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Law360 (December 7, 2020, 3:06 PM EST) -- Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP will reimburse its employees for any salary lost as a result of pay cuts implemented earlier in the year to offset losses due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the firm said.
The firm announced Friday that in either December or January, all attorneys and staff members who had their pay slashed due to COVID-19 austerity measures will receive a supplemental payment to bring their salaries back in line with what they were before the pandemic started.
A representative for BCLP confirmed the supplementary changes Monday, declining to comment further.
"We have been successful in carefully managing our business through the pandemic and our performance has been stronger than expected," Co-Chairs Lisa Mayhew and Steve Baumer said in a shared statement.
In May, the law firm implemented 15% salary reductions for all employees earning more than $40,000 across all offices, deciding in July that those reductions would be adjusted to 7.5% through the rest of the year before eliminating them in October after outperforming projections.
Along with the salary cuts, BCLP also laid off a number of attorneys and staff, which included the closure of the firm's Beijing office.
In recent months, there also has been an exodus of attorneys from the firm, including former head of professional risk and insurance Gaby Kaiser joining Stephenson Harwood as general counsel, Global Chief Operating Officer David Row joining Fladgate LLP as COO and three cybersecurity partners moving to Greenberg Traurig.
In London, BCLP has also lost a number of attorneys over the past year, losing a pair of construction partners to DLA Piper and a tax partner to Maurice Turnor Gardner LLP last November. A pair of competition partners and an investment management partner also left BCLP last year, joining Goodwin Procter LLP, Rosenblatt and Norton Rose Fulbright.
BCLP's latest announcement came soon after the firm announced a new program to foster firm growth. The program, dubbed "Project Advance," will improve operational infrastructure in order to support expansion, particularly in real estate, litigation and investigations and in its newly combined corporate and finance practices.
The decision by BCLP to restore employee pay follows a number of other firms that in recent weeks have made similar announcements. Baker Botts fully reversed its salary cuts last month and issued a round of interim bonuses, citing improved financial performance, while Hogan Lovells, Katten Muchin Rosenman LLP and Baker McKenzie also enacted salary restorations.
--Additional reporting by Emma Cueto, Michele Gorman and Aebra Coe. Editing by Stephen Berg.
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