Goodwin Procter’s head-turning move in January—laying off dozens of firm personnel and then hiring up to 40 lawyers for a new Philadelphia office—caught the legal industry’s attention for the abrupt and awkward chain of events.
However, industry observers say the two moves at Goodwin were likely unrelated and many other law firms will likely go through this sort of balance of pushing out lawyers and growing in key areas in the coming year—albeit with a slightly less-compressed time frame and less publicity.
