Getting Juniors to be responsive Forum

[nixy]

Just when you think the troll has run out of material, he continues to delight and amaze.

[Anonymous User]

The analogy is to schools. Some (i.e., public schools) spend an enormous amount of effort (usually futilely) getting the D- students to a C- level, while others (i.e., private schools) spend an enormous amount of effort (usually successfully) getting the A students to expand their horizons and become the leaders of tomorrow. Which group do you want to be part of?

Came back to this dumpster fire of a thread and this is the first thing I see. Amazing.

Public HS, UG, LS guy here told by many he is on the partner track and will be a leader of tomorrow just leaning back and LOLing right now. A preliminary thank is in order to all my mentors that were nothing like this douchebag. Juniors - don't work for this clown.

First thing, the school analogy is crap cuz redline fetishist is now admitting that even the leaders of tomorrow need training. Can't hand a 5 y/o a redline.

Second thing, redline fetishist fails to understand that the legal industry has shifted from "let's have hundreds of 1st years do diligence and let the competent survive" to "even perma-associates are profitable let's keep them forever as NEPs." Good luck being yesterday's leader.

There's so much more to respond to, like how redline fetishist sometimes acts as if he has the business in mind and other times talks about monopolizing the "good ones" (prolly private school future leaders to the max) which obviously leaves his esteemed world leader colleagues at K&E with the untrainables to staff their matters. Bummer for the bottom line. It's just so much fun watching this dude's ego struggle to defend itself.

Congratulations on the reading comprehension.

The point is that spending a lot of time trying to get people who are bad at something to become slightly less bad is not a good use of resources. If you enjoy it, go ahead, but those are the people who aren't going to last in the firm anyway. Better to focus on working with the juniors who actually care and are good at the job.

[Anonymous User]

The point is that spending a lot of time trying to get people who are bad at something to become slightly less bad is not a good use of resources. If you enjoy it, go ahead, but those are the people who aren't going to last in the firm anyway. Better to focus on working with the juniors who actually care and are good at the job.

Which has literally been disproven by every person ITT who does what you openly admit you won't do. Who knows better?

Is it easier to work with only the people who just get it? Hell yeah. But that's not good for the business, and it won't work for everyone by your own admission since only a handful get it. You're just a selfish prick who wants to take the easy way out, not unlike the lazy juniors you despise so much.

[MarcusH]

The analogy is to schools. Some (i.e., public schools) spend an enormous amount of effort (usually futilely) getting the D- students to a C- level, while others (i.e., private schools) spend an enormous amount of effort (usually successfully) getting the A students to expand their horizons and become the leaders of tomorrow. Which group do you want to be part of?

Came back to this dumpster fire of a thread and this is the first thing I see. Amazing.

Public HS, UG, LS guy here told by many he is on the partner track and will be a leader of tomorrow just leaning back and LOLing right now. A preliminary thank is in order to all my mentors that were nothing like this douchebag. Juniors - don't work for this clown.

First thing, the school analogy is crap cuz redline fetishist is now admitting that even the leaders of tomorrow need training. Can't hand a 5 y/o a redline.

Second thing, redline fetishist fails to understand that the legal industry has shifted from "let's have hundreds of 1st years do diligence and let the competent survive" to "even perma-associates are profitable let's keep them forever as NEPs." Good luck being yesterday's leader.

There's so much more to respond to, like how redline fetishist sometimes acts as if he has the business in mind and other times talks about monopolizing the "good ones" (prolly private school future leaders to the max) which obviously leaves his esteemed world leader colleagues at K&E with the untrainables to staff their matters. Bummer for the bottom line. It's just so much fun watching this dude's ego struggle to defend itself.

Congratulations on the reading comprehension.

The point is that spending a lot of time trying to get people who are bad at something to become slightly less bad is not a good use of resources. If you enjoy it, go ahead, but those are the people who aren't going to last in the firm anyway. Better to focus on working with the juniors who actually care and are good at the job.

