Summer Associate Class of 2016 Forum

[lavarman84]

Had two assignments due last Friday, and on Thursday evening I got an email that said something like "If you're free I might have some things you can help me out with. " for an older associate.

Basically wrote back saying I'm finishing up a bunch of stuff tomorrow but I'd be happy to help next week. Never heard back. Did I handle this situation right? It's been nagging me.

I would have said something like

"I would be happy to help? When do you need this done? I have two deadlines tomorrow, so a 24-hour turnaround will be difficult, but I'm more than happy to work on it over the weekend."

Haha. That might be your best joke of the day.

[Avian]

The work I did was actually used today. Was kind of cool seeing that at least some of what I do actually is used by the firm.

It's a nice feeling, especially after another partner barely glances at your last memo and dumps it in his make-work SA assignment file.

[registering]

Are they going to no offer extra people to get to 180K?

I feel like that's a bad idea. Seems like stealth layoffs of upper class-men would be a better idea.
God 180k in a non-NYC market sounds amazing and idk why people would want to be in NYC.

no offering a couple SAs here and there wouldn't raise any huge red flags, just cold offer them

exactly, esp for the non-100% firms

also if you no offer one or 2 SAs people will victim blame instead of firm blame

seems much easier than firing people who know things

You guys make it seem like it's only affecting this incoming class; it's affecting all of them. A typical V100 will have at least 300-400 associates, most likely a lot more. The new pay scale will cost these firms about $7-15million/yr, compared against typical PPP of $1-2million for most V100s. I don't see how trying to shed a prospective first year or two is going to help balance the books all that much.

If firms really cared that much about their class size, I think the better way of handling it is to play chicken with summers and keep mum about any plans to raise salaries. There are bound to be a few who will try their hand at 3LOLCI to snag a firm that adopted the pay scale early, and I can see the 3L hiring market heat up at OCI this year somewhat as a result.

[Johann]

Had two assignments due last Friday, and on Thursday evening I got an email that said something like "If you're free I might have some things you can help me out with. " for an older associate.

Basically wrote back saying I'm finishing up a bunch of stuff tomorrow but I'd be happy to help next week. Never heard back. Did I handle this situation right? It's been nagging me.

youre fine

[Anonymous User]

Are they going to no offer extra people to get to 180K?

I feel like that's a bad idea. Seems like stealth layoffs of upper class-men would be a better idea.
God 180k in a non-NYC market sounds amazing and idk why people would want to be in NYC.

no offering a couple SAs here and there wouldn't raise any huge red flags, just cold offer them

exactly, esp for the non-100% firms

also if you no offer one or 2 SAs people will victim blame instead of firm blame

seems much easier than firing people who know things

You guys make it seem like it's only affecting this incoming class; it's affecting all of them. A typical V100 will have at least 300-400 associates, most likely a lot more. The new pay scale will cost these firms about $7-15million/yr, compared against typical PPP of $1-2million for most V100s. I don't see how trying to shed a prospective first year or two is going to help balance the books all that much.

If firms really cared that much about their class size, I think the better way of handling it is to play chicken with summers and keep mum about any plans to raise salaries. There are bound to be a few who will try their hand at 3LOLCI to snag a firm that adopted the pay scale early, and I can see the 3L hiring market heat up at OCI this year somewhat as a result.

But failing to adjust up the salary scale early enough before 2L OCI will severely impair a major firm's ability to recruit 2Ls at 2L OCI. When there are already a lot of firms that adjusted their scales, why would any 2L from a top school choose a firm that stayed at 16k? Firms always hope to hire the best they can get during 2L OCI season.
Also, one of the reasons why firms are raising the scale is to keep up with the tuition. The firms that do not raise their salary will have tremendous difficulty with recruiting.

[registering]

Are they going to no offer extra people to get to 180K?

