On a related note, this undercutting and bending over backwards is there at all firms, but its the worst at KCO. I have seen partners promise clients the sun and the moon and all else, and then promising they would charge way less than other firms. How on earth do they keep doing this, [...]
The original post is spot on. The ‘something’ which has dislodged people is just absolute apathy stemming from the more senior partners who choose to live like ostriches with their heads buried under the sand. They prefer to be oblivious to reality (or possibly turn a blind eye to?) other than the status of their invoices. To them, the well-being of fee earners is as meaningless as their toothless PR stunt policies.
In a year which saw the firm make record high revenues, one ostrich even accused fee-earners of treating WFH as a paid vacation despite them functioning on precious little sleep to turn around another one of those countless “urgent” deliverables. Toxicity has hit an all-time high, and regard for the people who make the place tick has nosedived like never before.
Maybe the message will only get through to the ostriches when what remains of the reliable deckhands also choose to abandon what is a fast sinking ship, and only the unfortunate untrained and semi-trained deckhands (who are so through no fault of their own) are left to helplessly pick up the pieces. But no doubt, the undercutting and bending over backwards for clients will continue unabated, so cheers to that.
Our little Kco whatsapp groups get a nice chuckle out of every PR release. Sometimes it's schadenfreude, looking at all these optimistic college kids making a fuss out of Kco's releases thinking they've found the holy grail of law students: a law firm that pays well and makes you work just 9-5, 5 days a week with unlimited leaves. Most attorneys who came down with Covid got leaves only on days they couldn't physically get out of bed. Most attorneys haven't had a Sunday off since WFH began and nearly every attorney has had their annual leave requests turned down over the past year because "where will you go during a lockdown". I don't like comparing at will employment with slavery, but this comes close
Wellness policy is just a paper tiger. KCO is all talk and no cock when it comes to implementation of these fancy policies. Always ahead of the league on paper when it comes to drafting them. It's just optics tho. Mere PR management. This cuts across all locations btw.
Add those weekly boomer calls to the mix - where every office boomer basically questions your work ethic and considers you incapable of working from home (i.e. without direct physical supervision) and we have a sure shot recipe for disaster.
2 Partners - 75% of the A3 and SA population and numerous other juniors have left the firm in the last 2 months. The casualties are more or less limited to the Corporate team. And it doesn't stop there - there are more exits in the pipelines. This isn't your usual run of the mill annual attrition. It takes something to dislodge people who've spent most of their professional life in that system.
In a year which saw the firm make record high revenues, one ostrich even accused fee-earners of treating WFH as a paid vacation despite them functioning on precious little sleep to turn around another one of those countless “urgent” deliverables. Toxicity has hit an all-time high, and regard for the people who make the place tick has nosedived like never before.
Maybe the message will only get through to the ostriches when what remains of the reliable deckhands also choose to abandon what is a fast sinking ship, and only the unfortunate untrained and semi-trained deckhands (who are so through no fault of their own) are left to helplessly pick up the pieces. But no doubt, the undercutting and bending over backwards for clients will continue unabated, so cheers to that.
Apparently this ain't that obvious?
Perhaps KCo is going the AZB Bangalore way.