Leading law firms are poaching partners from rival firms who can bring in their respective teams and deliver from the very start. Law firms have seen plenty of business in the post-pandemic recovery era, especially in the fields of Mergers & Acquisitions, banking, finance, resolution, and regulatory advisory roles. Many firms found themselves short of the requisite manpower to meet the new business reality, a situation that has given rise to the poaching of star lawyers from rival firms.

“This is the beginning of a generational shift where we are going to see more teams moving to the firms in which their managing partner or founders are in their prime and the profit share and governance structure is more system-driven, than personality-driven,” said Aneesh Patnaik, head of disputes and practice acquisition at Vahura, a legal search and consulting firm told Economic Times.

The top five firms hire anywhere from 500 to 1000 lawyers each; however, the next segment of companies are also hiring aggressively to reach a critical size of over 200 lawyers.

In July, Bobby Chandoke and Sudhir Sharma, senior partners of law firm L&L Partners, along with their team of 19 partners and a total of 63 lawyers joined DSK Legal’s New Delhi office. Mumbai-headquartered company DSK Legal has also poached three partners from law firm Dua & Associates in Bengaluru along with their respective teams.