Just started a District Court clerkship after one year in big-law. Wasn't completely miserable in big-law though I felt bored, uninspired, and I didn't like most of the people I worked under. I would love to never have to go back but 1) I have an egregious amount of debt and 2) I don't think, with only 2 years experience by the time I would state, that I would qualify for the big fed jobs I want (AUSA/DOJ Main).
So, I am wondering when I should start applying to firms. I have an offer to go back to my previous firm but I would like to shop around a bit. I am thinking I will send out resumes in November. Does that sound right?
Post-clerkship hiring timeline Forum
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Anonymous User
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Re: Post-clerkship hiring timeline
It's a little bit variable depending on region / market. I'm most familiar with West Coast hiring, where it feels like the fact that Ninth Circuit seems very Sep.-Sep. causes the hiring timeline to pretty rigidly track that (which screws over people like me who have clerkships that were slightly offset from that and had no idea the jobs were being taken earlier than I thought). I don't think you'll get much of a response until Feb/Mar. but reaching out to people earlier isn't a terrible thing to do. That early, based on what I've seen anecdotally from other folks, you're just going to get a lot of responses along the lines of "we don't know what our hiring will be like" or "yes we'll interview you but our hiring process gets started later". But YMMV. My advice would be to focus on networking / reaching out early on vs. applying, especially if you're interested in boutiques for example.Anonymous User wrote:Just started a District Court clerkship after one year in big-law. Wasn't completely miserable in big-law though I felt bored, uninspired, and I didn't like most of the people I worked under. I would love to never have to go back but 1) I have an egregious amount of debt and 2) I don't think, with only 2 years experience by the time I would state, that I would qualify for the big fed jobs I want (AUSA/DOJ Main).
So, I am wondering when I should start applying to firms. I have an offer to go back to my previous firm but I would like to shop around a bit. I am thinking I will send out resumes in November. Does that sound right?
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Anonymous User
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- Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:32 am
Re: Post-clerkship hiring timeline
That's helpful feedback - especially because my target market is on the West Coast. Thanks for your thoughts!
