What do you think an attorney does? (Question for 0Ls) Forum

[anyriotgirl]

Clients are billed much much higher if their cases are processed by an actual lawyer or a team of lawyers even if most of the work is delegated to paralegals. Firms won't be able to justify their exorbitant costs if they tell clients that their cases are handled by 22 year-olds without even a bachelor's degree no matter how competent they maybe. The entire high end service industry (not just law) relies on two things, prestige and connections and paralegals have neither. Do you really think a Classics student from Princeton provides such salient advices worthy of the pay they get from Bain or Mckinsey?

that didn't really answer my question.

[prezidentv8]

This is a serious question meant for anyone not in law school yet, because I think it could help law grads and law students give better advice on choosing law schools and career paths.

1. What kind of law do you want to do? (And if you say just general PI without further explaining then I hate you)

2. What do you think think you will do for work as an attorney? What do you think your general day is going to look like?

Excellent.

#getspopcorn

[Jdempewo]

Attorneys get all the chicks and take their yachts out every weekend. Duh.

[BigBlackTruck]

Patent searches is lined through. Should I take this to mean that you typically won't be doing prior art searches? Is that above/below the level of a 1st year associate?

Paralegals do prior art searches and PDF-save them in the respective folder.

Junior Associates draft Office Actions' responses, senior Associates review them+redline before submitting them. Thats how a patent boutique streamlines their process to ensure quality. I imagine at BigLaw Pros., a junior associate may not have someone to review their work.

Thanks for the replies. I wasn't sure firms would entrust entry-levels to do more important things such as drafting nonprovisional applications.

[Humbert Humbert]

And even then, they're talking about subject matter and not work product.

This is a very key distinction. I got to "assist in a preliminary injunction hearing in an intellectual property litigation." What this meant was I kept all sixty of the the exhibits in good order, handed the exhibits to the attorneys, and then played a recording.

this sounds like some of the work I do at my job now as a paralegal. I don't really get why firms are willing to pay the premium for a person with a JD when they could have some 22 year old do it for a fraction of the price. If I had to guess, I would say that the point is so you can observe the hearing and learn and and still bill for it. Am I on track with that?

Clients are billed much much higher if their cases are processed by an actual lawyer or a team of lawyers even if most of the work is delegated to paralegals. Firms won't be able to justify their exorbitant costs if they tell clients that their cases are handled by 22 year-olds without even a bachelor's degree no matter how competent they maybe. The entire high end service industry (not just law) relies on two things, prestige and connections and paralegals have neither. Do you really think a Classics student from Princeton provides such salient advices worthy of the pay he gets from Bain or Mckinsey?

LOL. Sure, the firm can bill the client associate-level rates for paralegal-level work. And the client simply won't pay said bill.

[NYC-WVU]

Patent searches is lined through. Should I take this to mean that you typically won't be doing prior art searches? Is that above/below the level of a 1st year associate?

Paralegals do prior art searches and PDF-save them in the respective folder.

Junior Associates draft Office Actions' responses, senior Associates review them+redline before submitting them. Thats how a patent boutique streamlines their process to ensure quality. I imagine at BigLaw Pros., a junior associate may not have someone to review their work.

Thanks for the replies. I wasn't sure firms would entrust entry-levels to do more important things such as drafting nonprovisional applications.

You could definitely do some searching as a first year. It will depend on where you work and, more importantly, who you are working for. [Even if you're not doing official searches, you might find yourself searching just to get some familiarity with the technology you are working in.] Eventually, it will not be cost effective for you to do the searching, but you may get to do some early on so that you are familiar with the process.
You also could end up doing patent drafting early in your career. I drafted several applications in my first year as a scientific advisor (i.e., patent agent before being registered). I'm also working with a first year who is drafting an Appeal Brief. Again, it depends on where you work and what work is available.

[twenty]

The 0Ls who post here are, most likely, going to be the more knowledgeable 0Ls, and not the vast majority of 0Ls.

And even then, they're talking about subject matter and not work product.

Yeah this is the disconnect I was talking about. Working on financial services litigation sounds way different than looking for boxes.

In all fairness, and I say this with the utmost respect for both of you, I doubt either one of you (or more importantly a reasonably-informed 0L) went into your respective legal fields with the expectation that you'd be trying impact-litigation cases in front of a federal judge or defending a F500 company against allegations of wire fraud within your first few weeks at your organization/firm.

It's like if someone said "What do you suppose a medical resident does?" a fair and reasonable response would be "working at some hospital shadowing some god-awful boomer doctor at god-awful hours for god-awful pay." You don't need to know what exactly you'd be doing as long as you understand that you're not going to be having an exceptionally fun time while you do it. I think TLS has done enough work explaining to people that biglaw/law in general is anything but oodles of joy.

That said, I do wish people would start asking 0Ls looking to take on sticker debt from a T14 school how much they think they'll enjoy working in sweatshop conditions doing work that a well-trained monkey could do and oh, by the way, can't quit from because of debt. And you don't even get to see any money from your efforts because it will take you 4-5 years just to break even.

[hcrimson2014]

Clients are billed much much higher if their cases are processed by an actual lawyer or a team of lawyers even if most of the work is delegated to paralegals. Firms won't be able to justify their exorbitant costs if they tell clients that their cases are handled by 22 year-olds without even a bachelor's degree no matter how competent they maybe. The entire high end service industry (not just law) relies on two things, prestige and connections and paralegals have neither. Do you really think a Classics student from Princeton provides such salient advices worthy of the pay they get from Bain or Mckinsey?

that didn't really answer my question.

