Baker & McKenzie has just revealed its record breaking results and confirmed that it would show its appreciation of the hard work of its London staff with, naturally enough, a voucher.

In 2010 London staff got a 4% bonus when profit per equity partner hit £650,000. The firm announced this week that this has increased to £773,000 for 2013/14 and that it had become the first law firm to hit annual revenues of US$2.5bn since the global financial crisis. Hurrah! So the hardworking London staff that helped generate all this loot will be getting a hefty bonus as a result!  Nah, only joking.

Instead London staff will each get a voucher for £150. Despite the massive global haul, it seems growth at the City office (which chairman Eduardo Leite called "moderate") has not been enough to trigger a performance bonus.

    Don't spend it all at once.

Insiders at B&M have complained that the firm has welshed on its deal with its staff and that "morale is at an all time low".

The firm issued a statement saying that "we value the contribution and hard work of all of our employees and strive to ensure that we reward our people fairly and competitively. Our all staff bonus is one element of the overall bonus scheme that we operate and is part of a wider reward strategy that seeks to recognise both individual and collective performance. The criteria for these schemes are set at the beginning of the year. We continually review our reward schemes to ensure that they are appropriate and market competitive".

Translation: Enjoy the tokens, slackers.
Tip Off ROF

Comments

Anonymous 15 August 14 10:23

Is anyone really surprised/interested in the penny pinching antics of already uber-wealthy equity partners? Its business etc etc but is it? Its greed and what these people don't see is that the staff will put up with quite a lot. They will chubb by the water cooler and not go the odd firm 'night out'.

But then they will leave. En masse. And the partners will see that as par for the course and instruct some recruitment agent on 35% commission to replace them all - this is the 'business' despite it being the opposite of good business.

Most are waking up to what law is. If you want to succeed and show off that you wear a hugo boss suit to belittle your school mates down the pub in the one hour a week you have off then great. But for everyone else its just a very hard job with multiple pitfalls and guaranteed stress for not much more money than other jobs, which was what distinguished law.

Anonymous 15 August 14 10:25

I'm not sure that our firm has a total turnover of what each PEP gets there and even we get more than that.

They are mugging you off

Anonymous 15 August 14 11:14

Cynical and shameful - no token at all would have been better than this. They most know the effect on associate moral this would have - either they don't care or, more probably, it is a deliberate tactic to get some under-utilised associates to leave.

Anonymous 15 August 14 18:17

Disgusting especially given it's the associates that helped them get there. Remind me - why do we all put up with it again?

Anonymous 17 August 14 12:55

they only missed target by a couple percent too! what an utter disgrace these partners are!!

Anonymous 18 August 14 13:23

Why do people continue to apply to work at these firms (or stay at them)? Partners must really laugh at their associates.

Anonymous 18 August 14 15:57

That's why I left the MC years ago to start my own business. Now, few years later, I still work incredibly hard but earn more than an equity partner and feel totally satisfied with myself. One advice- be bold people!

Anonymous 20 August 14 00:37

B&M associates are billing far more than £150 per hour. To reward a YEAR's work with less than an HOUR's pay is disgraceful.