The Value of PR ( well, another example highlighting it's value)

Kleiner Lawyers See Pao Business Bump
Marisa Kendall, The Recorder
September 25, 2015

You might call it the Pao Bump.

It's been six months since Ellen Pao lost her gender-bias case against venture-capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, but the lawyers involved in her trial are still riding a wave of publicity that's better for business than any campaign a pricey advertising firm could dream up.


The business boost has been particularly obvious for Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, where a team led by partner Lynne Hermle scored the victory for Kleiner Perkins. Hermle has personally stepped into at least four new cases since the jury verdict, as counsel to Twitter Inc., Broadcom Corp., Fitbit Inc. and a San Francisco venture-capital firm.

"[The trial] was a unique opportunity for the world, including clients, to get a real view of her talent and the talent of our team," said Orrick partner Walter Brown Jr., a member of the firm's management committee. "The market came to us."

Even the lawyers on the losing side seem to be reaping reputational benefits. Pao lawyer Therese Lawless of Lawless & Lawless launched a high-profile gender discrimination case against Facebook Inc. even before the Pao jury started deliberations.

A legal PR firm couldn't have orchestrated a better marketing event. For one thing, the timing was impeccable. Opening statements kicked off just as debate over gender gaps in Silicon Valley reached a boiling point. As a result, people from around the world tuned in and courtroom developments were blogged and tweeted out to a universe of potential clients.

While it's difficult to quantify the effect in terms of financial return, lawyers in the employment bar agree it makes for unbeatable reputation building.

Morgan, Lewis & Bockius partner Melinda Riechert, head of the Northern California employment group, said word on the street is clients are seeking out Hermle's team because of the Kleiner Perkins win.

"I've heard that they are busy," she said. "I know that I've talked to clients who have retained them."

Hermle herself plays down the impact the trial has had on her practice, as did attorney Alan Exelrod of Rudy, Exelrod, Zieff & Lowe, who represented Pao along with Lawless.

Exelrod said his firm had a full caseload since long before the Pao trial. "We are as busy as we can be, literally," Exelrod said.

It seems Pao herself may be the only trial participant who paid a professional price. She's without a job after resigning as interim CEO of Reddit Inc. this summer amid controversy over the firing of a popular employee. This month she dropped her appeal of the trial verdict, citing overwhelming legal costs.

In March, a San Francisco jury found Pao couldn't prove Kleiner Perkins refused to promote and later fired her because she's a woman. The monthlong trial was a media sensation, with reporters and spectators packing the courtroom.

San Francisco employment lawyer Stephen Hirschfeld, who testified on behalf of Kleiner Perkins, said his call volume has doubled in the six months since the verdict.

Kleiner hired Hirschfeld to investigate Pao's complaints of discrimination before she sued, and after questioning Pao and interviewing several other partners at the firm, Hirschfeld found her claims were baseless. He was a key witness, and his investigation was cited repeatedly throughout the trial.

Now Hirschfeld is in high demand by corporate clients that want him to perform similar investigations at their companies.

This summer Hirschfeld conducted a high-profile investigation into allegations of corruption surrounding the Nevada higher education chancellor. Hirschfeld billed $57,495 for the report, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported.

Orrick's Hermle has long been seen as one of the region's top employment litigators. Her client list includes The Gap, Blockbuster and Burlington Coat Factory. She's also had her share of tech clients, such as Advanced Micro Devices Inc. and Apple Inc. But it's hard not to suspect Hermle's stock has shot up in Silicon Valley circles since the trial.

Shortly after the Pao verdict, Hermle signed on to represent Twitter in a gender discrimination class action filed in San Francisco Superior Court. In June she entered an appearance on behalf of semiconductor company Broadcom in the Central District of California, fighting gender discrimination accusations from a former in-house lawyer. In August she answered a complaint of disability discrimination on behalf of Fremont Group, a San Francisco venture-capital firm, in the Northern District of California. And Hermle is defending fitness tech company Fitbit Inc. in a misappropriation of trade secrets claim filed in May by rival Jawbone.

Coverage of the Pao trial created such good publicity, Brown said, that the firm didn't have to do much to promote its victory. Orrick's PR team merely fielded reporters' inquiries. "This is one of those circumstances where there was really not much to do after the verdict."John Mullan of Rudy, Exelrod, Zieff & Lowe said his firm saw a clear spike in calls during the most high-profile days of testimony.

Exelrod, who was operating in a trial bubble, didn't notice. "I wasn't paying attention to any calls," he said.

There was a similar spike last year when Rudy Exelrod lawyers were representing early Tinder employee Whitney Wolfe in a sexual harassment and discrimination suit against the company, which settled for a confidential amount.

"Between those two cases," Mullan said, "we certainly get more calls now related to gender discrimination and gender-based harassment."

The firm hasn't filed new gender discrimination cases since the trial, Mullan said, but lawyers have a number of disputes in the prelitigation phase.

For Exelrod, the Pao Bump comes at a transitional time.

Exelrod turned 72 this summer and would like to spend more time with his family. He said on Thursday that he's expecting his first grandchild any day."But," he added, "I'm still looking for interesting new cases."


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