You question was why won't firms hire the paralegal to do almost everything and essentially replace associates which would minimize cost and hence maximize profits. My response underlines the reality where it is within the firm's financial interest to pay the associates a premium over paralegals if for nothing other than being able to tell the clients that they have lawyers servicing the crutch of their legal problems. It is a consensual exchange, the big law clients like to be charged with a premium knowing that a Yale trained lawyer is servicing their needs while the firms like the higher profit margin.

[worldtraveler]

The 0Ls who post here are, most likely, going to be the more knowledgeable 0Ls, and not the vast majority of 0Ls.

And even then, they're talking about subject matter and not work product.

Yeah this is the disconnect I was talking about. Working on financial services litigation sounds way different than looking for boxes.

In all fairness, and I say this with the utmost respect for both of you, I doubt either one of you (or more importantly a reasonably-informed 0L) went into your respective legal fields with the expectation that you'd be trying impact-litigation cases in front of a federal judge or defending a F500 company against allegations of wire fraud within your first few weeks at your organization/firm.

It's like if someone said "What do you suppose a medical resident does?" a fair and reasonable response would be "working at some hospital shadowing some god-awful boomer doctor at god-awful hours for god-awful pay." You don't need to know what exactly you'd be doing as long as you understand that you're not going to be having an exceptionally fun time while you do it. I think TLS has done enough work explaining to people that biglaw/law in general is anything but oodles of joy.

That said, I do wish people would start asking 0Ls looking to take on sticker debt from a T14 school how much they think they'll enjoy working in sweatshop conditions doing work that a well-trained monkey could do and oh, by the way, can't quit from because of debt. And you don't even get to see any money from your efforts because it will take you 4-5 years just to break even.

I think you're missing the point of the thread. When people give a general description of a kind of law, it doesn't really give you a feel for what you actually do. So people make decisions on where to go and what career path to follow on the basis of an idea of what they think they want to do without knowing the actual experiences.

Like I said, it helps people with experience to give advice if we know what 0Ls are actually thinking and how informed they are. People are aware big law is not fun but don't seem to grasp what big law lawyers, or any attorneys actually do. A lot of people seem to be thinking they'll be doing a lot of drafting, which is very likely not what they'll do for the most part.

[anyriotgirl]

Clients are billed much much higher if their cases are processed by an actual lawyer or a team of lawyers even if most of the work is delegated to paralegals. Firms won't be able to justify their exorbitant costs if they tell clients that their cases are handled by 22 year-olds without even a bachelor's degree no matter how competent they maybe. The entire high end service industry (not just law) relies on two things, prestige and connections and paralegals have neither. Do you really think a Classics student from Princeton provides such salient advices worthy of the pay they get from Bain or Mckinsey?

that didn't really answer my question.

You question was why won't firms hire the paralegal to do almost everything and essentially replace associates which would minimize cost and hence maximize profits. My response underlines the reality where it is within the firm's financial interest to pay the associates a premium over paralegals if for nothing other than being able to tell the clients that they have lawyers servicing the crutch of their legal problems. It is a consensual exchange, the big law clients like to be charged with a premium knowing that a Yale trained lawyer is servicing their needs while the firms like the higher profit margin.

I didn't say almost everything, I was asking about that one specific instance, but whatever. I don't know what clients you deal with, but in my experience, they tend to get annoyed when they feel that they're being over-billed.

[Fed_Atty]

1) JAG

2) Legal work on a potentially wide variety of topics, all as a result of issues at that particular duty station. I've heard that it mostly ends up being minor drug use/possession issues and other less exciting areas of the law, rather than rules of engagement and laws of war. Regardless, I would hope to get a good amount of trial experience and individual responsibility early on, but I've heard that depends on where you get stationed. I expect to do physical training on a daily basis, which is awesome. It's also fairly likely I'll get deployed for a stretch (6 months to a year?).

ETA: But what do I know?

This is pretty accurate, at least from the navy side. Deployments are drying up though right now, but otherwise you seem pretty well informed. Although you may not get to be in court right away, you will get to draft and respond to motions and participate in an Article 32 hearing. I haven't had many drug trials lately, mostly a mix of sexual assault, domestic violence, child porn, counterfeiting (that was a fun one). Navy doesn't usually prosecute simple drug possession, we just administratively separate the sailor.

[RedJohnDoe]

.

[JustHawkin]

1) JAG

2) Legal work on a potentially wide variety of topics, all as a result of issues at that particular duty station. I've heard that it mostly ends up being minor drug use/possession issues and other less exciting areas of the law, rather than rules of engagement and laws of war. Regardless, I would hope to get a good amount of trial experience and individual responsibility early on, but I've heard that depends on where you get stationed. I expect to do physical training on a daily basis, which is awesome. It's also fairly likely I'll get deployed for a stretch (6 months to a year?).

ETA: But what do I know?

This is pretty accurate, at least from the navy side. Deployments are drying up though right now, but otherwise you seem pretty well informed. Although you may not get to be in court right away, you will get to draft and respond to motions and participate in an Article 32 hearing. I haven't had many drug trials lately, mostly a mix of sexual assault, domestic violence, child porn, counterfeiting (that was a fun one). Navy doesn't usually prosecute simple drug possession, we just administratively separate the sailor.

Curious if you, or any others, can expand of JAG exit options once your intial duty is up? PM me if you'd like.

[MisterGabriel]

massive amounts of cocaine.

[yadiermolina]

^best post on TLS I've seen yet