Which school for an overseas target market? Forum

[LogicalBaozi]

Long time no see, TLS.

If one hopes to work in an overseas market (read: overseas office of a US-based firm), should one target as if one hopes to work at the firm headquarters? I.e. try to go to CN for NY firms, Boalt/LA for CA firms, and then transfer? If so, would Michigan/UV/Penn be a serious disadvantage, given those markets tend to have less international reach?

I should point out I am not clear on hiring practices; I had assumed one simply interviewed for the firm, and they choose which office you get assigned to. If one can request/interview specifically for foreign offices, this would be good to know.


School choices (expected, so take it as a hypothetical if you must): MVPB, CCN if lucky. Feel free to discuss any school, but HYS is kind of liking God Mode for any market, so.... Other plusses that might help: Fluency in Chinese (maxed out HSK), proficiency in Japanese.

Compelling reason: My SO is in Beijing. Expect to be engaged by the end of law school, married if I can land a job.

[dingbat]

Long time no see, TLS.

If one hopes to work in an overseas market (read: overseas office of a US-based firm), should one target as if one hopes to work at the firm headquarters? I.e. try to go to CN for NY firms, Boalt/LA for CA firms, and then transfer? If so, would Michigan/UV/Penn be a serious disadvantage, given those markets tend to have less international reach?

I should point out I am not clear on hiring practices; I had assumed one simply interviewed for the firm, and they choose which office you get assigned to. If one can request/interview specifically for foreign offices, this would be good to know.


School choices (expected, so take it as a hypothetical if you must): MVPB, CCN if lucky. Feel free to discuss any school, but HYS is kind of liking God Mode for any market, so.... Other plusses that might help: Fluency in Chinese (maxed out HSK), proficiency in Japanese.

Compelling reason: My SO is in Beijing. Expect to be engaged by the end of law school, married if I can land a job.

I'd hazard a guess and say the one most likely to get you a biglaw job - CCN or Harvard.
Look at the firms that attend OCI at those schools and see how many Beijing offices attend.

[LogicalBaozi]

Long time no see, TLS.

If one hopes to work in an overseas market (read: overseas office of a US-based firm), should one target as if one hopes to work at the firm headquarters? I.e. try to go to CN for NY firms, Boalt/LA for CA firms, and then transfer? If so, would Michigan/UV/Penn be a serious disadvantage, given those markets tend to have less international reach?

I should point out I am not clear on hiring practices; I had assumed one simply interviewed for the firm, and they choose which office you get assigned to. If one can request/interview specifically for foreign offices, this would be good to know.


School choices (expected, so take it as a hypothetical if you must): MVPB, CCN if lucky. Feel free to discuss any school, but HYS is kind of liking God Mode for any market, so.... Other plusses that might help: Fluency in Chinese (maxed out HSK), proficiency in Japanese.

Compelling reason: My SO is in Beijing. Expect to be engaged by the end of law school, married if I can land a job.

I'd hazard a guess and say the one most likely to get you a biglaw job - CCN or Harvard.
Look at the firms that attend OCI at those schools and see how many Beijing offices attend.

Ah, so offices attend OCI separately, and hire separately? Off to search TLS for OCI info!

[Lincoln]

Ah, so offices attend OCI separately, and hire separately?

Sometimes, but not always. Overseas offices often do not attend OCI separately; they just don't hire enough people to justify the cost. But where one office is hiring for the firm as a whole, you get to list or rank your preferred locations. That may or may not be apparent from any information you can find online. I know for my school (Cornell), no overseas offices attended separately, but several firms indicated that you could interview for those offices, and I know a few people who are spending their whole summer in Tokyo, Shanghai, or Hong Kong.

You know that you're basically just going to be in corporate if you go to Asia, right? Very few firms have international dispute resolution practices.

[.375 H&H Mag.]

I think it's really firm dependent, as opposed to school dependent. A good enough resume will get you into the firm you want, and you should familiarize yourself with the staffing policies of firms that have offices you want to target. I haven't looked into this too closely, but I know there are a couple of V25 firms that encourage (openly facilitate?) spending part of the 2L summer in an international office, some firms that require (subtlety urge?) its partner-track associates to spend time overseas, and of course some UK firms that hire US law grads. I think that depending on the firm, once you get the offer, you can work with them to place you in the office you like, similar to those firms that might let you select a US office to split or summer at.
*Again, this varies firm-by-firm, so you'd have to do your research and networking (i.e. informational interviews.)

[LogicalBaozi]

Sometimes, but not always. Overseas offices often do not attend OCI separately; they just don't hire enough people to justify the cost. But where one office is hiring for the firm as a whole, you get to list or rank your preferred locations. That may or may not be apparent from any information you can find online. I know for my school (Cornell), no overseas offices attended separately, but several firms indicated that you could interview for those offices, and I know a few people who are spending their whole summer in Tokyo, Shanghai, or Hong Kong.

You know that you're basically just going to be in corporate if you go to Asia, right? Very few firms have international dispute resolution practices.

Yeah, but I'm one of the rare people for whom that isn't a total turn off. Maybe that'll change, and seeing M&A/IPO stuff will make me expel waste from at least one bodily orifice. From what I hear, IP law is near-impossible to get into without a hard science major (math not being counted), so corporate will be a fact of life.

That said, I would like to know more about OCI at Cornell, if there's a new thread about (most recent one I found is 2010 OCI). It's a school I could probably get $$$ at, and if it places well, might be one worth considering. Thanks for putting it on the map for me.

I think it's really firm dependent, as opposed to school dependent. A good enough resume will get you into the firm you want, and you should familiarize yourself with the staffing policies of firms that have offices you want to target. I haven't looked into this too closely, but I know there are a couple of V25 firms that encourage (openly facilitate?) spending part of the 2L summer in an international office, some firms that require (subtlety urge?) its partner-track associates to spend time overseas, and of course some UK firms that hire US law grads. I think that depending on the firm, once you get the offer, you can work with them to place you in the office you like, similar to those firms that might let you select a US office to split or summer at.
*Again, this varies firm-by-firm, so you'd have to do your research and networking (i.e. informational interviews.)

Thanks, guess it's time to give myself a bit of extra homework. Huzzah!