One giant leap Inside Ontario’s overhaul of the justice system p.15
Open concept A lawyer couple’s East End home is full of life p.26
In a trance This lawyer has DJed at Toronto’s hottest nightclubs p.30
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TAPPED OUT America’s largest law firms are siphoning off Canada’s top associates
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WeirFoulds welcomes associate Anna Alizadeh
Loopstra Nixon welcomes associate Robert Annibale
Burnet, Duckworth & Palmer LLP welcomes associate Carly Baker
Burnet, Duckworth & Palmer LLP welcomes associate Marlena Bova
Henein Hutchison announces Jennifer Brevorka as counsel
Dutton Brock welcomes associate Andrew T. Chau
WeirFoulds welcomes associate Eliott Cheeseman
Weisz Fell Kour LLP announces new partner Pat Corney
Gillian Hnatiw & Co. welcomes Chantelle Dallas
Minden Gross LLP welcomes new partner Frank DeLuca
Aird & Berlis welcomes associate Tamie Dolny
Dutton Brock welcomes associate Gurpreet Farmaha
Mathews Dinsdale welcomes associate Brady Farmer
Blaney McMurtry welcomes associate Daniela Faukovic
Polley Faith welcomes associate Emily Fraser
Get more news online at a-list.lawandstyle.ca
Naymark Law announces new partner James Gibson
Minden Gross LLP welcomes associate Alyssa Girardi
Bereskin & Parr welcomes new partner Louis-Pierre Gravelle
WeirFoulds welcomes new partner Peter Gross
Loopstra Nixon welcomes associate Alessia Grossi
Wildeboer Dellelce welcomes associate Peter Hill
Wildeboer Dellelce welcomes associate Nathan Holloway
Lenczner Slaght welcomes Caroline H. Humphrey
Loopstra Nixon welcomes associate Jasy Ibrahim
Blaney McMurtry welcomes associate Rohit Jha
Thomson Rogers welcomes associate Daniel Klein
Maleki Barristers announces new partner Sara Kun
Hicks Morley welcomes associate Mornelle Lee
Loopstra Nixon welcomes associate Connor Macdonald
Loopstra Nixon welcomes associate Ian MacLeod
Ruby Shiller Enenajor DiGiuseppe welcomes associate Harshi Mann
Wildeboer Dellelce welcomes Rachel Manno
Loopstra Nixon welcomes associate Victor Martins
Lenczner Slaght welcomes Lynne McArdle as research counsel
Lenczner Slaght welcomes Lauren Mills Taylor
Hicks Morley welcomes associate Christian Morin
Gillian Hnatiw & Co. welcomes Maria Naimark
Dutton Brock welcomes associate Ian Nicholls Mutter
Mathews Dinsdale welcomes associate Yinka Oyelowo
Burnet, Duckworth & Palmer LLP welcomes associate Daria Pankratyeva
McLeish Orlando welcomes associate Brandon Pedersen
Mathews Dinsdale welcomes associate Heather Power
Hicks Morley welcomes Bonnie Roberts Jones as counsel
Loopstra Nixon welcomes new partner Peter A. Saad
Addario Law Group welcomes associate Omar Said
Paliare Roland welcomes associate Kate Shao
WeirFoulds welcomes associate Abbey Sinclair
Gillian Hnatiw & Co. welcomes Laura Snowdon
Durant Barristers welcomes associate Leslie Anne St. Amour
Loopstra Nixon welcomes new partner Jayson Thomas
Loopstra Nixon welcomes associate Jenelle Westworth
Loopstra Nixon welcomes associate Alexandra Whyte
Minden Gross LLP welcomes associate Benji Wiseman
Lenczner Slaght welcomes Lidiya Yermakova
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On the cover Photography by Andrew B. Myers
PHOTOGRAPHY BY ANDREW B. MYERS
Fall 2021. Volume 15. Issue 3.