Screw all of you who get to judge... as someone else who has been promised the "brass" ring and "leader of tomorrow" title (lol - who cares). I will take whatever I can get right now, and I don't care if they're good or bad. This isn't brain surgery, any masochist can do this job.

[tlsguy2020]

When I was in first grade, my class had a tradition where each day a new student got to walk the attendance sheet up to the front office. One day, my teacher asked me to walk the sheet up to the office. She didn’t know, however, that it wasn’t my day to walk the sheet up. It was actually Jesse’s day. I really wanted to take Jesse’s spot. If I did, I could impress Kaylee and maybe she’d kiss me behind the jungle gym at recess. But, in my heart, I knew the right thing. It was Jesse’s time to shine and I told the teacher as much. Because of my honesty, I received an award for being—I shit you not—a “Leader of Tomorrow.” I ran with this and now send passive aggressive redlines in the middle of the night and scream at juniors for not apologizing enough. Maybe Kaylee will kiss me now?

[Anonymous User]

Go ask the toxic STB equity partners how much they care about associate development.

Since you raised it, not all the equity partners at STB are toxic. There are some who actively see mentoring as part of their roles, will sit with you at 10 or 11pm and explain why they've made some changes and not others to a document, or talk in general terms about how to keep clients happy. Some years ago there were stories of people who were held back a year for partnership expressly because they were considered to be a'holes to their juniors, and so had to clean up their act before being given the ring.

Is this everyone at STB? No, absolutely not. But some of the partners who have been bigger rainmakers do seem to take this stuff seriously. I can attest that as a senior associate, there have been things I've been told as part of feedback (at STB and at another firm) that are focused on being a more effective manager as much as they are on being a more effective lawyer.

(Anon for obvious reasons.)

[Anonymous User]

Go ask the toxic STB equity partners how much they care about associate development.

Since you raised it, not all the equity partners at STB are toxic. There are some who actively see mentoring as part of their roles, will sit with you at 10 or 11pm and explain why they've made some changes and not others to a document, or talk in general terms about how to keep clients happy. Some years ago there were stories of people who were held back a year for partnership expressly because they were considered to be a'holes to their juniors, and so had to clean up their act before being given the ring.

Is this everyone at STB? No, absolutely not. But some of the partners who have been bigger rainmakers do seem to take this stuff seriously. I can attest that as a senior associate, there have been things I've been told as part of feedback (at STB and at another firm) that are focused on being a more effective manager as much as they are on being a more effective lawyer.

(Anon for obvious reasons.)

Please offer some examples. Senior associate at STB. These people are sick in the head and are not your friend. Clearly your a lateral, did you ever wonder where all your classmates went who were hired straight from LS??? Even the weird flex in your email is toxic. Who the fuck wants to flip pages at 10 or 11 pm?????? Classic STB disconnected from reality.

[Anonymous User]

Go ask the toxic STB equity partners how much they care about associate development.

Since you raised it, not all the equity partners at STB are toxic. There are some who actively see mentoring as part of their roles, will sit with you at 10 or 11pm and explain why they've made some changes and not others to a document, or talk in general terms about how to keep clients happy. Some years ago there were stories of people who were held back a year for partnership expressly because they were considered to be a'holes to their juniors, and so had to clean up their act before being given the ring.

Is this everyone at STB? No, absolutely not. But some of the partners who have been bigger rainmakers do seem to take this stuff seriously. I can attest that as a senior associate, there have been things I've been told as part of feedback (at STB and at another firm) that are focused on being a more effective manager as much as they are on being a more effective lawyer.

(Anon for obvious reasons.)

Please offer some examples. Senior associate at STB. These people are sick in the head and are not your friend. Clearly your a lateral, did you ever wonder where all your classmates went who were hired straight from LS??? Even the weird flex in your email post is toxic. Who the fuck wants to flip pages at 10 or 11 pm?????? Classic STB disconnected from reality.

That was terrifying, to be honest. What the fuck.

[Anonymous User]

That was terrifying, to be honest. What the fuck.

