William J. Kilberg is a Partner with Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher.  He is a member of both the Executive and Management Committees of the Firm, and has served as Partner-in-Charge of the Washington office of the firm (1990-1995).  Mr. Kilberg is currently the most senior partner in the Labor & Employment Law Practice Group. 

Mr. Kilberg counsels and represents clients in all aspects of employee relations, labor relations, and employee compensation and benefits.  He has appeared numerous times in trial courts on behalf of employers in class and collective actions under the myriad of employment laws, including ERISA, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, and the Fair Labor Standards Act.  He has argued many significant matters before eight United States Courts of Appeals and has successfully argued two cases before the Supreme Court, Egelhoff v. Egelhoff, and Murphy v. UPS.  Mr. Kilberg’s practice also includes advocacy before Congressional committees, the Departments of Labor, Justice, and the Treasury, the EEOC, the IRS, the NLRB, and the PBGC. 

In 1973, Mr. Kilberg was appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate as the Solicitor for the U.S. Department of Labor, a position he held until 1977. He also has served as Associate Solicitor of Labor for Labor Relations and Civil Rights, General Counsel of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, and as a White House Fellow and Special Assistant to Secretary of Labor George P. Shultz. At the time of his appointment as Solicitor of Labor, Mr. Kilberg was the youngest person ever to be appointed to a sub-Cabinet post in the United States government.  Mr. Kilberg was President of the White House Fellows Association in 1982-83, and was appointed by President Reagan in 1982 to the Commission on White House Fellowships. 

Mr. Kilberg was elected a Fellow in the charter classes of the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers, and the American College of Employee Benefits Counsel.  He is a member of the Board of the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers, the Advisory Board of the American Employment Law Council, the Legal Advisory Council of the National Legal Center for the Public Interest, and of the ERISA Roundtable.  He serves as an Officer of the Labor and Employment Committee of the Federalist Society.

In 2009, Washingtonian Magazine named Mr. Kilberg as one of the Top Lawyers in labor and employment.  In 2008, Mr. Kilberg was named as one of the Top Ten Leaders of the Pack: Employment Litigators in the nation by Human Resource Executive and Lawdragon.  He was identified as the Best Employment Litigator in the Washington-metropolitan area in 2005 by the Washington Business Journal and as one of 100 "Superlawyers" by the Washington Post.  Legal Times has  characterized Mr. Kilberg as one of the "Twelve Leading Labor & Employment Litigators in the D.C. Area" and Chambers & Partners USA - America's Leading Lawyers for Business has listed him in every one of its editions.  Lawdragon magazine has also named Mr. Kilberg as one of the 500 leading lawyers in the nation, describing him as "the labor lawyer of choice for corporate America," and "one of the most esteemed employment lawyers in the land".

Mr. Kilberg served as Editor-in-Chief of the Employee Relations Law Journal from 1986 to 2003.  He has published many articles on employment and benefits issues, often appears as a speaker on employment and employee benefits issues at Bar and other professional events.  He is co-author of the monograph "Saga of Reform: Regulation of Worker Overtime," published by the National Legal Center for the Public Interest in September 2004, as well as co-author of the books "Employer's Rights and Responsibilities: Legal Dilemmas in the Changing Workplace," and "Pitfalls for Japanese Employers in the United States," published in Japanese.  He is the recipient of a number of awards, among them the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) Award for Outstanding Service to the Spanish-speaking community, the D.C. Chamber of Commerce Arthur Flemming Award for Exceptional Public Service, and the School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University Judge William B. Groat Alumni Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Field of Industrial & Labor Relations. In 2007 Mr. Kilberg delivered the inaugural Donald S. Shire Lecture at the United States Department of Labor.

Mr. Kilberg graduated in 1966 from Cornell University, which he attended on a scholarship from Local 3, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, and received his law degree in 1969 from Harvard Law School.