Ahead of the launch of Chambers USA 2024, Tom Wicker spoke with Chambers and Partners’ Kush Cheema and James Haggerty about the latest developments in the guide and how research works behinds the scenes.
Thanks for making the time to speak with me. As a legal directories consultant, I know there’s always huge interest from law firms in how the Chambers USA research process works, so I know any wisdom you are able to impart will be greatly received!
Hopefully, there will be more firms than not who are happy with the new rankings! However, is it possible to appeal a ranking or the lack of ranking? When would this be appropriate to do and what is the best process for appealing?
As shocking as it to admit, we do sometimes get things wrong – whether via a technical issue or a research matter where we’ve underappreciated a niche specialisation, a lawyer has fallen through the cracks across multiple areas of research, or other hiccups. Firms can get in touch with us directly and we will make changes in the small minority of cases where we may have made an error. All of our ranking decisions are based on our research and over 99% of our decisions stick.
Are there any key changes or new categories in this year’s guide or the upcoming research schedule that firms should be aware of?
After significant new investment in the team, we’ve rolled out roughly 70 new categories this year (https://chambers.com/topics/new-submission-areas-for-chambers-usa-2025). This largely focuses on evening out our coverage, adding in IP, Insurance and other areas across a large number of new states and expanding our coverage beyond the traditional hotbeds of activity in New York, California, Washington, D.C. and Texas. Our headline new areas for 2025 research include tables for Higher Education, Space Law and Artificial Intelligence.
If firms would like to suggest new practice areas, who at Chambers should they contact and what information would you need to consider these?
They’re welcome to get in touch with us or another member of the Chambers USA team with a proposal. We typically ask for a couple of paragraphs about to why the area is important, what kind of work would be covered, what kind of clients require those services and which other firms and attorneys specialise in that area beyond their own firm.
Are there any changes to this year’s submission template – for example, in terms of D&I statistics? How will this information be used in the guide?
We’ve removed the firmwide diversity survey and instead included an area for firms to provide practice-area based demographic. This isn’t used for rankings per se, what we’re attempting to do is build a picture of what practice groups look like internally, such that we can ensure our own coverage is reflective. For instance, if we see that Intellectual Property Practices in DC are 45% female, but our table is only 35% female, it would suggest that we need to invest more time and energy in discovering who has been overlooked. Please rest assured, however, that provision of those statistics is entirely optional.
Do you write new editorial for every ranked firm in every practice area, each year? If not, can you elaborate on why not?
In our overview of a firm, we look to describe its particular capabilities and distinguishing features, which are typically unchanging. For example, Cravath will remain a top M&A practice and Latham will remain an international powerhouse with nationwide and international resources. We will make changes in response to significant changes in a department, such as when a large group of laterals brings experience in an area not previously offered by that firm. Work highlight write-ups, on the other hand, change year-on-year and the quotes are always derived from the most recent research period and also change each year.
How are nationwide categories that do not request client references researched?
These are areas which have ample state-based coverage, where we already contact tens of thousands of referees for state-level tables. In these interviews, referees are not limited to attorneys only within a specific state, we ask them about the entire team they worked with. The nationwide research is conducted at the end of our cycle, where we direct our researchers to review all the referee feedback we received from seven months of preceding research. In that way, feedback from references we have already interviewed about their experiences with cross-office teams of attorneys contributes to these national rankings – without the need to re-contact a reference to re-trace old ground.
What is the benefit of being ranked in Chambers’ new Regional Spotlight guides? Isn’t it more prestigious to be recognised in Chambers USA itself?
The Chambers Spotlight captures a separate segment of the market. It looks only at firms of roughly 60 or fewer attorneys, which are considered the destination of choice for local counsel work or targeted at small-to-medium-enterprise (SME) clients. It’s a different proposition to the Chambers USA guide, where we would not expect these firms to carry out the same breadth of work that, for instance, a Kirkland or a Sidley would be handling. That said, there have been – and will continue to be – firms that are first identified during Spotlight research which we then deem to be more appropriately placed in the US guide. It’s important to note, though, that we do not currently recognise individual attorneys in Spotlight; we only award rankings at firm level in selected practices.
How can firms best engage with the referee research process, so that all client references receive the Chambers email? Some referees cannot find this, even after (for example) checking their spam folders.
