{"id":137159,"date":"2025-11-19T14:07:41","date_gmt":"2025-11-19T22:07:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/11\/19\/brand-new-biglaw-megafirm-announces-bonuses-offering-associates-top-dollar-for-hard-work\/"},"modified":"2025-11-19T14:07:41","modified_gmt":"2025-11-19T22:07:41","slug":"brand-new-biglaw-megafirm-announces-bonuses-offering-associates-top-dollar-for-hard-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/11\/19\/brand-new-biglaw-megafirm-announces-bonuses-offering-associates-top-dollar-for-hard-work\/","title":{"rendered":"Brand New Biglaw Megafirm Announces Bonuses, Offering Associates Top Dollar For Hard Work"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bonus news is being announced left and right, and Biglaw firms are busy stuffing their associates\u2019 bank accounts like the Thanksgiving turkeys they\u2019ll be gobbling down next week. The latest bonus news comes from a brand new megafirm that last night issued its first round of bonuses under its new name.<\/p>\n

McDermott Will & Schulte \u2014 formed from the August 2025 union<\/a> of McDermott Will & Emery and Schulte Roth & Zabel \u2014 has adopted the Cravath bonus scale, as well as the Milbank special bonus scale. Here\u2019s what that looks like at the firm:<\/p>\n

\"\"
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

On top of these bonuses, MWS will be continuing one of MWE\u2019s traditions of offering bonuses that go above and beyond the market scale. As chairman Ira Coleman notes in the firm\u2019s announcement, \u201cWe remain committed to being top of market in all that we do and are pleased to note that, consistent with prior years, about two-thirds of legacy MWE Associates will earn above the Cravath scale.\u201d We suppose legacy SRZ associates \u2014 who were formerly able to cash in on step-up bonuses for their extraordinary contributions \u2014 will be able to get in on that action next year. <\/p>\n

Bonuses for legacy MWE associates will be paid out on December 26, 2025, while bonuses for legacy SRZ associates will be paid out on January 16, 2026.<\/p>\n

Congratulations to everyone at McDermott Will & Schulte!<\/p>\n

Remember everyone, we depend on your tips to stay on top of compensation updates, so when your firm announces or matches, please text us (646-820-8477) or\u00a0email us<\/a>\u00a0(subject line: \u201c[Firm Name] Bonus\/Matches\u201d). Please include the memo if available. You can take a photo of the memo and send it via text or email if you don\u2019t want to forward the original PDF or Word file.<\/p>\n

And if you\u2019d like to sign up for ATL\u2019s Bonus Alerts (which is the alert list we also use for salary announcements), please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the bonus alerts, you don\u2019t need to do anything. You\u2019ll receive an email notification within minutes of each bonus announcement that we publish. Thanks for your help!<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Staci Zaretsky<\/a>\u00a0is the managing editor of Above the Law, where she\u2019s worked since 2011. She\u2019d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email<\/a> her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on\u00a0Bluesky<\/a>,\u00a0X\/Twitter<\/a>, and\u00a0Threads<\/a>,\u00a0or connect with her on\u00a0LinkedIn<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The post Brand New Biglaw Megafirm Announces Bonuses, Offering Associates Top Dollar For Hard Work<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n

Bonus news is being announced left and right, and Biglaw firms are busy stuffing their associates\u2019 bank accounts like the Thanksgiving turkeys they\u2019ll be gobbling down next week. The latest bonus news comes from a brand new megafirm that last night issued its first round of bonuses under its new name.<\/p>\n

McDermott Will & Schulte \u2014 formed from the August 2025 union<\/a> of McDermott Will & Emery and Schulte Roth & Zabel \u2014 has adopted the Cravath bonus scale, as well as the Milbank special bonus scale. Here\u2019s what that looks like at the firm:<\/p>\n

\"\"
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

On top of these bonuses, MWS will be continuing one of MWE\u2019s traditions of offering bonuses that go above and beyond the market scale. As chairman Ira Coleman notes in the firm\u2019s announcement, \u201cWe remain committed to being top of market in all that we do and are pleased to note that, consistent with prior years, about two-thirds of legacy MWE Associates will earn above the Cravath scale.\u201d We suppose legacy SRZ associates \u2014 who were formerly able to cash in on step-up bonuses for their extraordinary contributions \u2014 will be able to get in on that action next year. <\/p>\n

Bonuses for legacy MWE associates will be paid out on December 26, 2025, while bonuses for legacy SRZ associates will be paid out on January 16, 2026.<\/p>\n

Congratulations to everyone at McDermott Will & Schulte!<\/p>\n

Remember everyone, we depend on your tips to stay on top of compensation updates, so when your firm announces or matches, please text us (646-820-8477) or\u00a0email us<\/a>\u00a0(subject line: \u201c[Firm Name] Bonus\/Matches\u201d). Please include the memo if available. You can take a photo of the memo and send it via text or email if you don\u2019t want to forward the original PDF or Word file.<\/p>\n

And if you\u2019d like to sign up for ATL\u2019s Bonus Alerts (which is the alert list we also use for salary announcements), please scroll down and enter your email address in the box below this post. If you previously signed up for the bonus alerts, you don\u2019t need to do anything. You\u2019ll receive an email notification within minutes of each bonus announcement that we publish. Thanks for your help!<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Staci Zaretsky<\/a>\u00a0is the managing editor of Above the Law, where she\u2019s worked since 2011. She\u2019d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email<\/a> her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on\u00a0Bluesky<\/a>,\u00a0X\/Twitter<\/a>, and\u00a0Threads<\/a>,\u00a0or connect with her on\u00a0LinkedIn<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bonus news is being announced left and right, and Biglaw firms are busy stuffing their associates\u2019 bank accounts like the Thanksgiving turkeys they\u2019ll be gobbling down next week. The latest bonus news comes from a brand new megafirm that last night issued its first round of bonuses under its new name. McDermott Will & Schulte […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":137128,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-137159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-above_the_law"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Staci-Zaretsky-nHINK9.jpg?fit=150%2C100&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137159","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137159"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137159\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/137128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}