Several firms are starting the new year with newly added executive compensation partners. Baker Botts, Kirkland & Ellis and White & Case each announced Monday a new lateral partner in the field, a practice that is a key part of mergers and acquisitions dealmaking.

In New York, Victoria Rosamond moved from Katten Muchin Rosenman to White & Case, and Robin Melman moved from Jones Day to Baker Botts. In Houston, Rob Fowler moved from Baker Botts to Kirkland & Ellis.

Ross Weil, a recruiter at Walker Associates, said it's "mission-critical" for law firms with strong M&A and private equity practices to have a strong executive compensation practice. Partners in the area "play a crucial role not only with the transaction, but also counseling the client," he said.

Rosamond, who'd previously been counsel at White & Case and spent a year as a partner at Katten, said she had the chance to take on a leadership role at Katten, leading the executive compensation team within the firm's larger tax team. But she said she was glad to be back with White & Case's much larger executive comp practice, adding she's more familiar with the kind of deals that White & Case handles.

She noted that a drop-off in deals doesn't mean a drop-off in work. When the economy turns south, she said, "there may also be, at the same time, large reductions in force and employment-related issues that we also help with. … More creative ways [can be] needed to incentivize people when there's less cash in your coffer."

Executive compensation can demand detailed knowledge of tax law, securities law and benefits laws like the Employee Retirement Income Security Act. According to the biographies of the three lawyers who moved, they help clients negotiate severance, change-in-control and noncompetition agreements that govern the restrictions on and entitlements of their top officers, as well as the compensation arrangements, which are often combinations of cash and equity.

For Melman, who is also an alumna of Sullivan & Cromwell, the move from Jones Day was driven by the opportunity she saw in Baker Botts' strategic focus on technology, media and telecommunications and the energy industry. A practitioner in the executive-compensation field since she graduated from law school in 2006, she said she's not surprised by series of moves in the practice.

"I think increasingly, people are becoming aware of the value that we add," said Melman. "I think that executive compensation will be a growing field."

Fowler couldn't immediately be reached for an interview. Fowler had been at Baker Botts since 2005, according to this LinkedIn profile. Jon Ballis, Kirkland's new chairman, said in a statement that Fowler "has a great reputation and strong experience handling executive compensation and employee benefits issues across a range of matters, including in connection with mergers and acquisitions and within the energy sector."

Weil, the recruiter at Walker Associates, said he saw a common thread running through the moves in that each lawyer "traded for more 'secure option,'" he wrote in an email. "The firms they each went to have stronger M&A and private equity practices, which in turn demonstrates they value the executive compensation practice with more care and attention."