Ellie Dudley | Source: The Australian, September 2 2024

Top-tier lawyers have been granted considerable pay rises over the past financial year, with graduates seeing the most impressive boosts, as employers seek to retain quality staff through attractive bonus options and work perks.

The Australian’s Legal Partnerships Survey has revealed most firms have raised salaries for their lawyers this year following post-Covid high profits, with many also offering a suite of other financial benefits such as bonus programs and rewards.

“Salaries have gone up, especially for grads,” Eaton Strategy + Search partner Najeeb Nawab said. “Salaries for other lawyers at top firms have gone up as well, but not as high. We’re seeing increases anywhere from 4 per cent up to 8 per cent of their previous salaries. So it is, on average, keeping in line with inflation or a little bit less.”

Mr Nawab said firms had increased graduate salaries to try to prevent too many from going to overseas competitors.

“They’ve gone up basically from at the bigger top tier firms from $90,000 up to 110,000. It’s a $20,000 increase in some instances – quite a big jump for someone who has no experience,” he said. “The biggest competition Australian firms have is not necessarily other firms in Australia but overseas law firms. So they are investing in these grads now so they stick around and they can get a return on their investment.”

Gadens CEO Mark Pistilli said his firm had offered pay rises to graduates because they “are an important contributor to the fabric of our firm, they are out pipeline of talent and future leaders”.

“Graduates should be rewarded consistent with how the firm rewards performance and in line with their experienced colleagues,” he said.

Clayton Utz chief executive partner Emma Covacevich said lawyers salaries would be “competitively” raised this year.

“In addition to our salary package, we offer a generous bonus scheme to our lawyers once they have finished our graduate program,” she said. “Our recognition scheme offers diverse financial benefits that can be in the form of vouchers, time off, or smaller ­bonuses. It’s an important and timely way of saying thank you to our people or giving them an additional break for their hard work.”

Hamilton Locke managing partner Nick Humphrey said his firm was planning to raise salaries “in line with the market”, but said his employees also had an equity stake in the business.

“This promotes a sense of ownership and shared purpose which we see as a competitive edge in terms of attracting and retaining talent that is the right fit for us,” he said. “It also fosters collaboration and innovation: people working together for mutual benefit, rather than competing in silos. We also offer bonuses for high performance and collaboration, including an additional ‘Values Bonus’ of up to 10 per cent of salary to individuals who actively demonstrate our values in action.”

Lander & Rogers chief executive partner Genevieve Collins said salaries had been adjusted to “reflect parity by gender, role and employment status”.

“We were pleased to deliver competitive remuneration in 2024, reflecting our firm’s strong performance in the last financial year,” she said, adding the firm also offered free lunches, discre­t­ion­ary bonuses and other benefits.