I feel like that's a bad idea. Seems like stealth layoffs of upper class-men would be a better idea.
God 180k in a non-NYC market sounds amazing and idk why people would want to be in NYC.

no offering a couple SAs here and there wouldn't raise any huge red flags, just cold offer them

exactly, esp for the non-100% firms

also if you no offer one or 2 SAs people will victim blame instead of firm blame

seems much easier than firing people who know things

You guys make it seem like it's only affecting this incoming class; it's affecting all of them. A typical V100 will have at least 300-400 associates, most likely a lot more. The new pay scale will cost these firms about $7-15million/yr, compared against typical PPP of $1-2million for most V100s. I don't see how trying to shed a prospective first year or two is going to help balance the books all that much.

If firms really cared that much about their class size, I think the better way of handling it is to play chicken with summers and keep mum about any plans to raise salaries. There are bound to be a few who will try their hand at 3LOLCI to snag a firm that adopted the pay scale early, and I can see the 3L hiring market heat up at OCI this year somewhat as a result.

But failing to adjust up the salary scale early enough before 2L OCI will severely impair a major firm's ability to recruit 2Ls at 2L OCI. When there are already a lot of firms that adjusted their scales, why would any 2L from a top school choose a firm that stayed at 16k? Firms always hope to hire the best they can get during 2L OCI season.
Also, one of the reasons why firms are raising the scale is to keep up with the tuition. The firms that do not raise their salary will have tremendous difficulty with recruiting.

I've personally never understood what "best" in 2L OCI is supposed to be. My summer class has a good number of people with lower 1L class ranks than me from lower tier non-T14 schools who have turned out be incredibly diligent workers and a lot of fun to be around. The firms spend, at most, 2.5 hrs per candidate evaluating whether they'd be a fit for them. By now, I think almost all of them are aware that this gives them a crap shot at best of picking out "the best."

Also, we haven't seen an increase in market rate since, what, the boom years of the mid-2000s? It's a much different job market since then. Firm class sizes are still small compared to the boom years, most T14s still can't place everyone who wants biglaw into biglaw ,and the market overall is leaner. I strongly doubt firms are going to have that much trouble recruiting who they want. WLRK's bonus structure is the stuff of legends, yet I really don't think CSM/Skadden and other V5s/V10s have struggled at all the past few years to get top talent. At the end of the day, unless there's only a handful of holdouts, the $180K early-adopter firms are still only able to recruit a limited number of people.

[Anonymous User]

Are they going to no offer extra people to get to 180K?

I feel like that's a bad idea. Seems like stealth layoffs of upper class-men would be a better idea.
God 180k in a non-NYC market sounds amazing and idk why people would want to be in NYC.

no offering a couple SAs here and there wouldn't raise any huge red flags, just cold offer them

exactly, esp for the non-100% firms

also if you no offer one or 2 SAs people will victim blame instead of firm blame

seems much easier than firing people who know things

You guys make it seem like it's only affecting this incoming class; it's affecting all of them. A typical V100 will have at least 300-400 associates, most likely a lot more. The new pay scale will cost these firms about $7-15million/yr, compared against typical PPP of $1-2million for most V100s. I don't see how trying to shed a prospective first year or two is going to help balance the books all that much.

If firms really cared that much about their class size, I think the better way of handling it is to play chicken with summers and keep mum about any plans to raise salaries. There are bound to be a few who will try their hand at 3LOLCI to snag a firm that adopted the pay scale early, and I can see the 3L hiring market heat up at OCI this year somewhat as a result.

But failing to adjust up the salary scale early enough before 2L OCI will severely impair a major firm's ability to recruit 2Ls at 2L OCI. When there are already a lot of firms that adjusted their scales, why would any 2L from a top school choose a firm that stayed at 16k? Firms always hope to hire the best they can get during 2L OCI season.
Also, one of the reasons why firms are raising the scale is to keep up with the tuition. The firms that do not raise their salary will have tremendous difficulty with recruiting.

I've personally never understood what "best" in 2L OCI is supposed to be. My summer class has a good number of people with lower 1L class ranks than me from lower tier non-T14 schools who have turned out be incredibly diligent workers and a lot of fun to be around. The firms spend, at most, 2.5 hrs per candidate evaluating whether they'd be a fit for them. By now, I think almost all of them are aware that this gives them a crap shot at best of picking out "the best."

