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I'm down to two firms, deciding between S&C or Cleary. I've been fairly "unplugged" regarding the firm chatter though, so here I am, soliciting the collective wisdom of TLS. I know the hours can be crazy, I had a 1L SA position, so that's not a major concern.

I want to stay in private practice, and hopefully make partner. Thus, a higher number of lateral partners is a big negative. Similarly, an "up or out" policy for senior associates is also a big negative. Also, I'm probably going to end up in litigation, rather than corporate.

So far, and this may sound like a stupid reason, but I'm leaning slightly towards Cleary, in part, because their office building is so ridiculously gorgeous. Every side of the building has a panoramic view. On the other hand, from many S&C offices, you only see the walls of other buildings across the street.

Anonymous User wrote:I want to stay in private practice, and hopefully make partner. Thus, a higher number of lateral partners is a big negative. Similarly, an "up or out" policy for senior associates is also a big negative.

Careful - you should be thinking about "what are my odds of making partner if I start at firm XYZ" and not "what are my odds of making partner AT firm XYZ if I START at firm XYZ."

You may just find firms with abysmal odds of making partner also have a relatively high percentage of associates that leave the firm and make partner elsewhere... in the same vein, you may finds firms which seem to make more partners are often promoting laterals to partner more often than homegrown associates. Not always, but you have to dig pretty deep to really get a sense for these things.