Equity Incentive Plan Lawyers Cross Cities to Move in 2026

Firms hiring equity compensation lawyers should expect to look beyond their own city. Sartori & Partners data show that 23.4% of lateral moves by lawyers who focus on equity incentive plans and employee stock ownership plans crossed a city in the last 12 months, against 17.3% across the pensions, benefits and executive compensation practice and 20.5% for all lawyers who moved. The pattern holds over three years: 22.5% of equity plan moves came with a change of city, against 19.6% in the practice.

The group is small and senior. It recorded 71 lateral moves in the 12 months to October 2026, and partners made up 40.8% of them. That mix, a city map centered on New York, London and Chicago, and a level hiring line shape how a firm should run an equity plan search.

The equity plan share sat 6.1 points above the benefits practice and 2.9 points above the market in the last 12 months.

The gap to the practice is the one that lasts. Over three years the equity plan share ran 2.9 points above the practice, while the gap to the market's three-year share of 21.6% narrowed to 0.9 points. The three-year window covers 209 equity plan moves against 71 in the last 12 months, so it is the steadier reading. Read together, the two windows say the same thing: equity plan lawyers relocate at least as often as the market as a whole, and more often than the benefits lawyers they work beside.

For a hiring firm, this sets the search radius. Most benefits lawyers who move stay in their city, so a benefits search can start in the hiring office's own market. An equity plan search should not. A shortlist confined to one metro area sees only part of the lawyers who would take the role, and the candidate who fits may be two time zones away.

Cities are read over three years for this group. In the Sartori & Partners lateral database, New York took 19.6% of equity plan moves over three years, London 13.4% and Chicago 10.5%. Each of the three holds a larger share of equity plan moves than of benefits moves over the same window.

Chicago stands out most against the market. Its share of equity plan moves over three years was 2.6 times its 4.0% share of all lateral moves. New York's equity plan share compares with 14.2% for the market, and London's with 10.0%. The same three cities top the list of places equity plan lawyers left, with New York at 15.8% of moves.

A firm hiring outside these three cities is, in practice, recruiting someone who will relocate. Build the plan around that from the first call: the move, the timing of a family relocation and any bar admission belong in the offer, not in a late round of negotiation. A firm inside one of the three cities has the opposite task: its own lawyers are the ones other markets will try to bring over.

Partners made up 40.8% of equity plan moves in the last 12 months, against 30.2% in the benefits practice and 27.7% in the market. Over three years the partner share was 41.1%, so this is not the effect of one busy year.

Only 12.7% of equity plan moves came with a higher title, against 17.5% in the practice and about the market's 12.9%. Lateral partner moves in equity plans held flat (+3.4%), from 29 to 30 on the settled 12-month windows.

The candidate a firm meets is most often a partner moving at the same title. A title step is part of few equity plan moves, so the offer has to rest on the platform, the flow of plan work from the corporate and benefits groups, and often the city. Counsel made up 12.7% of equity plan moves, against 19.8% in the practice.

Equity plan hiring held flat (+19.0%) on the settled 12-month windows, with 63 moves in the earlier window and 75 in the later one. On counts this small, that gap sits inside the range chance alone produces. The benefits practice rose 16.6%, from 217 to 253 moves, and the market rose 9.0%.

The yearly counts move up and down with no steady direction: 88 moves in 2022, 62 in 2023, 78 in 2024 and 63 in 2025. Equity plan work is still a sizeable part of its practice. Of the moves recorded under the benefits practice in the last 12 months, 25.0% were by lawyers whose own focus is equity plans.

A firm should not read the practice's growth as a wider equity plan pool. The pool held about the size it was, and the firms adding benefits lawyers draw on part of it too. Plan on roughly the same number of movers next year, and on meeting the same rivals for each of them.

Over three years, 122 firms hired at least one equity plan lawyer. The ten most active took 23.3% of individual hires, against 18.1% for the benefits practice and 12.2% for the market over the same three years.

Latham & Watkins, Kirkland & Ellis and Greenberg Traurig sit in the 6-10 band; the rest of the top 10 sit in the 3-5 band. By size, firms of 1,000+ lawyers took 64.8% of equity plan moves to firms of known size in the last 12 months, against 61.9% in the practice and 53.6% in the market.

No firm takes a large slice, so a firm cannot map its competition for an equity plan partner by watching a handful of rivals. Expect the counter-offer to come from a large platform, and expect it from a name that was not on your list.

Sartori & Partners data point to four steps. First, widen the map: with 23.4% of equity plan moves crossing a city, a shortlist drawn from one office's city misses part of the market. Start in New York, London and Chicago, the three cities with the largest shares over three years, whatever city the seat sits in.

Second, price relocation in at the start. A firm outside those three cities should assume its hire will move house, and should agree support, start date and admission steps before the offer letter, not after it. Third, plan for a partner at the same title. Partners were 40.8% of moves and only 12.7% came with a higher title, so the case for joining has to rest on work, platform and city rather than a step up.

Fourth, do not wait for a bigger pool. Equity plan hiring held flat (+19.0%) while the practice around it grew, and firm career pages listed 172 openings for equity plan lawyers on one day in November 2026. A firm that finds a fit should move to an offer quickly: those openings draw on the same small pool.