See the respective report webpages to view a list of metrics included in each report. The reports for legal departments included an expanded set of metrics due to the data being sourced from HR departments rather than from individuals.

The compensation metrics are segmented by the following demographics in the benchmarking reports where there is sufficient data to report out:

• Industry
• Law Department Size – Number of Lawyers
• Company Revenue
• Legal Specialty – only in self-reported data reports
• Geography – US Major Metropolitan Areas
• Law School Class
• Law School Rank – Top 20 vs Not Top 20

The survey was structured to enable the collection of compensation data at both the individual level and at the company level.

The individual-level survey is structured as a conventional online survey and is intended for a single individual to report their own compensation data.

By company-sourced we mean that we allow for the data to be reported for all positions in the legal department. For smaller departments, this might be handled by the general counsel or legal operations professional. For larger departments, the company-level version almost always requires HR or the compensation department to fill out the survey on behalf of all legal positions.

ACC and Empsight fielded the compensation survey questionnaire between May 3 and June 3, 2022, through an online survey platform. The data effective date is March 1, 2022.

See the recent ACC Docket article Reliable Compensation Data for In-house Legal Professionals to learn about the key differentiating factors.

Yes. Our data collection and reporting standards conform with the Safe Harbor guidelines to ensure confidentiality. We recognize that compensation data is highly sensitive, and we have instituted several important practices to preserve confidentiality.

Compensation data is not reported where there are fewer than five participants, no single organization's data represents more than 25 percent of any reported statistic, and the data must be three months old prior to reporting. Additional minimum participant thresholds are used when presenting percentiles in a statistical distribution. See our practices on our data confidentiality webpage.