Lateral Partner retention is a vital metric for law firms. "Each year, law firms invest countless hours, money, and resources in their lateral hiring efforts", so the success rate of each lateral hire has significant implications to any firm.

Based on input from a number of firms, a key window for a lateral Partner hire is the first 3 years from joining. Within that timeframe, most firms will have a sense of whether the hire is going to be a success, or not!

Using publicly-available data tracked by Pirical, we've analyzed how many of the lateral Partner hires made by AM Law 100 firms between 2020-2022 exited the firm within 3 years of joining.

Note on methodology

Each firm's retention rate is based on the cohort of lateral Partner hires made between Jan 2020 - Dec 2022, and how many of those hires subsequently left the firm within the first 3 years of joining.

Excludes firms that made fewer than 5 lateral Partner hires and moves as a result of mergers. Data is derived from tracked lateral Partner moves, numbers may be slightly incomplete due to limited public information. Exits include Partners that left but didn't lateral to another firm, eg. retired.

The major European and US legal hubs of Paris (90%), London (82%), and New York City (82%) show the strongest lateral Partner retention rates.

In contrast, the legal markets of Los Angeles (75%), Dallas (74%), and Houston (74%) have the lowest retention. As a particularly competitive lateral market, Texas appears to be the trickiest state to hold onto lateral Partner hires within the first 3 years of joining.

Looking at the data by practice, Labor and Employment (84%) practices have the strongest lateral Partner retention within the first 3 years. Project Development (82%) and Litigation (81%) practices are the next highest. 

Cybersecurity, Privacy & Data Protection is the practice with the lowest retention at 68%, well below the 79% average. Insurance (77%) and Capital Markets (77%) practices also show a slightly higher than average rate of early exits.

Among the firms with over 90% retention within the first 3 years, Kirkland & Ellis was the most common source of the hire, accounting for 5.2% of moves.

Latham & Watkins (2.6%) was the next most common source of the hire, followed by a number of AM Law top 50 firms and Magic Circle firm Linklaters.