Freshfields has raised trainee and associate salaries after a five year pay freeze.

It is the third Magic Circle firm to announce raises this year after Slaughter and May and Linklaters took the plunge in early May. All grabbed the chance to pay just slightly more than Allen & Overy, which increased wages last November but said it would not raise them again in 2014. RollOnFriday understands that Clifford Chance will announce new wages imminently, when it will presumably pay staff a symbolic £1 more than everyone else.

  A Freshfields NQ on £77k yesterday 

Although it will have a tough time working out exactly what that pay is at Freshfields. The firm's 'Career Milestones' system means that instead of receiving a fixed salary per PQE level, lawyers are paid according to their development across seven "key elements", like technical skills and project management. It means a 1PQE with the Midas touch could soar past bitter elders to the pinnacle of "Career Milestone 3", and take home £135,000. Linklaters has just introduced a similarly amorphous system for +2PQE lawyers.

Worries that the banded pay structures will lead to firms smuggling in pay cuts by putting staff at the low end of brackets so far appear unfounded, at least at Freshfields. In the RollOnFriay Firm of the Year 2014 survey its lawyers were the most satisfied with their pay of the Magic Circle. Besides which, even the lowest paid NQ at Freshfields will now get at least £2,500 more than their peers at the other MC firms.

  1st seat trainee
NQ
1PQE
2PQE
3PQE
 Freshfields  £40,500
(£39,000)
CM Foundation:
£67,500 to £77,500
(£65,000 to £72,500)
CM1: £87,500 to £100,000
(£80,000 to £92,500)*
 Linklaters  £40,000
(£39,500)
£65,000
(£64,000)
£70,500
(£69,500)
£77,500 to £82,000
(£78,250)
£87,500 to £93,500
(£89,000)
Slaughter and May
 £39,500 (£39,000)  £65,000 (£63,000)
 £70,000 (£69,500)
 £79,000 (£78,000)  £89,000 (£87,500)
 Allen & Overy
 £39,000  
 £64,000
 £69,500  £78,500  
 £89,000
 Clifford Chance
 £39,000  £63,500  £69,500  £78,200  
 £87,800
*a junior associate who secures a £10 million annual retainer from Citibank will be eligible for CM2 (£107,500 to £115,000) and, if they liberate some of its branded pencils, CM3 (£120,000 to £135,000).

Freshfields London managing partner Julian Long said,Investing in our associates is critically important at Freshfields. We make sure we offer the most talented individuals a combination of great work, great training – and market leading levels of compensation"

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Comments

Anonymous 30 May 14 13:56

jusding by FF's brackets, I would have thought that CM Foundation actually covers NQ-2PQE, and that CM1 starts at 3PQE (in line with Links' lower end 3PQE banding...). Suggest you've got this wrong RoF

Anonymous 30 May 14 16:06

Anything that takes away the inefficiency of the billable hour being the main indicator of employee worth is a good thing. Not sure that FF is doing that, though. Guess what? In the real world, you don't get paid more just by being somewhere for longer than somebody else.

Anonymous 30 May 14 16:53

@anon user 15:06 - you can bet your bottom dollar that a key factor in deciding whether an associate moves from CM1 to CM2 will be the number of hours they bill per year - so inneficieny will still be incentivised. The firms still value cold hard cash much more than "technical skills and project management".

Roll On Friday 30 May 14 18:15

You can also bet your bottom dollar that, when you factor in the amount of hours they work, it is the equivalent of earning half as much in an in-house role.

Anonymous 03 June 14 11:15

@anon user 15:06 - in the real world you do get paid more just by being somewhere for longer than somebody else - it's called overtime.