I think we’re witnessing redline psycho and others like this STB weirdo have an actual meltdown as everything they thought they knew about the world is slowly turning upside down. It’s okay friends, take the blue pill and maybe you can be the one that saves the faceless masses of associates at your firm from the robotic redline-obsessed overlords.

All you have to do is *gasp* send some constructive feedback in an email and close it out with “happy to chat if you would find it helpful.” I know right? Revolutionary.

[Anonymous User]

If nothing else, self interest should make you want to develop associates. There's only so far you can go based on good work and a ton of hours. Eventually partners will look to your contributions to the firm as a whole. Unless you're a rainmaker, your ability to manage and develop associates is important.

lol that equity partners actually care about "mentoring associates". Literally all the equity partners care about is making as much $$$$ as possible and squeezing every possible miserable hour out of associates, 95% of whom are going to quit. Your "contributions to the firm as a whole" are all about the bottom line, not joke time spent "training" associates. Did you ever work at a real biglaw firm in your life? Go ask the toxic STB equity partners how much they care about associate development.

I'm a sr associate at a slightly smaller firm than STB, and the partnership is a lot closer to "lockstep" than eat what you kill so maybe it's a lot different at a place like STB, but IME the partners care a loooot about associate development/recruitment. If our group gets the good associates and trains them well, it makes the partners lives a lot easier. Why wouldn't they care?

You would think this makes logical sense (and I personally think it does, because turnover is costly) but I came from a firm (also closer to "lockstep" than eat what you kill) where there was zero mentorship by the equity partners in my practice group. They just didn't give a rat's ass about the associates beyond working them to the bone and it showed - morale was poor and associate turnover was high. It literally felt like a revolving door with people coming and going all the time. I tried raising this issue during my exit interview with HR and all she said was "oh you know what the partners are like, can't force them to do something they don't want to do". Ok sure Jan.

Am now in house at a regulator and the difference is night and day. My boss is great (bent over backwards to help me with some personal issues, which I'm really grateful for) and the team is very big on teaching and mentoring. I do feel that the leadership sincerely believes in investing in people, and it shows in the longevity of the counsels.

Lol I’m at fucking Kirkland of all places, and the share partners in my office have an attitude way more similar to the person you’re responding to than the partners at your previous firm. Several of them have been willing and eager to help me (a junior), and seem to really press the NSPs and midlevels to train us and give us good feedback.

Maybe it’s because many deals here run lean and they want juniors to very quickly upgrade to midlevel work, which requires mastering junior work fast and becoming good enough to be self-sufficient on certain work streams. But whatever the motivation, I’ve had (and been lucky to have, according to this thread) multiple midlevels, NSPs, and even SPs give me thoughtful and consistent feedback/guidance to improve with. Whenever I tell someone I’ve never done X task before, they usually either write a very long and detailed email about it (often with a pre-written PDF guide elaborating further) or schedule a 30 minute call to walk my through it, or both.

And you know what? It works. After quality initial instruction and several rounds of feedback, by the next deal I’m already performing that task at a high level, and by the following deal I feel comfortable taking ownership of that whole work stream with basically no oversight. The people above me (including SPs) are getting a great return on investment from training me, with the added side effect of my morale staying high and me feeling more loyal to these people in the future.

[Anonymous User]

All I hear from your posts is that you're trying to pass responsibility for training off on others at the firm, which is remarkably similar to the lazy junior behaviors you seem so concerned with.

I'll say it for the last time, I find that putting in an hour of time mentoring saves me many more hours on the back end when I get higher quality work product from a motivated junior.

Ok, I will ask again what I should have done differently to be a "real manager" in addition to sending the redline and telling her to look at it, following up with additional phone calls and emails about the lingering issues and telling her to look at other filings in the case, and telling her to go back and fix it?

I mean, ideally I want to teach juniors how to figure out the answer for themselves, which is most efficient for all involved. And when the question is "how do I format this motion or brief" the easiest way to get answer for me is always to just look at a previous filing from the case, if one exists (and look at previous filings in that court with that partner if not). I don't know what else to tell someone to do other than that. What else should I be telling her?