Also, we haven't seen an increase in market rate since, what, the boom years of the mid-2000s? It's a much different job market since then. Firm class sizes are still small compared to the boom years, most T14s still can't place everyone who wants biglaw into biglaw ,and the market overall is leaner. I strongly doubt firms are going to have that much trouble recruiting who they want. WLRK's bonus structure is the stuff of legends, yet I really don't think CSM/Skadden and other V5s/V10s have struggled at all the past few years to get top talent. At the end of the day, unless there's only a handful of holdouts, the $180K early-adopter firms are still only able to recruit a limited number of people.

Your "best" argument is beside the point. I never defined "best". Firms' view of what a good candidate is differs. Literally, they hope to recruit the best they can get (emphasis on "they can get").

You are mising the point. It is not that CSM etc have struggled in the past to get top talent vis-a-vis other firms. No. The reason why they raised the scale is not really to snag talent from other firms, but has more to do with making biglaw seem like a more financially rational option for prospective law students and raising the standard higher industry-wide. Also, the class sizes of the firms that have already adopted the new scale are large enough so that 2Ls at top schools could easily avoid the firms that have not adopted the new scale by 2L OCI. (And of course, more and more firms will adjust up their scale until 2L OCI. Just look.)

Not adopting the scale by 2L OCI doesn't make much sense. Cold offering one or two SAs sounds more reasonable.

[El Pollito]

well first of all we were joking

[pancakes3]

1) the firms that are moving up in pay scale were already getting their pick of the litter because of their vault rankings anyway. the pay bump is just a manifestation of the implied delineation.
2) cold-offering 1 or 2 SA's isn't going to cut it - that's registering's original point - all associates get bumped. if the plan is to cannibalize intra-class salaries to finance the bump, there will need to be some letting go of associates as well.

[soj]

.

[20160810]

i <3 SA threads. never not overanalyzing to the point of psychosis

"New York law firms are raising their salaries, how might I be hurt by this?!?"

[Serett]

We are the Norb of summer classes.

[lavarman84]

We are the Norb of summer classes.

[youtube]mFEzW1Z6TRM[/youtube]

[runinthefront]

Your "best" argument is beside the point. I never defined "best". Firms' view of what a good candidate is differs. Literally, they hope to recruit the best they can get (emphasis on "they can get").

You are mising the point. It is not that CSM etc have struggled in the past to get top talent vis-a-vis other firms. No. The reason why they raised the scale is not really to snag talent from other firms, but has more to do with making biglaw seem like a more financially rational option for prospective law students and raising the standard higher industry-wide. Also, the class sizes of the firms that have already adopted the new scale are large enough so that 2Ls at top schools could easily avoid the firms that have not adopted the new scale by 2L OCI. (And of course, more and more firms will adjust up their scale until 2L OCI. Just look.)

Not adopting the scale by 2L OCI doesn't make much sense. Cold offering one or two SAs sounds more reasonable.

lol are you in law school/have you attended law school post 2007?

[JenDarby]

We are the Norb of summer classes.

but worse. he never had anything to be happy about

[Anonymous User]

Heard a rumor that a Weil summer was fired

[Anonymous User]

Gosh all these rumors out of the same firm I wonder why?!

[Anonymous User]

Heard a rumor that a Weil summer was fired

False

[BizBro]

Heard a rumor that a Weil summer was fired

I heard this rumour too. What's the word?

[PeanutsNJam]

how bad does your work product have to be to get no offered? I'm not getting much positive or negative feedback at all.

[sublime]

..

[barkschool]

how bad does your work product have to be to get no offered? I'm not getting much positive or negative feedback at all.

You turn stuff in and then what?

[Johann]

how bad does your work product have to be to get no offered? I'm not getting much positive or negative feedback at all.

Really depends where you are at, but nobody is expecting much from you.

[Anonymous User]

Going to be easy to spot the CovingTTTon summers at the 5k tomorrow, they'll be walking into traffic

[stannis]

How do you guys handle those memos where the law the assigning attorney is looking for just isn't out there? Or is the opposite of the position you are looking for?