Catherine Hanaway, a partner with Husch Blackwell in St. Louis/courtesy photo

Catherine Hanaway, newly chosen as Husch Blackwell's chair-elect, will join a small cadre of women leading Am Law 200 firms. But that's not the only way she stands out from the crowd. Hanaway brings a background in government and politics to a job typically held by a Big Law veteran.

Hanaway said her varied experience provides her with the skill set to run the 622-lawyer firm, pointing to her time as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri and as speaker of the Missouri House of Representatives. She also ran for governor, but lost in the Republican primary in 2016.

"She certainly has a healthy experience in leadership in complex organizations," said Gregory Smith, who is in the final year of his three-year term as chairman.

Hanaway said she understands the significance of being the first woman to lead Husch Blackwell. She was also the first woman speaker of the House in Missouri. She takes  responsibility for being a mentor for other women.

She's also the first person to chair the firm who has not practiced there for her entire career—the first nonlifer, Smith said.

But Hanaway said she considers law firm partners and elected legislators as similarly autonomous, and she expects to draw heavily on what she learned as speaker to her role as firm chairwoman. In the Legislature, she learned to be a consensus builder, she said, because calling on the "biggest and most diverse group" possible leads to the best ideas.

Hanaway, who joined Husch Blackwell in 2013, will move into the chair role on April 1, 2021. Smith will return to his real estate practice. Over the next several months, Smith and Hanaway will collaborate, so she is prepared to assume the chair position.

In addition to noting her leadership experience outside the firm, Smith said Hanaway is also well-suited for the job because she served on Husch Blackwell's compensation and governance and nominations committees, and created and led the firm's government solutions group.

Husch Blackwell was created in 2008 in a merger between Husch & Eppenberger and Blackwell Sanders Peper Martin. Hanaway actually started her legal career at predecessor firm Peper, Martin, Jensen, Maichel & Hetlage, and as a result feels an attachment to Husch Blackwell, she said.

After six years in the Missouri House, from 1999 to 2005, and four years as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri, from 2005 to 2009, she was a partner for four years in the Ashcroft Law Firm in St. Louis until her move to Husch Blackwell.

Smith noted that she's been at the firm only a short time compared to previous chairs, but that comes with benefits too. "She brings a very helpful dimension in that if you get too insular, I suppose it can be problematic," he said.

Although it will be nearly a year before she assumes the chair role, Hanaway's expectation is to increase the firm's head count and expand its geographic footprint, although she declined to say where.

"This isn't my decision to make at this point. Obviously, I am very committed to our strategy. We tend to grow where the opportunities are," she said of the 18-office firm. While centered in the Midwest, the firm has a presence in various markets, including Sacramento, Washington, D.C., Chicago and Houston.

Because of the coronavirus pandemic, Hanaway said she is focused on short-term goals right now, such as helping clients manage through the crisis. She said stay-home and shelter-in-place orders have impacted clients differently, depending on their industries, but the lawyers are getting calls from clients in trucking, health care and education, and the firm's labor and employment practice is as busy as it has ever been.

While much has changed since the firm's fiscal 2019 ended, Husch Blackwell posted strong financials for the year. Gross revenue hit $380.3 million, up 7.6% from 2018,  with 3.3% more lawyers, and revenue per lawyer came in at $611,000, an improvement of 4.1% from the  prior year.

Profits per equity partner were $650,000, up 9.6% from 2018, although the number of equity partners declined by 4.3% from 2018. Net income was $100.8 million, up 5% when compared with 2018, according to preliminary ALM data.

"It was quite a spectacular year," Smith said, noting that the strong financials reflect the Midwest-centered firm's focus on six industry sectors—energy and natural resources; financial services and capital markets; food and agribusiness; health care, life sciences and education; real estate, development and construction; and technology, manufacturing and transportation.

He said the reach of the firm's 18 offices and its industry focus have made it a "bargain" for many clients because of innovative billing, including fixed pricing and portfolio pricing.

The firm had a "very, very strong" first quarter of 2020, Smith said, and lawyers remain surprisingly busy even several weeks after lawyers and staff started working remotely under stay-home orders to slow the spread of the coronavirus. While utilization is "very strong," Smith said some of the demand is COVID-19-related, as clients seek to deal with business issues and government programs under relief legislation.

Husch Blackwell has taken some steps to counter the economic uncertainty, he said, with C-level executives taking a pay cut and the firm increasing holdbacks for equity partners.

Smith said it's difficult to predict what reentry will look like, once the economy starts returning to normal.

"I'll be frank. Nobody knows what's going to happen at this point," he said.

Correction: A previous version of this story misstated Husch Blackwell's 2019 gross revenue.

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