Cover story
The new talent war
The pandemic has led to a spike in legal work around the world. To meet demand, the largest law firms in the United States have started poaching Bay Street associates. Can Toronto mount a defence? p.19
PRECEDENTMAGAZINE.COM 5
Contents
15
30
26
A trip to Bay Street on a quiet summer morning p.9 Letters
Our readers respond to our summer issue p.10 Our People
We asked our contributors how they’d spend an American-sized signing bonus p.11
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Debrief
Best Practices
Going In-House
How Gillian Hnatiw fights for clients whom the law has failed to protect p.13 On the Record
Ontario’s outdated justice system is looking a bit more modern p.15
Inside the modern home of two Bay Street litigators p.26 Secret Life
Meet the corporate lawyer who moonlights as a DJ p.30
IMAGES BY (CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT): MAY TRUONG, MIN GYO CHUNG, STEPH MARTYNIUK
Editor’s Note
Brief
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FALL 2021. VOLUME 15. ISSUE 3. PUBLISHER & EDITOR
Melissa Kluger SENIOR EDITOR
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PRECEDENT FALL 2021
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Editor’s Note
A quieter place As the pandemic labours toward its conclusion, can Bay Street return to normal? On a Friday morning in July, I took a trip to King and Bay. I hadn’t been in the area
PHOTO BY IAN PATTERSON
since the start of the pandemic, but I’d heard from lawyers who’ve been going into the office that it was worth the trouble to see Bay Street in its weirdly vacant state. I took the streetcar for the first time in more than a year. (And I had a good laugh when I realized that I had added $100 to my PRESTO card in February 2020, cash that I probably should have invested in Zoom instead.) To be fair, a Friday morning in the summer was always quiet downtown, with lots of people on vacation or rolling into work a little late. But this was different. It was eerily empty. At the TD Bank Tower, there was one bike locked to a rack that could have held at least 50. In the lobby, every elevator bank sat empty waiting for passengers. Over at First Canadian Place, there was a hushed library vibe as I wandered down the vast and lonely marble hallways, sometimes without another person in sight. The street-level Starbucks was shuttered and gone for good. Some retail stores had closed, while others, like Harry Rosen, were papered over with a note in the window that simply said, “See you in the fall!” For lawyers working downtown, Bay Street might feel a little emptier for another reason. While most of us were stuck at home unpacking our latest Amazon deliveries, other lawyers were packing their bags for a new adventure in American cities like New York and Los Angeles. Indeed, in the midst of a global pandemic that caused an epic health crisis and staggering job losses, business in the legal industry has been strong — so strong that major U.S. firms can hardly keep up with the demand. And, as history has shown, a busy market forces the United States to send headhunters to Canada. In our cover story (“The brain drain,” p.19), journalist Luc Rinaldi digs deep into the ongoing recruitment boom. He looks at what has prompted so many Canadian lawyers to leave for the U.S. and whether Bay Street can do anything to stop the bleeding (spoiler alert: probably not). Managing partners at the city’s top firms spoke candidly with Rinaldi about losing lawyers to America and what it means for business. I think you’ll be surprised to hear what they have to say. While I admit that I kind of enjoyed my visit to empty, eerie Bay Street, I am eager to see the financial district come back to life. The coming months will bring a lot of challenges as we all navigate what a return to the office should look like. I wish everyone luck, patience, flexibility, creative thinking and, hopefully, a new Starbucks.
Are you looking for a new job? We don’t mean to brag, but The Precedent A-List is Canada’s best job board for lawyers. Head over to a-list.lawandstyle.ca today to find the latest career opportunities at top law firms and leading corporations. New jobs are added every week. To make sure you never miss an update, follow The Precedent A-List on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. Your new gig is waiting for you.
Melissa Kluger
Publisher & Editor melissa@precedentmagazine.com @melissakluger
PRECEDENTMAGAZINE.COM 9
Letters
Your CPD. From your legal community.
SCREEN TIME I appreciated Daniel Waldman’s column on how COVID-19 has impacted mentorship in our profession (“Reach out,” Summer 2021). His piece is a timely reminder for senior lawyers to build mentorship into remote work practices by developing new habits, such as regularly scheduled check-in calls with junior colleagues and law students. As a junior lawyer myself, I also encourage those at the start of their careers to actively seek out learning and mentorship opportunities with senior colleagues. You are your own best advocate. If you are interested in a project or matter, it never hurts to ask how you can get involved. Jennifer Philpott Associate, Goulart Workplace Lawyers
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I enjoyed Precedent’s recent article on lawyers who’ve left established firms to start their own practices (“A bold move,” Summer 2021). I thought the piece captured the entrepreneurial spirit of the lawyers who were profiled. Throughout the pandemic, I’ve noticed that more and more lawyers are finding that they can not only survive but thrive outside of the big-firm environment. As the owner of a small firm, I will be forever grateful for the training I received on Bay Street, and I believe that big firms will remain an important part of the legal fabric. But in niche areas of law — such as professional regulation and discipline, the focus of my practice — the playing field is increasingly levelled. Clients often prefer the focused attention they can receive in a more intimate environment.
year’s Precedent Setter Awards (“Curtain call,” Summer 2021) especially important. Reading about how the award recipients got their starts, what motivates them and how they’re leading the way in their practice areas and communities was a powerful reminder of the talent in our profession. We need to continue recognizing and supporting such amazing lawyers. And to the future Precedent Setters out there: we see you, we look forward to hearing more about you, we support you and we will celebrate your upcoming accomplishments and work. Fernando Garcia General counsel and vice-president of legal, Cargojet
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Our People
Cashing in In this issue, our cover story reveals the big money that American law firms are willing to fork out to poach associates on Bay Street. So we asked our contributors how they’d spend a $50,000 signing bonus
Lunch & Learn Series: Tech in Your Legal Practice – Tips from the Frontline
“I’d pay off my student loans and donate the leftover money,” says Allison Baker, a fact-checker, copy editor and producer. Since 2016, Baker has produced Mi’kmaq Matters, a podcast about the Mi’kmaq people, politics, land and water of Newfoundland. For this issue, she wrote about how the pandemic has forced the justice system in Ontario to embark on a massive overhaul (“A new look,” p.15).
Kagan McLeod is an illustrator whose work has
appeared in the Globe and Mail, GQ and Entertainment Weekly. In this issue, he produced a portrait illustration of Gillian Hnatiw, one of the country’s leading practitioners in cases that involve sexual misconduct (“Fighting back,” p.13). If McLeod suddenly received a massive bonus, he knows precisely how he’d spend the money. “I would buy golden-age illustration art,” he says. “Maybe a Mead Schaeffer or Dean Cornwell.”
“In theory, I’d spend a $50,000 signing bonus building a state-of-the-art home recording studio,” says Luc Rinaldi, a freelance journalist, whose writing has appeared in Toronto Life, Maclean’s and Reader’s Digest. “In reality, I have a mortgage.” For this issue, he reported on how American law firms, which were flooded with new business throughout the pandemic, have gone on a hiring spree to handle the increased workload. And, as Rinaldi learned, they have been targeting associates at the largest firms in Toronto (“The brain drain,” p.19).
