed well at a high academic level, are involved in their communities in and out of school and have demonstrated leadership qualities.” 

Top tips for this stage: 

“Make a connection. Interviewers see a lot of candidates in a short time and you need to stand out.” – hiring partner Kerri Ann Law  

Callbacks

At the callback stage, “students typically meet with four attorneys (two more senior lawyers and two more junior lawyers), and a member of the legal recruiting team to answer questions on the recruiting process. We try to match department interest if indicated by the student.” At this point, Law explains, “HSF Kramer looks for the complete package. We have a very small program and want our summer associates to be long-term success stories. We look for students who are smart, well-spoken, engaged and interested in our firm. They need to explain why they want to work at HSF Kramer, and they should be prepared to discuss legal issues that interest them.” In addition, our associate sources tell us, “The firm is very conscious of maintaining its culture. We are looking for people who are friendly, humble, inclusive and eager to learn.”  

Top tips for this stage:  

“Be prepared and ready to explain how you can add your voice at our firm." – hiring partner Kerri Ann Law

Summer program

Summer associates are not assigned to practice groups and do not rotate through departments. Instead, Law tells us, “We tailor our program to the needs of each individual summer associate. We have an assignment attorney who meets with each summer and determines the assignments that meet the summer associate’s interests.” That’s not to say summer associates should be too quick to pigeon-hole themselves, however, “We encourage summer associates to try work in all different departments and be open-minded about new areas of the law. We try to balance substantive work assignments with shadowing assignments, which provide opportunities for summer associates to see what life will be like as they grow their career. Social networking is also important and we average one event per week as well as many lunches with attorneys.” As a couple of final pointers, Law advises summer associates to “be open-minded and try new things. Make sure you attend everything you can.” From those who have already been through the application process we heard, “It can be intimidating but people recognize you need to ask questions. It’s a steep learning curve and it’s always best to ask if you don’t understand something.”  

 Top tips for this stage:  

“Our small program provides a unique experience for summer associates. Take advantage of it!” – hiring partner Kerri Ann Law

Interview with Paul Schoeman, US executive partner

Commercial strategy, market position and trends 

Chambers Associate: How would you define your firm’s current position and identity in the legal market? What differentiates your firm from your peer firms in the market?  

Paul Schoeman: We have had a transformation as a result of our combination; we’ve created something very special in the marketplace. We’ve combined what we each thought were great firms and great brands. Kramer Levin was very much a US-based firm but with limited visibility around the world. And now, we’ve joined forces with HSF to become a truly global firm, with genuine strength in the three largest financial markets in the world: New York, London, and Hong Kong. We really are a global firm as opposed to being a US firm with outposts or a UK firm with outposts. Not many firms have an organic strength in all regions of the legal market; that is a great new thing and a distinguishing characteristic.  

In turn, by combining with Kramer Levin, HSF has got a real size, scale, and capability in the US that it didn’t previously have to offer to its clients. The combination really strengthened both firms – what I think is unique is that we’re both transatlantic and transpacific. We really have strength in Asia and Australia in ways that a lot of others don’t. Now, we have the US, and we’re strong in the UK and EMEA.  

The other thing I would say is that in the US, we still have all the great things that we loved about Kramer Levin. We have a fantastic group of people and a great culture. We have a very good scale currently in the US – it’s a manageable size so that people know each other. It’s a real collegial partnership in the US, and adding the HSF New York partners has only strengthened that.  

CA: Have there been any developments at the firm over the past year that you’d like law students to know about?  

Schoeman: I would say the headline is that integration has gone surprisingly well. We’ve been able to operate as one firm from the 1st of June. We’ve been collaborating, working together on matters, and sending work back and forth. There is a lot of work to be done on what I call ‘the plumbing’, which is IT, tech, and other systems that have to be integrated. There are people who are much more tech savvy than I am, who are working around the clock to get all the systems in line. From a working lawyer’s perspective, we really are very well integrated. From day one, we saw work being referred into the US and from the US, which was proof of the concept that there would be demand going both ways. 

We’ve also created a real antitrust capability in our Washington, DC office. We had existing experience with antitrust, but we wanted to strengthen that in order to match the global firm’s really strong competition and antitrust practice. So, we’ve hired two great lateral partners in DC for antitrust, which is terrific. Recently, for example, we’ve hired three M&A partners in New York who specialize in energy and mining which, among other things, really dovetails with the global firm’s strength. We saw the ability to recruit lateral partners into the global platform for those interested in what that could offer. Those are just some examples, but even leading up to the combination, we hired for bankruptcy, private equity, and white-collar investigations – all who were very excited about what the combined platform looks like.  

Having the scale of the global firm gives us the ability to invest in AI in a way that we might not have been able to do as a standalone. We’re able to try to be at the forefront of technology and AI, based on the global scale that we now have. We have announced Legora as our enterprise AI platform; we’re rolling that out now around the world. We’ve got a global AI team under the leadership of our global chief AI officer, Illona Loginova, who joined us a few months ago.  

 CA: Are there any domestic or international events that are affecting any of the firm’s practices at the moment? Are there any trends that you think are affecting the business of law firms more generally, and how is that playing out with your firm? 

