About the Awards: National Law Journal Awards 2022

About the Awards is a new series of Q&As with our editors across ALM Media’s publications that aims to give readers and potential nominees insight into our judging process for awards related to ALM Recognition Events. We hope this will guide you as you draft your submissions, and we welcome any additional questions you may have.

For our next column, we’ll be discussing our National Law Journal awards with bureau chief Christine Schiffner, who will be leading the judging across all categories. For more information about the NLJ Awards 2022 contest, please visit the awards site. The deadline for submissions is July 14. You can also view other upcoming ALM contest submission deadlines and sign up for marketing notifications here.

Christine, can you tell us more about yourself?

I joined the National Law Journal as bureau chief in September of last year. Covering legal matters in Washington, D.C., is most intriguing to me as a lot of our coverage focuses on the intersection of law and politics. At a time when U.S. Supreme Court decisions are under constant scrutiny and the Biden administration has been pushing for new regulations on a broad spectrum of issues from ESG to cryptocurrencies and antitrust enforcement, I couldn’t imagine a more exciting place to cover legal news. I previously held newsroom management positions with various international news organizations as well as The Associated Press.

As for the National Law Journal Awards, is this a new contest? 

The National Law Journal Awards started in 2017 when we first launched the NLJ Professional Excellence Awards. Since then, the contest has been a high-stakes competition among law firms in and around Washington, D.C.

I noticed that Pro Bono Hot List is missing from the categories list. Has something else taken its place? Will Pro Bono Hot List be offered later this year?

The Pro Bono Hot List has been replaced by the ESG and Community Impact Leaders category to reflect the growing demand for environmental, social and governance projects. This new category could include pro bono projects but will also be open for submissions featuring other legal initiatives with strong focus on community impact.

Do attorneys need to practice in DC to qualify?

Nationwide legal projects qualify for this year’s awards unless the category description specifically mentions DC attorneys. Please review the complete list for details.

Will you accept arbitrations for the Winning Litigators category?

Arbitrations will not be accepted for this category.

How many nominations can a firm submit in each category?

Each firm can submit two entries per category.

Will you accept confidential information? 

While firms may have to keep  certain pieces of its submission  confidential,  we suggest limiting those portions as much as possible as we need to be able to credibly write about any winner with as much detail as possible.

Who should be interested in submitting nominations for this contest?

Law firms and attorneys that have scored significant legal victories over the last 12 months either in a jury or bench trial or a high-stakes settlement are welcome to submit award applications. Nominees will have proven outstanding, innovative approaches to legal project resolution. Submissions are not limited to Am Law 200 firms.

Who is judging this contest?

ALM / National Law Journal senior staff and editors will review the award submissions carefully to narrow down this year’s finalists, bringing in subject-area experts from our team as needed on certain categories. All judges have a solid background in legal news coverage.

What are the judges looking for?

The judges are looking for outstanding, innovative approaches to the practice and business of law. Excellent results for clients, innovative approaches to service delivery, diverse teams and work that has overcome unique challenges or employed novel legal theories will stand out. We want to see why hiring your firm or that lawyer was the best choice for the client. We want to see how your firm is going above and beyond industry norms to improve society, retain top talent, change laws or otherwise impact the legal industry and those industries of your clients.

The deadline for submissions for the National Law Journal Awards is July 14.

For more information about National Law Journal Awards and other Recognition Events awards, please contact Recognition Events desk manager Pearl Wu at [email protected].