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A P P L I C AT I O N D E A D L I N E · O C TO B E R 18, 2021
Brief
THE LATEST FROM THE LEGAL WORLD
BEST PRACTICES
Fighting back How Gillian Hnatiw became one of the country’s top advocates for survivors of sexual misconduct by Greg Hudson illustration by Kagan McLeod
“ We are not going back to the way it was.” Doug Downey on how the justice system has changed during the pandemic p.15
After her second year of law school, at the University of Toronto, Gillian
Hnatiw took on her first case. The year was 2001, and she had started a summer position at Downtown Legal Services in Toronto. Hnatiw met with a trans woman who had visited an apartment that was listed for rent. On arrival, however, the landlord suddenly declared that the unit was no longer available. To Hnatiw, this looked like textbook discrimination, so she planned to file a human-rights complaint. But she soon discovered a loophole in the law that permitted housing discrimination when there is a shared bathroom or kitchen. Her client, in the end, had no legal protection. “It was my first experience trying to use the law to address discrimination,” recalls Hnatiw, “and also coming up against the limits of what the law could do.”
PRECEDENTMAGAZINE.COM 13
Brief Up to that point, Hnatiw had worried that law school was a mistake. The lofty discussions in the classroom seemed detached from the real world. “I felt like I was the only one with doubts,” she says. “It was very isolating.” Her perspective began to shift after that summer. “Once I had clients with real problems, it started to feel like law school was a good choice.” After law school, Hnatiw launched her career at Lerners LLP as an articling student, before becoming an associate and then a partner. “I never saw myself as a Bay Street type,” she says, “so I was surprised I liked it there.” As she built a broad civil litigation practice, she continued to seek out clients who lacked a clear path to justice. Today, she is one of the country’s leading experts on sexual misconduct and violence, as well as gender-based discrimination. In these areas of law, survivors have to choose from a range of imperfect legal pathways. Imagine someone who has experienced sexual harassment in the workplace. There are many legal options. One would be to leave the job and sue the employer for constructive dismissal. (In Canada, there’s no tort for sexual harassment.) Another would be to file an internal complaint with the organization’s HR department, which could see the harasser disciplined or terminated but can trigger retaliation. The individual can bring a complaint to the Human Rights Tribunal, which will sometimes order employers to make systemic changes and pay nominal damages to survivors. Or the person might decide to stay silent and keep the matter private. Hnatiw takes the time to understand what each client sees as most important: money, systemic change,
of survivors, the firm also handles a wide array of civil-litigation work, including health, employment and administrative law. Outside of court, Hnatiw trains large organizations on how to recognize myths and stereotypes in sexual misconduct, so they can better identify it in the workplace. On top of that, she trains regulatory adjudicators who sit on disciplinary panels. Because their cases sometimes involve sexual misconduct, Hnatiw helps them unpack their own biases so they can weigh evidence without falling back on preconceptions. This work allows her to use her legal skills to push for society-wide change. “She’s always thinking about the large-scale impact of our work,” says Molly Warwick, Hnatiw’s long-time law clerk. “She has what we jokingly refer to as ‘The Grand “Once I had clients with real List of Legal Injustices That Need to Be problems, it started to feel like Repaired.’” Most of them have to do with law school was a good choice.” protecting the rights of women. Gillian Hnatiw At the moment, Hnatiw is serving as senior counsel for the Mass Casualty privacy or holding the harasser to account. Commission, investigating the causes and “There are pros and cons to every legal circumstances behind the 2020 shooting pathway,” she says. “I don’t think there is that began in Portapique and left 22 people one set of goals that is better than another.” dead. As a result, she’s been bouncing No matter what her client identifies as the between Nova Scotia and her home in top priority, she will fight for it. Toronto. From April to July, her three chilAfter 15 years at Lerners, Hnatiw moved dren (ages 9, 13 and 14) and her husband, her practice to a newly established litigation Ian Campbell, a partner at Fasken, joined boutique. About two years later, in the fall her out east. Hnatiw will continue to spend of 2019, she started her own firm and called time in both provinces until October 2022. it Gillian Hnatiw & Co. This was an opporHer work on the inquiry is horribly diffitunity to be truly independent: to take on cult. A violation was committed that has so more cases that she cared about and run the mangled the lives of those involved that it business her way. might be impossible to achieve true justice. The firm has since grown to a team of One thing, though, is certain: Hnatiw is the nine. Beyond the relentless work on behalf right person to have on the case.
Timeline of a litigator
Year of call 2003
14
PRECEDENT FALL 2021
2001: As a law student at the University of Toronto, Hnatiw takes a summer job at Downtown Legal Services, where she has her first experience representing real clients.
“Connecting the law to human problems was something I very much enjoyed, as opposed to sitting in the classroom having philosophical debates about the law.” 2002: Hnatiw articles at Lerners LLP in Toronto. 2003: After getting called to the bar, she joins the firm as an associate. 2012: Hnatiw becomes a partner at Lerners.
2018: Hnatiw moves to Adair Goldblatt Bieber LLP, a new litigation boutique. 2019: In November, she launches her own firm: Gillian Hnatiw & Co. “Starting your own firm four months before a global pandemic is probably not ideal,” she says. “But I also didn’t have a lot of overhead at the time, so the financial pressures were relatively small. Mostly because we hadn’t had time to find the office.”
