In a recent article, that Reed Smith was found to have fired multiple associates via teleconference on allegations of “billing errors” during a document review project. Law firm Reed Smith gave no severance to its dismissed associates and declined to comment on the matter.
The document review project spanned from August to October, during which attorneys were called upon to undertake extensive tasks. Remarkably, these associates were not given any warnings of wrong billing practices until their dismissal was announced, three months after the project’s conclusion. This begs the question of why no one in a managerial role had identified and cautioned the attorneys about these alleged infractions, particularly before the invoices were sent out and before the necessity to dismiss them “for cause” arose.
The reason behind these dismissals has sparked a controversy, too. Following the initial report, it’s been tipped that among the fired associates were at least two pregnant attorneys whose maternity leave was denied, and whose healthcare was cut off.
Further complicating the panorama, those attorneys that escaped dismissal have been told that they will not be promoted and will have their pay reduced. Clearly, the document review project was far from being a mundane administrative task.
This situation is particularly troubling when multiple people across various offices are implicated in the same problem, shifting the blame upwards and implicating higher-level management. Merely discarding associates for blindly following faulty orders seems harsh, yet considering the scale of the punitive measures effectively introduced, it’s clear that this isn’t an isolated issue. Whether these associates acted as instructed or mistakenly thought they were following orders, the responsibility lies primarily with management.
Decision-making comes into the limelight when examining the handling of this situation. Challenging choices have been made; firing attorneys without any form of severance, and even more severely, firing pregnant lawyers and discontinuing their healthcare. Each of these choices becomes more difficult to justify if the fault for the alleged billing errors lies at a higher pay grade.
In future developments, finding the point of origin for the billing errors could shed new light on the fairness of these actions. Several punitive measures, including dismissals, pay reductions, and halted promotions, have collectively created another hurdle in the path to justice.