Columbia EIP 2015 Forum

[Anonymous User]

Post-CB DPW ding; CB was about a week ago.

[Anonymous User]

Jumping the gun a bit, but does anyone know how successful people are at 3L OCI?

Not very, if you didn't have a summer associate position. I wouldn't be thinking like that right now, anyway.

What about if you do have an SA but are interested in different firms? Assuming you have the grades of course.

[Anonymous User]

K&E screener dING today

[Tiago Splitter]

Jumping the gun a bit, but does anyone know how successful people are at 3L OCI?

Not very, if you didn't have a summer associate position. I wouldn't be thinking like that right now, anyway.

What about if you do have an SA but are interested in different firms? Assuming you have the grades of course.

Definitely possible. Keep your grades up.

[Anonymous User]

Sitting here with 10/18 dings. How likely am I to get any callbacks at this rate? I've begun churning out mass e-mails and will meet with OCS tomorrow, so I'm not just dicking around being sad about this shit. Genuinely curious though.

[Anonymous User]

Paul Hastings ding after the screener winked at me. Easily the strangest anecdote from EIP.

[Anonymous User]

K&E (NY) ding

[Anonymous User]

Dinged by Sidley NY as well. Via email

[Anonymous User]

Done a handful of CBs now but still no offer. Should I start mass mailing now?

[tlsuser123]

K&E (NY) ding

screener or callback?

[Anonymous User]

Do NY firms ever give offers a week out from cb's, or at 6-7 days after a cb should you consider it a ding?

[John_Luther1989]

Done a handful of CBs now but still no offer. Should I start mass mailing now?

If it's been more than 5 work days since your callbacks, absolutely. If not, maybe not, but probably still yes.

EDIT: I say 5 days because this time of year hiring committees are meeting at least once a week to make offer decisions and 5 days should cover the longest decision timeline. If you happened to come in on Tuesday and they meet on Monday, you wouldn't hear back till the next Monday or Tuesday.

[Anonymous User]

If we are not sure whether we want to accept an offer, are we allowed to go to the offer dinner? I am still debating what I want to do, and I feel like the offer dinner is a good chance to know more people at the firm.

[Anonymous User]

Whole point of offer dinner is to help you make a decision, so yes.

[Anonymous User]

which offer dinner?

[patfeeney]

No-offer people like myself who are interested, PM me so we can meet IRL and talk strategies.

[EquallyWrong]

No-offer people like myself who are interested, PM me so we can meet IRL and talk strategies.

I don't get this trend of cool, kick-ass folk not getting offers. It really shakes my confidence in the future/present of the legal profession. Maybe the answer is we shouldn't become corporate whores after all, but band together and become a fearsome gang of thieves and cutthroats that prey upon the successful yuppies that spurned us? Will discuss further at the strikeout summit/strikeout emotional support group.

[Anonymous User]

No-offer people like myself who are interested, PM me so we can meet IRL and talk strategies.

PMed

[patfeeney]

No-offer people like myself who are interested, PM me so we can meet IRL and talk strategies.

I don't get this trend of cool, kick-ass folk not getting offers. It really shakes my confidence in the future/present of the legal profession. Maybe the answer is we shouldn't become corporate whores after all, but band together and become a fearsome gang of thieves and cutthroats that prey upon the successful yuppies that spurned us? Will discuss further at the strikeout summit/strikeout emotional support group.

It really is brutal but there's not much we can do about it. If anything, though, I feel the legal profession has gotten more laid-back as time has worn on. I'm still reaching out to corporate places - I really want the experience.

I think the thing that sucks most is how important EIP is. If EIP were just one other way to get jobs, okay, no problem. But when 98 percent of important firms get 99 percent of their associates through EIP, and everyone else has to pick up whatever they can find, it's majorly frustrating.

[Anonymous User]

To those entering no-offer territory - please don't give up. I'm a rising 3L, and I know at least 5-6 people off the top of my head who got nothing out of EIP and picked offers up.

Feel free to reach out to 3Ls who summered at the firms you may be applying to, and if you do notice that a firm's still hiring, ask to talk to people at the firm who may be Columbia alums. In the meantime, beyond networking (and talking to OCS - please talk to OCS - they can help forward your materials, they're good for this, I promise) figure out what went wrong. Even if you think your interviewing skills are okay, have a couple close friends you trust mock interview you and give you some feedback. I had one friend who didn't realize his answers were hedging hard and horrible, and not selling himself at all until very late in the process (it worked out eventually). You don't need to be the most charismatic person out there, but small things in your interview answers may be slipping you up.

Good luck.

[Anonymous User]

can anyone tell me some questions that worked best during CBs?

[Anonymous User]

I have a good number of callbacks, but so far at the firms I've interviewed with, I haven't received any offers. Should I be concerned and how do I improve my interviewing skills? Any advice on interviewing?

[Anonymous User]

can anyone tell me some questions that worked best during CBs?

Usually, the interviewer was a lateral from another firm, so I would ask him/her to compare the different firms. What were the differences you noticed, what differences did you appreciate more, etc.

I'm also interested in cross-border disputes, so I would ask the interviewer what jurisdiction/country was most interesting in whatever case he was involved in, what challenged his basic ideas of law etc.. Some would state cultural differences, some would state jurisdictional differences. Either way, the replies were long.

For corporate, especially M&A, I would mention about the fact that I've heard the schedule is pretty unpredictable, so I would ask him to go through one of the more exciting days, and one of the more boring days.

Not quite sure whether these questions were actually great, but seemed to work as fallback questions.

[Anonymous User]

can anyone tell me some questions that worked best during CBs?

There is no magic recipe for questions; just don't ask stupid questions.

The universe of stupid questions is actually pretty small if you're staying on topic ("Why should I come here instead of going to X firm," "What are the exit options 1-2 years in," "How large is the [practice group firm doesn't have]," etc.). You get the interviewers names beforehand, look them up and see what they've done. If you are actually interested a practice, event, or personal anecdote ask. If you come in with not only pre-canned, but fake ass questions, they will know.

As a testament to the kinds of questions you can ask, I would usually burn the first 5-10 minutes of the callback having a normal ass conversation with the interviewer. At one firm I spent 10 minutes talking to the partner about chess, his son's baseball team, and if the 'skins would have to change their name. That doesn't include random digressions into things tangentially related to my resume. I think the only question I asked at the end was about how closely that office worked with NY in my preferred practice area (which was a stupid question to ask in a selective secondary market). Offer.

[Anonymous User]

If we get an offer via voicemail, what's the etiquette for responding? As in, should I call them and let them know I received the voicemail and will get back to them soon, OR should my next phone call be to accept/decline the offer?