General Counsel Name Their Top 20 Law Firms
from July/August 2005
A big part of the general counsel’s job is to select outside law firms to handle all kinds of business, from merger transactions to problems with the regulators. The
Corporate Board Member
survey of inside lawyers asked them to name the firms they’d most want to represent their companies on national matters, and the list below shows their top 20. Seventeen of their picks appeared on the national list selected by directors, though often with different rankings. But three of the national top 20 firms were not on the general counsel’s list: Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, O’Melveny & Myers, and Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy. Their places were taken by Covington & Burling, King & Spalding, and DLA Piper Rudnick Gray Cary. Here are the top choices of the in-house lawyers.
| Last Year's Ranking | How they scored in the 2005 general ranking | ||
| 1. | Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom | 1 | 1 |
| 2. | Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz | 3 | 2 |
| 3. | Cravath Swaine & Moore | 4 | 3 |
| 4. | Davis Polk & Wardwell | 10 (tie) | 6 |
| 5. | Latham & Watkins | 2 | 9 |
| 6. | Sullivan & Cromwel | 6 | 4 (tie) |
| 7. | Jones Day | 6 (tie) | 5 |
| 8 (tie). |
Gibson Dunn & Crutcher
|
8 (tie) | 12 |
| Kirkland & Ellis | - | 8 | |
| 10. | Weil Gotshal & Manges | 5 | 11 |
| 11. | Shearman & Sterling | 8 (tie) | 10 |
| 12. | Sidley Austin Brown & Wood | - | 19 |
| 13 (tie). |
Covington & Burling
|
- | - |
| Simpson Thacher & Bartlett | 10 (tie) | 20 | |
| 15. | Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr | - | 18 |
| 16 (tie). |
Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld
|
15 (tie) | 14 |
| Baker & McKenzie | 12 | 7 | |
| 18. | Fulbright & Jaworski | - | 15 |
| 19 (tie). |
King & Spalding
|
- | - |
| DLA Piper Rudnick Gray Cary | - | - |
