We reported last week the rumour that Mallesons might need to prepare for an exodus of lawyers, in particular from its Melbourne office, in light of the emergence of a new Gilbert + Tobin office in the city.  In response to that post we received the following comments from an anonymous (ostensibly a Mallesons) spy:

Firm Spy is always good for a laugh. If only you guys had the balls to apply the blow torch to Gilbert & Tobin the way you do to other firms. You read like a PR outfit for G&T. It’s not even subtle.

Clearly our friend missed the berating we gave Danny Gilbert over his use of the word “sanguine”.

In any event, we’re always keen to moderate any biases in our reportage, so this got us digging around for some dirt on G+T. Thankfully, two anonymous tips have come through over the last week, meaning we didn’t have to dig too far.

First, we received this in response to last week’s post from an anoymous spy:

I suggest the lawyer from Mallesons does his homework…

G+T is known for being a sweat shop, yes the money is good but does it make up for being overworked and having very little resources and support around you… Remember all the benefits of a large firm with L&D, KM etc etc

Not to mention there are some dysfunctional partners at that firm, just check out how many partners have been and gone from G+T in the last 5 years, it is a lot higher than other firms.

We couldn’t find the statistical evidence to support the partner attrition rate and the claims about it being a “sweat shop”, however we did receive the following from another anoymous tipster earlier this week:

What the legal news sector has failed to observe in its reporting on the “coup” by G+T to secure some of Telstra’s work for a fixed fee is that staff at G+T will suffer greatly from the deal. In the first place, there will be the workers who are stuck running errands into the wee hours for Telstra, with no billing upside. In the second place, the partners, who have left major firms with the hope that G+T will offer greater performance-based remuneration will find that the opposite is true. You can work to your heart’s content for Telstra under this arrangement, just don’t expect your pocket to get any fatter!

I think Danny has been very canny in this deal. He is hoping to forge a deep connection with Telstra, to understand its business, only so that in future he can use that expertise to leverage a traditional, billable-unit fee arrangement in future. I guess time will tell.

Can Mallesons lawyers, pondering a move to Gilbert + Tobin, expect an even bigger workload? Will the hours be longer? Is G+T a “sweat shop”?

Should G+T revolutionary billing arrangement with Telstra actually be called a “fixed-fee-billable-unit arrangement”?

Send the Firm Spy your news and views!

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