PHOTO: KENYA-JADE PINTO
Gillian Hnatiw Principal, Gillian Hnatiw & Co.
1999: Hnatiw graduates from Queen’s University with a degree in history. “History overlaps with the law, especially if you see the law as a vehicle for social change,” she says. “History reinforces my optimism that change is slow but possible.”
Brief ON THE RECORD
A new look The pandemic has forced the justice system to undergo a drastic makeover by Allison Baker illustration by Min Gyo Chung
The Rules of Civil Procedure is a dense
read, bursting with text that is complicated and old-fashioned. One of its more mundane sections spells out, in a three-part test, how to establish that a document is authentic. If you’d scrutinized that part of the text about a year ago, you would have noticed that it specifically mentioned telegrams. This sort of anachronism might be relatively harmless, but it’s emblematic of a deeper problem: the legal rulebook is often out of step with the modern world. Once the coronavirus pandemic touched down, however, the justice system had no choice but to adapt to the reality of mostly shuttered courthouses and vacant law offices. Inside the Ontario government, Doug Downey, the attorney general, had already been working on reforms that would modernize the profession. Now, Downey moved to pass them at an accelerated pace. As he puts it, “I really wanted to make a practical impact on the profession and the public.” His core team got to work. “We were very hands-on,” says Amanda Iarusso, a litigator at McCarthy Tétrault LLP, who, when the pandemic began, was on a temporary leave from Bay Street to work in a senior leadership position with the attorney general. Alongside her colleagues, she reached out to key stakeholders — including judges, lawyers, legal associations and advocacy groups — to determine the most urgent issues. “We fostered those relationships and kept that open line of communication because, often through one or two phone calls, we were able to come to an agreement for resolutions on issues which were very quickly moving.” One of the most pressing obstacles to overcome was the fact that lawyers had a limited ability to share documents online. The province moved fast to expand its online filing system. Today, close to 95 percent of civil proceedings and almost
80 percent of family matters are filed online. And the province launched CaseLines, a cloud-based platform that allows lawyers to share evidence and documents with judges and opposing counsel. Remote court, meanwhile, became the norm. As of April 2021, the Superior Court of Justice had held close to 140,000 virtual hearings and the Ontario Court of Justice had heard 1.3 million. Beyond such major structural changes, the government cleaned up the most outdated sections in the Rules of Civil Procedure. That reference to telegrams, for instance, has been replaced with email. The culture shift, says Downey, has been seismic: “Instead of having to say, ‘Why would you do that online?’ I now want to hear, ‘Why wouldn’t you do it online?’”
One predicament, though, remains unsolved: the backlog of jury trials, which cannot take place over video conference. During the provincial lockdown, a small number of courtrooms stayed open, but they prioritized criminal jury trials — making it virtually impossible to hold a civil jury trial. “Most personal-injury cases take four to five years at the best of times,” says Kris Bonn, a partner at Bonn Law and the president of the Ontario Trial Lawyers Association. Though he credits the government for passing reforms that have improved the profession, he still finds that “timely access to justice is a problem.” Downey doesn’t deny that more work has to be done. But, on the whole, he’s upbeat about one crucial fact: “We are not going back to the way it was.”
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The Brain Drain
The pandemic has triggered an economic boom in the corporate world. And with large law firms taking on more work, the competition for legal talent has become fierce. Over the past year, top firms across the United States have used money and the promise of adventure to lure associates away from Bay Street. And there’s no way to stop the exodus by Luc Rinaldi photography by Andrew B. Myers
PRECEDENTMAGAZINE.COM 19
I
n early 2021, Kojo Hayward was a second-year associate at
Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP in Toronto with no plans to leave his job. He liked his colleagues and enjoyed his work, providing legal advice to exciting local upstarts like the fintech firm Wealthsimple. He made good money, too — about $130,000 a year, plus a year-end bonus. But then a friend of Hayward’s who had moved to a firm in the United States told him that his workplace was looking to add more lawyers. In short order, Hayward applied and received a job offer. Before accepting it, though, he decided to take a few meetings with American recruiters to see what else he could find on the job market. After a series of emails and LinkedIn messages, another enticing opportunity arose. The Los Angeles office of Latham & Watkins LLP — one of the most prestigious and profitable law firms in the U.S. — was looking for associates who could advise highgrowth tech companies and their investors, handling mergers, acquisitions and exits. This basically matched his caseload at Osler, but, if he moved to California, his salary would rise to US$240,000, plus a discretionary year-end bonus. “I thought, Okay, what other cities in the world would I want to live in?” recalls Hayward. “Los Angeles was at the top of my list.” He was attracted to the balmy weather and West Coast lifestyle, California’s thriving tech scene and the calibre of the city’s law firms. “The big thing wasn’t even the money, to be honest. The money was a nice cherry on top.” Plus, the timing was right for an adventure. Hayward was 30, single and childless. After mulling it over, he told himself, “If I don’t go now, when will I?” Hayward applied and, after a whirlwind of interviews, got the job. When he told Osler, the firm was sad but congratulatory. “We were really sorry to lose Kojo,” says Doug Bryce, Osler’s national managing partner. “But I understand entirely why, at his age and stage, an adventure of that sort is appealing.” Hayward isn’t the only lawyer who’s been lured south of the border by weather, prestigious work and a fat paycheque. He knows at least half a dozen other associates who have left Toronto to work in the States. Virtually every large Bay Street firm has lost at least one or two associates to America over the past year. For the most part, these associates have moved to elite legal giants in New York and the Bay Area, such as Kirkland & Ellis LLP, White & Case LLP, Cooley LLP and Shearman & Sterling. It may seem