The State of In-House Hiring: A View from the Trenches

The US economy is full of question marks (e.g., Wall Street Braces for an Earnings Season of Mixed Signals per NYT), and the IMF warns of a global slowdown, citing inflation and rising interest rates, war in Ukraine, slowdown in China, COVID, etc. How do these conditions affect legal hiring in-house?

This is what I’m seeing in the Bay Area legal market:

• The number of employers looking for in-house lawyers and the number of open positions have dropped dramatically compared to a year ago.
• Market leaders who voraciously hired lawyers in the past have slowed or frozen hiring. Amazon announced earlier this week a hiring freeze, joining the ranks of  Google, Twitter, and Uber. Meta, Snap, Netflix and others have shed employees.
• Searches I have been conducting are taking longer than before. Employers are not in a hurry to close because they need to be sure business justifies the hire. Also, lawyers are not getting multiple offers as quickly as before, so employers have more time to finish their process.
• Top law firms are also experiencing slowdowns, leading to hiring freezes or stealth layoffs. It’s not good for lawyers at either companies or firms.

However, hiring has not completely stopped. Lawyers are essential to business, e.g., drafting sales agreements necessary for revenue growth or advising on business strategy. As a result, legal hiring will never go to zero.