While we are working on third-party whitelisting for our domain address, we would encourage firms to let referees know in advance that an email from an @chambers.com domain address will be coming. Some corporate-level filters might stop our emails before they reach individual inboxes, in which case we would encourage those clients to allow emails from Chambers.
If a referee cannot locate an email from a researcher, can they email the researcher themselves to engage in the feedback process?
Yes, though the firm itself can let the researcher know, too, and we will get in contact via an alternative method.
Some firms are reluctant to impinge further on their clients’ time to ask them to email a researcher. Are there any other solutions? Would it, for example, be possible to send a survey link to a firm to distribute to clients?
We would encourage firms to just get in contact with the researcher directly and we’ll try to connect with the referee in another way, whether via another mail client or cold calling. Your suggested alternative is something we’ve been mulling; however, we would need to work out a technical solution to verify that the intended recipient was indeed the one who responded – a puzzle we’ve yet to solve.
Can you provide any insight, generally, into the follow-up process with client references? How many times will you contact them and by what means?
Referees we contact for telephone interviews in general receive an initial email and, if we don’t hear back, up to two rounds of reminders before the end of research into that particular area. There is a bit of nuance here – in our largest areas of research, that initial outreach will take place over a couple of weeks to ensure availability, so the reminders will also be staggered over a couple of weeks. Referees who are sent an online survey to complete receive the initial email and up to three follow-up emails until they complete the survey.
Chambers USA sets a limit of 30 referees per submission. Will this remain the same? Are there any limits on the number of referees per individual lawyer?
This will remain the same in the near-to-medium term. We have toyed with the idea of offering a certain number of referees per lawyer, but we’re limited by the size of the research team and our desire for an interview-led approach to research. We recommend firms include at least 4/5 referees per lawyer they are putting forward, but we don’t place a limit.
When are updates to Chambers’ Research Management Tool available?
Information on the Chambers product roadmap can be found here: https://chambers.com/release. With our Spring Release already with firms, we are looking forward to the next major product updates in our Autumn Release.
Can you provide any update on the submission generator functionality that has been under discussion?
We’re still fine tuning it. However, this will soon be an alternative way to send in submissions directly. We understand that it won’t be a good match for every firm, with many practice groups preferring to redline physical documents and work from shared files. Nevertheless, Online Submissions will soon offer a fully digital pathway for completing submission documents, including the ability to copy work highlights across multiple related submissions. We will still, of course, allow firms to upload individual documents via the traditional route.
What are your top tips for preparing a good Chambers USA submission, from the departmental overview to the work highlights and the distribution of referees?
I would first ensure an even spread of work highlights and referees for attorneys being put forward for consideration – it can be quite difficult to investigate a practice sufficiently deeply if we only receive one or two of each.
The departmental overview should be tailored towards the firm’s specialties and particular areas of strength, focusing on what sets a practice group apart while avoiding marketing hyperbole. My perennial advice is that work highlights are tightly written and focus narrowly on the work carried out and why it was particularly important.
I would also counsel firms to make use of the text box which prompts you to provide your thoughts on the existing coverage Chambers provides. Many firms include something akin to “We would be happy to provide feedback in an interview”. However, please bear in mind that we are only able to interview a selection of submitting law firms. The C2 box can be an extremely useful avenue to discuss macro trends or aspects of the firm’s practice which our current coverage might not be sufficiently appreciating.
What keeps a guide like Chambers USA relevant? Why should firms continue to participate in the process? Chambers has always positioned itself as – and has become – the first choice for in-house counsel when faced with a legal issue in an unfamiliar practice area or jurisdiction where they are unsure of where to turn. That is only increasing – demand statistics for last year saw more and more clients push their work down to midsize and boutique law firms as fee pressures and their need for services continued to mount. At the other end of the spectrum, the elite national firms must continue to differentiate themselves in a buyers’ market for services. Chambers is the best, most trusted source in helping in-house counsel identify alternative firms and to distinguish the relative strengths and capabilities of their existing panel firms. Chambers also offers first-of-its-kind coverage of alternative legal service providers, vendors, consultants and wider law-firm adjacent service providers as part of our wider suite of coverage into the legal sector.
Thanks for your time, both!
For more information on Chambers USA and other Chambers and Partners guides and products, see: Chambers and Partners | Showcasing the Best Legal Talent
Posted in: Legal Directory Consulting, Q&A