strange that this cross-border hiring frenzy began when borders were, well, closed. All manner of industries — travel, hospitality, retail, entertainment — were decimated by the pandemic, resulting in closures, mass layoffs and emergency relief funds. The least fortunate have struggled just to pay rent and feed their families. Meanwhile, many white-collar professionals managed to prosper throughout the coronavirus crisis and its economic aftermath. Large law firms and their clients have more work — and more profits — than ever. “When the world’s in a crisis, lawyers tend to be busy,” says Adam Lepofsky, founder and president of RainMaker Group, a Toronto-based recruitment agency. The surge in business has many causes. Early in the pandemic, large employers worldwide had endless legal questions about health and safety restrictions, layoffs and wage subsidies. Plenty of companies went belly up, resulting in a spike in bankruptcy and insolvency matters. Then central bankers flooded the global economy with trillions of stimulus dollars; in tandem with low interest rates, that meant corporations had plenty of capital available to make all kinds of business deals. And, with huge swaths of employees working from home, major tech companies enjoyed a spike in revenue. “The amount of work that this has generated for some of
“ The biggest challenge I’ve got right now is finding people.” — Dave Leonard, CEO of McCarthy Tétrault LLP
the big U.S. firms is jaw-dropping,” says Bryce. “And it requires an army of associates to do that work.” By late 2020, American firms had depleted the talent pools in their own country. “There’s a shortage of suitable U.S. talent,” says Warren Bongard, the president and co-founder of the legal recruitment firm ZSA. The busiest law firms started to look beyond the domestic job market. American recruiters have looked to other countries — including Canada, Australia and Ireland — where educated, experienced associates are doing identical work in similar legal landscapes for less money. “A number of U.S. firms are engaged in a ferocious war for talent,” says Bryce. “Our transactional associates are a terrific target for them because they can plug them into their existing structure.” That’s a terrifying scenario for Bay Street, where the largest firms are desperate for associates for all the same reasons as their American counterparts. “The biggest challenge I’ve got right now is finding people,” says Dave Leonard, the CEO of McCarthy Tétrault LLP. “If I could hire 20 or 30 more associates across the country tomorrow, I’d have work for them.” In an attempt to stop — or at least slow — the bleeding, virtually all of Toronto’s biggest law firms have taken defensive measures. Torys LLP acted first, instituting a new two-pronged associate bonus. All associates received a cash payout equal to 10 percent of their salary in May, with a second payment going to any associate who bills a certain number of hours by the fall. Most large firms followed suit, introducing a similar special bonus structure. Deborah Dalfen, the chief professional resources officer at Torys, says the bonuses are a token of appreciation for associates, who have worked long hours, often under challenging conditions, through the pandemic. She hesitates to call them “retention bonuses,” as some have, because she doesn’t think they’ll have that effect. “If people are interested in going to the U.S. for a larger salary, what we are capable of doing will not be enough to offset that,” she says. “The markets and economics in Canada and the U.S. are so different. We’re just not able to financially match what they’re offering.” (Dalfen is confident, however, that “the experience a lawyer will get at Torys is as good or better than they’d get at any U.S. firm.”) If the exodus continues, the Canadian legal market could become hollowed out and starved of talent. But is there anything Bay Street firms can do to stop American competitors from stealing their best lawyers?
T
his is not the first time that U.S. firms have poached Can-
adian associates. In fact, many in the legal world consider this to be the “third wave.” The first wave began in 1998–99, at the height of the dotcom boom, when firms in New York and Silicon Valley — which were losing associates to lucrative in-house positions at
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technology companies — started hiring out of Toronto. “They realized there was an untapped talent pool up here,” says Bryce, who was an associate at Osler at the time. “An entire generation of associates above me in Toronto got decimated by that first wave.” The associates who remained on Bay Street had to take on the mountain of work that their colleagues had left behind, but they also enjoyed a clear path up the law-firm hierarchy. “It provided a series of opportunities for my generation, the ones who stayed, because all of a sudden, the people above us disappeared.” After the dot-com crash that began in March 2000, the international hiring spree ended, and many laid-off Canadians returned home. But by 2006, Toronto associates had another opportunity to head south or even overseas. Firms in the U.S., London and Dubai were awash in M&A work due to a hot stock market, low interest rates and massive amounts of borrowing. This second wave came to an abrupt end as well, thanks to the 2008 global financial crisis. Few people would have expected 2020 to bring a third wave. In the spring, shortly after the pandemic arrived, the legal job market went dead. “It was basically crickets chirping for us,” says Emily Lee, the co-founder of ALT Recruitment Partners in Toronto. “Nobody could wrap their heads around starting a new recruit in those circumstances.” Besides, many law firms were worried they’d need to cut staff, not hire more. “We were telling partners, in no uncertain terms, that we have to be ready for some pretty tough situations,” says Bryce. Though Osler
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ultimately didn’t lay anyone off or adjust compensation due to COVID-19, the firm did temporarily decrease partner draws, afraid that the pandemic would adversely impact cash flows. By the end of the summer, however, client companies were performing better than expected. After a brief standstill, there was a glut of IPOs and, especially in the United States, SPACs (special-purpose acquisition companies, an alternative means of taking a company public), resulting in massive amounts of legal work. In addition to racking up billable hours, law firms were saving on expenses. Lawyers weren’t flying overseas or taking clients out to dinner. The extra cash helped firms bolster their bottom lines. “Much to everybody’s surprise,” says Bryce, “2020 was a terrific year for most big law firms.”
