Ride the Lightning

Altman Weil Chief Legal Officer Survey: 66% Say Revenue Has Fallen

November 30, 2020

The Altman Weil Chief Legal Officer Survey was recently released. According to the survey of those managing a corporate law department, in the fall of 2020, 66% of respondents said that their organization's revenue fell, while 77% said their workload had increased. Employee layoffs took place at 11% of the organizations surveyed.

A trend that started ten years ago remains. Respondents reported spending less money on outside counsel and project that they will spend less money again in 2021. The median discount on billing rates has been 10% for five years but respondents report asking for greater discounts now.

For 2020, non-law firm vendor spending is also projected to decrease. It decreased by 9% in 2019 and 18% in 2020. 25% plan to make further decreases in vendor spending next year.

Perhaps surprisingly, many law firms have declined to renegotiate billing rates. Only 12% agreed to cooperate on coming up with new alternative fees. There were reports of some law firms taking proactive measures to earn their clients' loyalty and cement client relationships, but the survey makes it clear that a lot of possibilities were "left on the table in 2020."

I suspect there will be some shuffling of law firms in 2021 to cut costs. As we have seen, the pandemic has made some law firms "winners" and some – well – not so much.

Sharon D. Nelson, Esq., President, Sensei Enterprises, Inc.
3975 University Drive, Suite 225|Fairfax, VA 22030
Email: Phone: 703-359-0700
Digital Forensics/Cybersecurity/Information Technology
https://senseient.com
https://twitter.com/sharonnelsonesq
https://www.linkedin.com/in/sharondnelson
https://amazon.com/author/sharonnelson