Shearman Left Out of ‘Sweet Sixteen’

Law Firms

Posted May 13, 2008, 09:35 am CST
By Martha Neil

Sixteen law firms are part of an elite international group that has been highly successful both in New York and in London.

But not among the "Sweet Sixteen" honored by the Lawyer is Shearman & Sterling, because of a series of missteps that have canceled out the benefit of the New York-based firm's avant-garde international strategy in the 1990s, the British legal publication says.

Shearman's international offices operate as "independent island states," rather than rich referral networks for one another, the Lawyer writes. (The firm's entire Mannheim, Germany, office defected in April, opting to became a separate law firm again rather than continue under the Shearman & Sterling banner, as discussed in an earlier ABAJournal.com post.)

And financially, too, the firm is lagging, compared to its A-list competitors. Although Shearman partners took home a hefty $1.8 million average profit per equity partner last year, the average among the Sweet Sixteen was $2.7 million, the Lawyer says.

However, Rohan Weerasinghe, who serves as the firm's senior partner, says Shearman is doing fine, and points to an increase of 60 percent in the average profit per partner between 2004 and 2007 of proof of that fact.

"The financials are important, but what's really relevant in my mind is the kind of work we're doing," he tells the Lawyer. "Because we're clearly doing, as our strategy has directed us to, the most high-profile and significant matters for the largest companies in the world. And that's really the indicator in my mind of the direction and trajectory of this firm and where it's going to go."

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