T
he exodus began quietly, with a flurry of emails
and LinkedIn messages from American headhunters offering Toronto associates astronomical salaries. “For those who are young and unattached, who had been living inside their apartments for eight months straight, the idea of an adventure was pretty darn exciting,” says Kate Reder Sheikh, a San Francisco-based recruiter with the headhunting firm Major, Lindsey & Africa. Meanwhile, she adds, “there’s no mountain high enough that firms won’t climb to get capital markets and M&A talent.” The U.S. firms’ most effective weapon, of course, is money. At a major Toronto firm, third-, fourth- and fifth-year associates — the demographic most likely to
Reder Sheikh knows of one candidate who requested a signing bonus equal to her student-loan debts. “She said, ‘Pay me a $50,000 signing fee and I’ll join.’ Which is gutsy, but it worked.’” Between the salary and the bonuses, an associate who left Toronto for the U.S. in 2021 could conceivably make more than half a million dollars (in Canadian currency) this year. Granted, that money goes further in Toronto than in New York or Los Angeles, where the cost of living is higher. But it goes even further in Charlotte, North Carolina, where former Fasken associate Matthew Downer moved this past January. Downer, who is 32, has always hopscotched between Canada and the U.S. He has family on both sides of the border, his wife is American and his dual law degree (split between the University of Ottawa and Michigan State) set him up to practise in either country. It was by chance that he ended up on Bay Street. “Out of law school,
get poached because they’re experienced but not yet on the cusp of partnership — typically make between $150,000 and $200,000 a year. In the U.S., where top firms follow a pay grid called the Cravath scale, those same associates would earn between US$240,000 and US$305,000. And that doesn’t even take into account the colossal year-end bonuses that American firms award to associates. According to the current market rate, a fifth-year associate would take home a US$52,000 bonus. To make the move even more enticing, American firms generally cover the cost of relocation, including moving expenses, visa fees, and bar courses and exams. Latham & Watkins, for example, paid Hayward during part of the two-and-a-half months he spent relaxing and studying for the California bar. He moved to L.A. in June, before writing the exam in July. To seal the deal, U.S. firms often offer a signing bonus, too. Stephanie Biderman, another recruiter with Major, Lindsey & Africa, says that many of her offers to Canadian candidates have come with one. The amount varies wildly, she says, but “if a law firm really wants the candidate, they aren’t going to lose them over a signing bonus.”
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“ There is a marketplace for talent across the border, and we can’t be blind to that.” — Doug Bryce, national managing partner at Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP
Most firms have framed the bonuses and perks as a token of appreciation for the hard work that associates have put in over the pandemic. That may be true, but they’re also defensive measures: they can’t afford to lose any more talent. Even if firms aren’t able to stave off American headhunters, they need to protect themselves from the Canadian competition. Bay Street firms, flooded with legal work themselves, are battling one another for associates on home turf. RainMaker’s Lepofsky says firms find themselves wanting for associates, in part, because they failed to act sooner. “For the most part, firms here are reactive, not proactive,” he says. “They’re riskaverse and prudent about their business practices. They prefer to know they have the work before they decide to hire.”
T
he first and second waves of foreign poaching ended in
my wife and I had a deal that whoever landed the better job, that’s where we would move,” he says. Fasken offered him work in 2017, so the couple settled in Toronto. For a few years, life was good. Downer liked his colleagues and his work in corporate law, dealing with banks, private equity and real-estate funds. But when the pandemic hit, he and his wife were confined to a 600-square-foot condo. Within a few months, they were miserable and burnt out, stuck in an endless loop of 12-hour days, Zoom meetings and late-night emails. As Downer recalls, “My wife and I started looking at each other more and more, like, This isn’t sustainable.” In the summer of 2020, Downer visited his wife’s relatives in Charlotte. Restaurants were open, small businesses were thriving and real estate was relatively affordable. (The average home sells for nearly $1.1 million in Toronto, more than double the average price in Charlotte.) Downer and his wife could see themselves buying a house there and enjoying time with family. As soon as he got back to Toronto, Downer asked a recruiter to find him a job in Charlotte or another mid-sized U.S. city. He eventually received an offer from the Charlotte office of the global law firm Mayer Brown, doing corporate work. Downer took the job, and, as of January 2021, his base salary was US$200,000. By summer, it had risen to US$215,000.
W
hether or not Bay Street firms can compete with
that kind of salary, they decided earlier this year to do something. Torys was the first domino to fall. This year, associate bonuses are now de rigueur at Bay Street’s biggest firms. “To be blunt, we can’t have our competition offering bonuses and then say to our people, ‘We’re not going to do that,’” says Leonard, of McCarthys. “It’s not right, it’s not fair, it’s not good for business and, quite frankly, it would increase attrition.” At Osler, Bryce had also come to the same conclusion, factoring in pressure from the south. “It would be disingenuous not to say that one of the elements that went into that bonus was the competition from U.S. firms,” he says. “There is a marketplace for talent across the border, and we can’t be blind to that.” Beyond the bonuses, Toronto firms have ramped up their slate of perks and benefits. McCarthys implemented a one-time increase to associates’ tech allowance to help them outfit their home offices. The firm also started sending $100 Uber Eats credits to associates every month and partnered with Fairmont to offer its employees discounts on hotel suites. Torys, meanwhile, increased the amount it gives to associates for mental-health services like therapy and counselling up to $4,000 per year, and it gave every employee access to a new suite of virtual health and wellness tools.
