How to resign from a law firm

After the money you have earned is paid, and before you start accruing a fresh claim you would forfeit by leaving. For an associate that usually means resigning after the year-end bonus has actually hit your account — bonuses are typically announced from November and paid in the first quarter for the prior year’s work, and most firms condition payment on still being employed and not under notice on the payment date. For a partner it means landing on the paid side of the year-end distribution, because partner pay is a monthly draw against a year-end true-up. The exact week depends on your firm’s calendar, your comp structure and what your contract or partnership agreement says about leavers — but the principle is constant: do not walk out the door days before the money you already earned is handed over.

Usually, yes — and this is the single most expensive resignation mistake lawyers make. Big Law bonuses are generally contingent on being employed on the payment date and not having given notice. The scale is announced in late autumn (Cravath traditionally opens the season), but the cash lands months later, often in February, for the year just ended. Resign in December or January — after a brutal year you have already worked — and you can forfeit the entire bonus for that year. Unless your new firm will make you whole for a forfeited bonus (some do, as part of the package), the default is that the timing of your notice, not your performance, decides whether you are paid. Check your offer letter or bonus policy for the exact condition before you give notice.

It varies by seniority and by what your agreement says, but the reported general practice is roughly two to four weeks for associates and counsel and 30 to 90 days for partners, with garden leave (paid, but kept away from clients and the office) appearing mainly at partner level. A critical ethics limit cuts across all of it: a notice period cannot be used to unreasonably delay a client’s representation or to penalise a competitive departure. ABA Formal Opinion 489 says advance notice should be the “minimum necessary,” and an over-long or punitive notice period can itself violate Model Rule 5.6. So a notice period is partly a contract question and partly an ethics question — and the second can override the first.

A pure non-compete on a lawyer is generally unenforceable. ABA Model Rule 5.6 prohibits agreements that restrict a lawyer’s right to practise after leaving a firm, with a narrow carve-out only for genuine retirement benefits, and most states follow it — this is separate from, and survives, the back-and-forth over the FTC’s general non-compete rule. Garden leave sits in a greyer zone: a reasonable, transition-focused notice period can be legitimate, but a long garden leave designed to sideline you and keep you from clients runs into the same Rule 5.6 and Opinion 489 limits as any other restriction. The financial versions — forfeitable bonuses and clawbacks that bite only if you compete — are the live battleground, and NYC Bar Opinion 2025-3 holds they violate the rule when their effect is to deter a competitive move.

Three things, all governed by hard rules. First, your clients on active matters have the right to choose — to stay with the firm, move with you, or go elsewhere — and the cleanest way to inform them is a joint notice from the firm and you (ABA Opinions 489 and 99-414). Second, on withdrawal you must protect their interests: give reasonable notice, surrender the papers and property they are entitled to, and refund any unearned fees (Model Rule 1.16). Third, you must keep them reasonably informed throughout the transition (Model Rule 1.4). What you must not do is pre-position — copying files or client lists, or soliciting before proper notice and the firm’s conflicts process. Done right, the client transition is a duty you discharge cleanly; done wrong, it is the fastest way to turn an orderly exit into a dispute.