Willkie Farr is Raided for In-House Talent

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Willkie Farr may be getting raided, but it’s not entirely a bad thing. Because Willkie is just losing talent to a top client, instead of losing talent to a rival law firm. The Bloomberg LP has decided they want to strengthen their in-house presence, and they plan on doing so with almost all of Willkie’s attorneys.

Could this be a good thing for Willkie Farr? Even with less work coming in from the client, the firm will remain Bloomberg’s outside counsel.

  

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And Willkie was even generous enough to send an email to all of their people, to insure that nobody freaked out. He obviously didn’t chaos in the firm. If chaos were to happen, things would be a lot harder to manage.

Even if it may not seem like it, I think this move could be a net positive for Willkie. Because, according to the Bloomberg press release, the company doesn’t want to shift work away from the outside counsel, they just want more in-house lawyers to make the company grow.

The Bloomberg press release says this:

Bloomberg LP announced today that five partners from Willkie Farr & Gallagher will be coming to Bloomberg as full-time employees to join the existing Bloomberg legal team, effective January 1, 2012. The newly constituted internal legal team will include Dick DeScherer, Dan Grossman, David Levine, Carol Mascera and Sarah Osborn from Willkie. DeScherer will become Chief Legal Officer. ”As a growing company operating in almost 200 locations around the world, we are finding unprecedented opportunities for growth in our customer base, our product offerings and our local partners. Bloomberg will benefit greatly from a ramp-up of both the number and range of expertise of in-house legal staff to ensure we are much more efficient and nimble and we seek to take advantage of these global opportunities.” said Bloomberg CEO Daniel L. Doctoroff.

If Bloomberg decides to expand, there will be plenty of work for the outside counsel. And with the five additional Willkie partners on board, it feels like Willkie has really locked up the client for the future.

And it doesn’t hurt Willkie recruiting to say that not only can you work on the Bloomberg account, but if you’re really good at the job, then Bloomberg may hire you.

Willkie says this to calm everyone:

For many years we have been privileged to handle almost all of Bloomberg LP’s legal matters with a dedicated team of attorneys. Effective January 1, 2012, some core members of that team, including our partners DeScherer, Grossman, Levine, Mascera, and Osborne, as well as a number of counsel and associates, will move in-house at Bloomberg. Willkie will continue to serve as the company’s primary outside counsel. Given the profile of the team, we wanted to let you know first hand about this change. A press release will be issued by Bloomberg shortly that we will also circulate. We look forward to working with our new colleagues in their new in-house roles and to our continued representation of Bloomberg. Please join us in wishing a successful transition to those involved in this new chapter of our client’s growth.
-The Executive Committee.

Hey, this is just an opportunity for new talent to show the company what they’re made of.