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economic catastrophe. The industry hopes this one will not. Based on what clients have told Leonard, he predicts a strong demand for legal work for the rest of 2021 and into 2022. “I think there’s still wind in this market, and we’re certainly planning for that,” he says. “I don’t see demand letting up.” Whether it’s gradual or sudden, though, the red-hot market will cool down. The IPO and SPAC spree has already slowed. Interest rates will eventually rise, stimulus funds will dry up and a post-pandemic era of relative austerity may begin. American firms won’t always need as many associates as they do today. “It’s cyclical,” says Dalfen. “As hard as it might be to see some people depart for greener pastures — no pun intended — that will calm down and it’s our expectation that we’ll see people coming back.” After the first and second waves, lawyers returned to Bay Street en masse. But today’s legal landscape is dramatically different. The pandemic has shown that lawyers can work from anywhere. When former Fasken associate Kai Kramer landed an in-house position with MongoDB, a database-software company headquartered in New York, the company said he could stay in Toronto. Instead, he and his wife decamped to Calgary, a cheaper city closer to her family. Now, he leads the company’s commercial legal operations for all of western North America. “I’m finding that, in the tech world, all the companies are really building up their in-house departments,” he says. Much like the big U.S. law firms, MongoDB, which already employs 14 lawyers, is now looking to hire more Toronto talent. “We can definitely get capable people from Canada at — it sounds bad to say — a discount.” It’s a fool’s errand to try to predict the distant future. But Bryce, for his part, still believes in the allure of Toronto. He expects many departed Canadians will return when they want to start families or advance their careers. Bryce speaks from firsthand experience. He worked in New York from 2008 to 2011, albeit at his own firm’s office, before returning to Toronto. “If you’re in your 20s and haven’t put down roots yet, the idea of making more money and living in a global city is exciting,” he says. “The fine print is that you’re going to be working so extraordinarily hard that you aren’t going to get to enjoy that city very much. It’s a bit of a short-term transactional relationship, in truth.” As for his lost associate Hayward, “I hope he’ll come back one day,” says Bryce. “We’re betting that some of the people who left will return enriched by their experience and training, and that will be quite valuable to us and our clients. We’re playing the long game.” For Bryce, and the rest of Bay Street, the long game may be the only choice.
Debrief life beyond the law
GOING IN-HOUSE
Better together After tying the knot, two Toronto litigators updated a traditional Danforth home with modern flair by Jeremy Freed photography by May Truong
At the outset of 2019, Larissa and Brad
Vermeersch, who had recently married, were looking to buy their first home. In Greektown, the couple found a perfect place: a 1,000-square-foot semi-detached house with three bedrooms, a modest backyard and room for an office. “The previous owners had lived there for 15 years and taken excellent care of it,” says Larissa. “It checked all of our boxes.” The newlyweds bought the house without hesitation. Four years before that moment, Larissa and Brad had met as associates at Lax O’Sullivan Lisus Gottlieb. Ultimately, it was a collaboration on a particularly challenging case that brought them together. “I had always thought Brad was cute,” says Larissa. “But I realized how well we clicked by doing these really hard cases together. I didn’t think twice that it would work on a romantic level.” That intuition was, of course, correct. Both of them have since made partner at the celebrated litigation boutique. And the pair continue, quite often, to team up on the same files. “When we tell people that we work at the same firm, they assume that we try to stay as far away from each other as possible,” says Brad. “But it’s quite the opposite.” One year after moving into their new home, the couple decided to make a few small improvements to the kitchen. At least, that was the idea. That minor project soon expanded into a full-blown renovation of the main floor, which involved knocking
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Larissa and Brad Vermeersch pose with their son, Teddy, in the living room of their East End home
“ If you have a creative outlet, it can help you think outside the box at work.” Varoujan Arman on how his career as a DJ has made him a better lawyer p.30
Debrief The owners: Larissa and Brad Vermeersch Larissa’s role: Partner at Lax O’Sullivan Lisus Gottlieb Brad’s role: Partner at Lax O’Sullivan Lisus Gottlieb Years of call: 2012 (Larissa) and 2013 (Brad) Neighbourhood: Greektown Home profile: Three-bedroom semi-detached house, 1,000 square feet
down walls to create an open-concept living space. The new layout added a bright play area for the couple’s newborn, Teddy, and raised the main-floor ceiling by five inches. In the made-over kitchen, Brad, a passionate home cook, has perfected braised short ribs, handmade gnocchi and Nashville hot chicken. Best of all, perhaps, the home is close to parks, ravines and the bustling Danforth. “We lived in a condo before, so that was a big change,” says Larissa. “There’s a ton of green space and 20 other moms on the street. It’s very homey.”
1 1. Sweet dreams In Teddy’s room, kid-friendly art purchased on the couple’s South African honeymoon is displayed alongside crocheted blankets, pillows and stuffed animals, all handmade by Larissa and her mom. “I find it so calming,” says Larissa. “This is my favourite room in the house.” 2. Litigation station “It’s not a huge room, but we’ve made the most of it,” says Larissa of the home office. The standing desk, procured early in the pandemic, has proved its worth during remote trials. “It’s 1,000 times easier to cross-examine a witness,” says Brad, “when you can actually get up on your feet.”
