"There are a handful of headhunting firms that  stand above the rest in both Northern and Southern California .... Esquire is one of those firms".
(California Law Business, September 1998).

"Esquire...one of the top 10 legal search firms in California"
(Daily Journal, February, 2001)

Click here to see a partial list of our clients.

Our success in playing the key headhunter role in staffing Winston & Strawn’s Los Angeles office was not only a testament to our successful representation of several top partners, but our knowledge of the market. By early 1999, Winston & Strawn, a Chicago based national powerhouse of 700 lawyers had concluded that the West Coast was an important part of the firm's strategic growth objective.  James Thompson, former four term Governor of Illinois and chairman of the firm and James Neis, firm-wide managing partner met with Esquire president, Sandford Lechtick.  The three had a frank discussion of the overall job market, their firms, business philosophies and growth objectives, culture, compensation and overall game plan. 

The two nationally known lawyers probed Lechtick on his views of the California job market, available talent, potential law firm mergers, compensation and other issues. The two were especially interested in how Esquire could assist Winston & Strawn in landing key partners who would form the nucleus of their L.A. office. 

In the following year, the two, as well as several other senior partners met with Mr. Lechtick and his staff several more times to discuss the market and interview top partner prospects. Indeed, in a one year period, Winston & Strawn met, through Esquire representation, the managing partners of several major law firms for merger discussions and interviewed several top partner candidates.

As of this writing, Esquire has successfully represented Lee Paterson, formerly national labor chair of Sonnenschein, Nath & Rosenthal who brought a multi-million dollar practice, the core of his labor group: Laura Petroff, employment litigation partner and several associates; Neal Marder, business litigation partner from Sonnenschein, Nath & Rosenthal and Debra Albin-Riley, litigation partner and former chair of the hiring committee at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson in Los Angeles.

As a testament to Esquire’s ability to represent top talent, Ms. Petroff was elected to the firm-wide executive committee and made managing partner of Los Angeles. Ms. Albin-Riley was selected as hiring partner. One senior partner commented that "Esquire hit a home run".