soliciting donations from your firm? Forum

[Anonymous User]

I belong to the public interest organization at my school, and every year the organization has two big fundraising events. I will be working at a big law firm next summer. At the first event, fundraising was lackluster, so I agreed to ask my firm to contribute, and they did. I'm not really asking about whether that was kosher although I suppose it would be good to know if it was not. They seemed completely fine with it, and I don't see anything wrong with it given that I am a lowly peon who they could easily say no to (I had already accepted their offer).

The issue is with the fundraising for the second event. I am in charge of it, and my firm has donated in the past, so they are likely to give again if asked. Somehow I feel weird about asking again, though. I'm not sure what the etiquette is here. Would it be weird for me to ask again?

[Mce252]

Have someone else ask?

[LawIdiot86]

I wouldn't ask. I may be hard-hearted and entirely self-interested, but until I have that offer in my hand after the summer, I would not ask the firm for anything. Charitable donations, time off, bar dues, etc., can all wait until I'm actually in the door.

[Moxie]

Have someone else ask?

+1 to this suggestion.

[KMaine]

I think you were fine to ask once. I would not do twice.

[Transferthrowaway]

The Human Fund - Money for People

[nymario]

Kind of OT, but I went to go into one of the PI organization's meetings to snag some free food and I basically got chased out because everyone knew I had a BigLaw SA lined up. I felt very unwelcome. That said, I certainly would't have expended a whole lot of effort doing any fundraising work for them, so fair is fair.