Top 15 Biglaw Firm Is On A Quest To Reach 1K Lawyers In The U.S.

If a Biglaw firm is one of the biggest, does that mean it’s also one of the best? That’s what one of Biglaw’s top firms seems to be banking on.

Norton Rose Fulbright — a firm that brought in $2,261,192,000 gross revenue in 2023, putting it at No. 15 in the Am Law 100 — has about 850 lawyers spread across the country right now, and according to Jeff Cody, the firm’s U.S. managing partner, that number is likely to increase to roughly 900 by year’s end. Cody’s goal is to increase the firm’s lawyer headcount to 1,000 by the end of 2025. Roy Strom of Bloomberg Law has additional information:

“Lawyer growth, to me, that’s the driver,” Cody said in a wide-ranging interview. “It’s growing lawyers, partners, and growing the firm. If we’re successful, we’ll be successful at growing revenue.” …

Traditionally, law firm leaders target metrics such as revenue per lawyer, but there has been an increasing drive for scale as the largest law firms have outperformed their smaller peers in recent years. Cody, who is based in Texas, said the firm was looking to grow through lateral partners and group hires rather than another merger.

“If you’re competing to bring in new talent, that’s the strategy to grow the firm and produce more revenue and grow more hours,” he said.

Norton Rose grew its global revenue by more than 8% last year, with its U.S. offices increasing revenue by 13%. Cody says that thus far in 2024, the firm’s U.S. performance is already beating last year’s achievements, driven by increases in productivity and headcount.

“We’ve added timekeepers but our productivity is up,” Cody told Bloomberg. “It is just demand. We’re busy.”

If the firm remains as busy as it currently is, it should have no problem in its quest to be the best. Lots of luck to Norton Rose Fulbright in its journey to reach its 1,000-lawyer goal.

Norton Rose US Head Targets Lawyer Growth, Eyes AI Disruption [Bloomberg Law]

Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on X/Twitter and Threads or connect with her on LinkedIn.