Schoeman: I think it's fair to say it's been an uncertain economic environment. You can see the transactional work going a little in fits and starts. We’re busy but you get the sense some people are waiting until the global macroeconomic events settle down, but others are still transacting. One of the nice things that is true of the combined HSF Kramer, but was true of both firms individually, is that we have balanced practice groups. As the world is complicated, different parts of the business react differently.  

One of the exciting areas that the firm is very strong in and that we're really looking to develop in the United States is energy transition. It seems particularly pointed now that we're having issues in the Strait of Hormuz and so forth; thinking about alternative energy and energy transition is exciting. Data centers are a big thing, and we're doing that with all the data centers globally.  

The overall message is, it's an uncertain time but in periods of uncertainty clients look to trusted advisors to help guide them through it. Our firm has a lot of really thoughtful, talented lawyers who are very dedicated to their clients; uncertainty is not necessarily bad for lawyers, it can be an opportunity. CA: What is your firm’s commercial strategy focusing on, and how do you expect the next year to unfold? 

Schoeman: Speaking about the US strategy, we have an investment plan that involves laterals in specific areas, and antitrust was one of them, but others include energy and infrastructure. We're definitely looking to build in those areas. Also, as a strategy, there are certain corridors of work that we're in a very strong position to take advantage of. For example: US-Japan. There’s a lot of opportunity to do cross-border work there as we have a very well-respected office in Tokyo. 

Other traditional areas of practice are strong. We have very strong litigation, private equity, restructuring, and real estate practices; those are very good businesses in the US, among others. We’re continuing to build those and rely on them. For example, we have a Silicon Valley office and we’re looking to make investments in the tech sector. Tech is an area of strength for the global firm. We see a lot of opportunity for cross-border tech transactions, so we hired a tech transactions partner, but also IP litigation, which is often cross-border these days. We were already doing international IP litigation, but now we have our own partners in different parts of the world that we can work with.  

Inside the Firm 

CA: How is the firm evolving to accommodate the needs/expectations of the next generation of lawyers? 

Schoeman: We have a lot of people thinking about these issues; we have a great people team both globally and in the US. We hired Melissa Neulander as our director of People US, who started a couple of months ago and she is terrific; she is part of our people strategy in the US. There's been recognition for a long time that there are generational differences and the younger generation may have different ways that they like to work, different expectations, different ways of communicating. We've discussed that internally and done training on some of that. One of the great advantages of this combination is that we have, on a global level, a first-rate people function.  

As a result, we offer a whole leadership curriculum and a well-being curriculum. We know that we live in a complicated global environment and provide ways to help succeed in that. We do a lot of introspection on these issues, including surveys and focus groups. We have a level of sophistication, given our scale, to try to make sure that we're understanding the needs of our newer lawyers. One of the things we redoubled our efforts on is training. I think people come out of law school not necessarily familiar with all of the things that young lawyers have to do, and so that's definitely an area of focus. That couples with AI as well, which we're just at the beginning of. Young lawyers are very interested in figuring out how AI and other technologies are going to become part of their work lives.  

The Legal Profession 

CA: How do you predict the legal profession will change in the next five years? Are there any particular challenges the industry is facing? 

Schoeman: No one has a crystal ball; everyone is asking these questions and it's hard to predict. But the way we're thinking about it is AI is powerful tool that’s going to enhance the service that we're able to deliver to our clients. It's not just going to be that we're going to automate processes; it’s not going to replace lawyers, but it's going to give us the ability to do certain things faster, and more efficiently, to deliver an enhanced product or service to the client. I think that this is going to be a collaborative process with clients. We have different projects around the globe to try to partner with clients and see what we can do with AI together. There will be workflows, both client and operational workflows, that we can speed up and simplify, so we’re exploring all of that.  

Everyone is thinking about the impact that it will have on the billable hour and whether we’ll see a shift to different kinds of billing arrangements and different ways of collaborating with clients. There definitely will be a response to AI which we’re all spending a lot of time and money investing in. Firms will have to adapt to it and figure it out: that goes both to revenues and billings and to training young lawyers.  

The other thing that’s clearly happened is there has been a very strong movement to a greater scale, which we saw and wanted to be a part of, but the size of the firms are now much bigger than they were five years ago. I expect that to continue: leading firms will continue to grow, and small firms will continue to experience pressures. That’s not to say that different firms can’t choose different paths, but after our transaction was announced a number followed quickly thereafter – the market has spoken. Some boutiques might then spin off as that format will make sense for some practices, but firms are going to embrace scale. 

The Fun Bit 

CA: Throwing it back to law school: it's been a long day of classes and studying. What's your go-to easy meal to have before you crash? 

Schoeman: Well, I live in New York City, so my current go-to easy meal is ordering sushi. I'm too far away from my student cooking days of ramen and so forth.  

CA: What was the first concert you attended? 

Schoeman: It's hard for me to remember. But the most memorable one was a Stevie Wonder concert at Madison Square Garden – it was great! 

CA: Thinking about the ways in which the legal profession is developing, what is the one skill you have learnt in your career that you think is key for young attorneys to learn? 

Schoeman: I think lawyers are ultimately problem solvers, and so the skill you need to develop as a lawyer is the willingness to see the problem and think about solving a problem rather than performing a set of tasks or just following some set of instructions.