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Associate Mobility Brief - Market Intelligence | JuLY 2026
The associate lateral market posted its first month-over-month increase since March, with 1,126 attorney moves recorded in July - up from June's 1,079. Labor & Employment led all practice areas for the second consecutive month with a net gain of +67, while Corporate turned net-negative for the first time in three months. DC continued to absorb talent at the strongest net rate of any major market, and associates accounted for 52% of all lateral arrivals. Here's what the data signals heading into the back half of Q3.
The Legal Tech Hiring Problem Nobody Wants to Admit
Law firms are competing for a very small group of people who have both technical fluency and real law firm experience. The internal pipeline most firms never built is now the one everyone is chasing, and the traditional recruiting approach is not going to close that gap.

