Tenor is a premier legal services firm offering Fortune 500 companies and leading law firms unmatched access to exceptional legal talent on either a flexible secondment or direct-hire basis.
Innovation driven.
Broadly connected.
Holistically oriented.
The Talent You Deserve. The Perspective You Need.
We place remarkable legal talent. At Tenor, we not only welcome the unique contributions, views, and experiences of attorneys across all backgrounds, we celebrate them. This means we broadly identify and elevate legal talent that have demonstrated true excellence in their practice. Tenor’s talent base of exceptional legal professionals, combined with our unique model, delivers big wins to our clients.
Our Legal Talent Expertise.
We are domain experts. Tenor brings depth on the requisites behind a legal talent need, an understanding of industry dynamics, and a capacity to shape a placement arrangement that works best for the client and attorney. This know-how combined with our high-caliber attorney network allows us to deliver placement solutions that excel for their speed, bespoke design, and close alignment with client priorities.
Our Wide-Ranging Placement Options.
We deliver talent solutions across the range of placement models–from flexible secondments to permanent hires–depending on the client need and attorney preference.
Our Holistic Post-Placement Approach.
We value holistic thinking and a relationship ethos. With our Placement+ program, we stand behind our placements after they commence with tailored ongoing support from wellness programming to career coaching. We serve as a true partner to our clients and attorneys to support their unique goals.
Case Studies
An internationally renowned company urgently required experienced M&A counsel, on an interim basis, to help handle dynamic deal flow. Tenor, through its robust attorney network placed an experienced M&A attorney, which provided flexible extra capacity. This demonstrated Tenor’s agility to deliver in high-pressure scenarios.
Fortune 500 Company
A globally recognized leader in science and technology urgently needed to expand its in-house patent team. Tenor promptly placed a seasoned IP attorney to advise on complex IP portfolio management issues and handle patent preparation and prosecution. This showcases Tenor’s capacity to solve hard-to-fill direct hire challenges.
Fortune 500 Company
A prominent global strategy firm was searching for a Chief Labor and Employment Counsel to hire on a permanent basis. Tenor promptly delivered, placing an attorney with substantive in-house experience and a commercially-minded perspective. This placement solidified Tenor’s reputation for meeting specific legal hiring requirements.
Preeminent Global Company
We Solve Key Client Challenges.
Challenge: Limited Legal Domain Expertise
Organizations commonly contend that talent providers struggle to deliver the best attorneys for a role because they lack depth in the legal arena. Effective legal talent solutions not only require an understanding of the underlying legal work and a candidate’s substantive background, but also matchmaking prowess to see the linkages between the two and a credible understanding of the market. When these requisites are unmet, organizations risk hiring attorneys misaligned with the role, suffer from needless delays, and waste legal budget on misfires.
Challenge: Legal Departments Face Budget Constraints and Hiring Freezes
In-house legal departments face ever increasing demands on their expertise but frequently operate under tight budgetary constraints. Our secondment offering typically costs 5x less than BigLaw rates. We also offer a range of alternative fee arrangements that provide additional cost predictability and transparency. Our secondment solution is also tailor-made to navigate hiring freezes as it provides a nimble way for in-house teams to access legal support on a full-time basis without adding to the company’s full-time employee headcount.
Challenge: Siloed Talent Solutions
Organizations often lack a single trusted authority that can seamlessly address the range of their legal talent needs–from permanent hiring to tackling more dynamic work streams that require flexible solutions. This can leave organizations having to juggle multiple talent providers, adding needless complexity, time, and risk to hiring.
Challenge: Limited Post-Placement Support
Organizations can spend significant time and money hiring attorney talent, but fail to get any lift from talent providers on what comes after a start day. Talent providers, operating holistically, can play a value additive role in promoting performance, growth, and retention after a placement.
Our Leadership
We are a minority-owned business enterprise whose leadership brings 20+ years of combined legal talent and new law experience partnering with Fortune 500 companies and Am Law 100 law firms. We also bring a depth of expertise across a range of legal talent placement models from direct-hire arrangements to secondments to ALSP managed services. Taken together, our team has amassed a rare combination of skills, experience, and a network to deliver on Tenor’s aspirations.
Views & News
We’ll share, from time to time, our perspective on interesting issues within our domain expertise and some community events. Watch this space.