Job growth Job growth

In-house legal hiring went up in May and stayed in line with the Bureau of Labor Statistics report, which showed more legal jobs were added to the economy last month despite the threat of a looming recession, according to recruiters who spoke to Corporate Counsel on Wednesday.

"One of the things we saw [from 2008 to 2010] is that when the economy takes a hit, corporations will move to hire in-house attorneys because it can be a cost-saver," Alice Rafalko, a senior legal consultant at Beacon Hill Legal in Philadelphia, said.

The legal sector added 3,200 jobs in May after losing 60,000 jobs between April and May. The report currently shows 1,097,500 people working in the legal industry in the U.S. That number includes attorneys, paralegals and secretaries. That number is down 50,000 from this point last year when there were 1,147,400 in the legal sector.

The National Bureau of Economic Research announced this week that the U.S. is officially in a recession based on February seeing the last monthly peak in economic activity prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

At the beginning of the pandemic, Rafalko said there had been a pause in hiring and onboarding new attorneys in corporate legal departments. She explained that individuals who were recruited became hesitant to leave their steady jobs to move elsewhere.

"While some of the actual hiring was slow during that time, now that the market is doing well and we're starting to see things loosen up, we're seeing an uptick in open positions," Rafalko said.

Jamy Sullivan, executive director of Robert Half in Dallas, said legal departments are optimistic about hiring as states begin to open back up. She said there is a range in what kind of attorneys that legal departments are seeking.

"There is a mixture, but I've seen more positions open for general counsel or senior corporate counsel," Sullivan explained. "Seven years of experience have been the immediate openings."

Chris Batz, legal recruiter and founder of The Lion Group in Kansas City, Missouri, told Corporate Counsel that many of the positions he's seen filled are those which had already been furloughed and are being refilled. He said he would expect legal departments to begin hiring in full force in the fall.

"I think if legal departments were not already planning to hire during COVID-19, they will hold off," Batz said.

However, Batz added corporate legal departments are not hiring en masse across the country. Although he has seen areas of growth in the financial and health care sectors.

When legal departments do begin hiring in full force again, Rafalko said she would expect life sciences to try to attract in-house attorneys as many companies work to find a vaccine to COVID-19.

"We anticipate that we will see more hiring for bankruptcy and corporate restructuring," Sullivan said. "Law firms do that but there are also corporations that do that kind of work or corporations that hire in-house counsel for that work."

Sullivan also said she would expect legal departments to hire litigation attorneys as the pandemic ends and companies prepare for lawsuits.

The numbers in the May jobs report have been criticized for not being entirely accurate. The Bureau of Labor Statistics admitted in its report that it counted approximately 4.9 million people as employed although they were unemployed.

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