First year tax associate: how to get bearings Forum

[Anonymous User]

Started at a NYC firm as a tax associate recently. I knew it would be a steep learning curve but feels like my head is on overload. Enormous amounts of new tax material tbat I'm sure takes me 3 times as long to get through as it should.

Any tax associates have any tips?

[mvp99]

"No one knows what they’re doing. Deep down, everyone is just faking it until they figure it out."

[Anonymous User]

Bump - Really curious about this as well.

Also just wanted to add that I'm a 3L who has done tax both summers and have heard from great tax associates that you won't know what you're doing for the first two years. As long as you like doing it, just keep working hard and you'll figure it out.

[Anonymous User]

OP here

I believe I'm feeling extremely lost as I'm at a PE heavy firm. And PE and partnership tax are both things I'm quite unfamiliar with

[CanadianWolf]

Long ago, I took many LLM in Taxation courses. A few were taught by attorneys/law profs who actually drafted much of the particular section being discussed. Two profs confessed that after Congress was done with their contributions that they could not "understand" their own work. In short, don't panic--just argue law & facts which support your client's position.

[Anonymous User]

OP here

I believe I'm feeling extremely lost as I'm at a PE heavy firm. And PE and partnership tax are both things I'm quite unfamiliar with

3L from above.

I've been told PE and Partnership are some of the hardest areas. If you haven't taken partnership tax (or took it awhile ago), I would start with getting a normal textbook and supplement and reading those. Partnership taxation is unusual and I was told to learn all the basics at once. A lot of the important ideas are absolutely buried in the regs and I don't see how you would pull it all together working on any given research assignment without at least having gone over the basics. Lots of firms (and maybe yours) also have private equity/tax primers and some of these you can just find online. With PE, whether you're doing fund formation or transactions, the tax stuff is going to be really complicated when you're working through the waterfall, plus blocker entities for tax or business reasons, plus international issues, and I think it just takes experience to get a handle on all this. Sorry if this is naive or amateurish. I'm really hoping another associate gets drawn into the thread.

[Anonymous User]

Sorry, I don't mean to hijack, but is there any advice for a 2L who will be trying to crack a tax group next summer? I'll be taking all the tax classes available, and I'm going to an NY V10 with a big tax dept. Is there anything else I should be doing to prepare?

[Johann]

Long ago, I took many LLM in Taxation courses. A few were taught by attorneys/law profs who actually drafted much of the particular section being discussed. Two profs confessed that after Congress was done with their contributions that they could not "understand" their own work. In short, don't panic--just argue law & facts which support your client's position.

OP as long as you understand more tax than this person, you'll be fine. It's a tough field. Stick with it. FInd some partnership outlines online or RIA guides and read through those an hour a week if you're feeling that bad (I wouldn't).