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3. Time traveller Handmade in Russia a century ago, this antique clock belonged to Larissa’s great-grandmother. It’s a statement piece that injects an aura of history into the home.
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Debrief 4. Gallery hopping This painting, titled “Bribery and Intimidation,” is an original piece by South African artist Lisette Forsyth. The couple bought the artwork on their safari honeymoon. “Brad saw this piece in a window in the Franschhoek Valley,” says Larissa. “We must have stood in that gallery for two hours debating whether we could afford to buy one.”
4
5. Rear window In the backyard, the couple created a “living fence” out of lilac, raspberry and honeysuckle bushes. “We love our backyard,” says Larissa, “and we love our neighbours.”
5
6
7 6. Hobby in a bottle Brad is a passionate whisky collector. “I started collecting about six years ago,” he says. “It requires creativity and perseverance, but the payoff when I land a coveted bottle is always worth it.” His current stockpile leans heavily toward small-batch, rare Kentucky bourbon, and it includes about 150 bottles. Seventy-five unique finds are on display in the basement. (The rest are stored in the crawl space.)
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7. Barrel of memories Instead of a traditional wedding guestbook, the couple sourced a bourbon whisky barrel and had their initials and wedding date etched into the wood. The guests signed their names directly on the barrel to produce a one-of-akind memento.
8 8. Gourmet ambitions The recent kitchen renovation combined IKEA cabinetry with a custommade quartz-topped island and a farmhouse-style sink. “The whole design was about having parties and hosting,” says Brad. “We can’t wait to have friends and family over again.”
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another thing that new parents should consider is setting up a trust for their child and designating a trustee to manage it.” If parents pass away without a will, their children will receive whatever’s left in the estate when they reach the age of majority. By putting a trust in place, parents can control how the funds are dispersed, which could be particularly important if their children are minors. Ultimately, a lawyer will draft these documents. But financial advisors can offer guidance on how a will or trust can safeguard the financial health of your family.
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Building a budget. “If you want to become a parent, start planning before it happens,” says Karen Sill, the manager of financial planning at Lawyers Financial and a 16-year veteran of the industry. The ideal time to start is before that sprog is two lines on a pregnancy test or you’ve printed the adoption papers. A financial advisor can design a budget and an investment strategy with your unique goals in mind. Let’s say, for instance, that you want to save enough cash to afford an extended parental leave without missing a student-debt payment. “We can develop a plan,” says Sill, “for any scenario.” Wills and estate planning. “Creating a will is a must,” says Sill. “But
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Insurance. Most group health plans offer some life insurance, but, typically, it isn’t enough to truly cushion the financial blow of a sudden death. As a result, lawyers should supplement their group benefits with a personal life-insurance policy. Another good idea is to buy critical illness insurance, which pays a lump sum in the event of a serious medical event like a heart attack, stroke or cancer diagnosis. “An advisor can walk you through all the options, making the process simple,” says Sill. “At Lawyers Financial, we offer a full slate of insurance products at some of the lowest rates in the industry.” Investing in education. As soon as your kid has a social insurance number, open an RESP. If you make regular contributions to this account, you could receive up to $7,200 in free money from the government toward your child’s post-secondary education. The balance also grows tax free until your child takes it out to pay for school. It’s a no-brainer. What can be difficult, however, is deciding how to invest the money you deposit in the account. Should you opt for a blue-chip mutual fund? Are you better off buying and selling individual stocks? “Before making a decision, speak to an advisor,” says Sill, “who can help you select the best option based on your financial knowledge and risk comfort.”
Debrief SECRET LIFE
Drop the beat by Greg Hudson photography by Steph Martyniuk
When Varoujan Arman began law school at the University of Wind-
sor, back in 2007, he found himself enjoying the electronic trance music that his roommate liked to play. “At that time, I mostly listened to rock and alternative bands,” recalls the partner at Blaney McMurtry LLP. “But the lyrics were too distracting for studying and reading old caselaw.” To power through the endless course material, he listened to Armin van Buuren’s weekly radio show, which showcased the latest in trance music. The tracks had deep basslines, smooth tones and a general paucity of lyrics. The perfect soundtrack for studying. A few years later, Arman discovered house and techno, EDM subgenres that generally shun the euphoric melodies of trance in favour of propulsive basslines. He became a die-hard fan. He even started to produce his own tracks, but he wasn’t satisfied with the product. His full potential as a musician remained untapped. That changed in 2015. As an associate on Bay Street, Arman started to attend live shows, where hordes of bodies danced in unison. He came to a powerful conclusion: “I wanted to be the DJ in control of the music, not just a participant.” Arman got to work. He watched YouTube instructional videos, practised with free software and eventually invested in turntables. His talent as a songwriter also improved. After performing at a few house parties, he booked a real show through a friend of a friend. “I was fortunate to land my first club gig about six months into learning to DJ,” he says. Over the past six years, Arman has performed all over Toronto, at clubs like CODA and music festivals like Electric Island. Throughout the pandemic, he released a new episode of his podcast, Around the Atmosphere, about twice a month, delivering one hour of deep and progressive house to his followers on SoundCloud. Arman’s commitment to music has never interfered with his career in commercial litigation. On the contrary, his double life as a musician has strengthened his legal mind. “If you have a creative outlet, it can help you think outside the box at work,” he says. “I love being both a DJ and a lawyer.”
Varoujan Arman Blaney McMurtry LLP
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