- 6th year lit. (I'm not the other person you are replying to who said the system allows attrition FYI)

I'm the corporate redline guy. Why should I spend my time training incompetents in an industry with a 95% attrition rate? No one trained me, I just worked hard and figured it out myself. If you can't cut it as a junior, do something else with your life. For me to spend my time training a non-great junior, there would need to be something in it for me, like I would actively need to like the junior and want to hang out with them, or be convinced that they are rich and a good person to have in my network. Otherwise, its sink or swim.

$20 says this guy went to Columbia or Chicago. There are plenty of nice people at those schools. but when I’ve met cunty cynical people like this, that’s often where they came from.

[Anonymous User]

Why should I spend my valuable time training third rate juniors when the people running the firm treat everyone else like trash? The juniors are welcome to review the redlines on their own. This isn't some warm happy family - biglaw is all about the benjamins, and you should do whatever maximizes your benjamins, not whatever makes juniors feel warm and fuzzy inside.

"My valuable time" get over yourself bro (I assume this is redline psycho back for another ass whooping). I wish I could take myself half as seriously as you do yourself. K&E must be the home of fragile egos and small...

Literally everybody in this thread has answered your question like 10x. You just refuse to see it peaking out from behind the view of the shit stains from your own asshole.

Is redline psycho at K&E? I got the impression that he was pointing to both STB and K&E as examples of places that are “even more intense” than his firm, and using them as an example to drive home his point.

Which (as someone who is actually at K&E) is silly. Also, to redline psycho: I have criticized your weird “senior” bullshit ITT and also worked with Andy Calder; no nervous breakdowns here bro. Trying use him as a sort of weird bogeyman to scare juniors into dealing with your nonsense reveals how fucking dumb and asocial you are. It also proves to me that you’re projecting all sorts of super weird stuff onto SPs that isn’t accurate (because you named someone I’ve personally worked with) and then using it to justify your own bad behavior. Psycho stuff my friend.

[Prudent_Jurist]

But don’t we all have a little redline psycho in each of us?

[Anonymous User]

Why should I spend my valuable time training third rate juniors when the people running the firm treat everyone else like trash? The juniors are welcome to review the redlines on their own. This isn't some warm happy family - biglaw is all about the benjamins, and you should do whatever maximizes your benjamins, not whatever makes juniors feel warm and fuzzy inside.

"My valuable time" get over yourself bro (I assume this is redline psycho back for another ass whooping). I wish I could take myself half as seriously as you do yourself. K&E must be the home of fragile egos and small...

Literally everybody in this thread has answered your question like 10x. You just refuse to see it peaking out from behind the view of the shit stains from your own asshole.

Is redline psycho at K&E? I got the impression that he was pointing to both STB and K&E as examples of places that are “even more intense” than his firm, and using them as an example to drive home his point.

Which (as someone who is actually at K&E) is silly. Also, to redline psycho: I have criticized your weird “senior” bullshit ITT and also worked with Andy Calder; no nervous breakdowns here bro. Trying use him as a sort of weird bogeyman to scare juniors into dealing with your nonsense reveals how fucking dumb and asocial you are. It also proves to me that you’re projecting all sorts of super weird stuff onto SPs that isn’t accurate (because you named someone I’ve personally worked with) and then using it to justify your own bad behavior. Psycho stuff my friend.

Oh boy, the K&E recruiting team has made their obligatory appearance. We talking about the same Andy Calder? The Andy Calder of this "sign up for bankruptcy work or get fired" email blast? https://abovethelaw.com/2020/05/partner ... ne-at-all/ - "the math is not going to work out well for you at the end of the year" "That doesn't mean you have an annuity here" "This isn't a gravy train where you can just chill and be along for the ride".

I mean, I have a lot of complaints about horror show partners at STB/DPW/CSM, but this one takes the cake. A pathetic, disgraceful email like that would mean the end of your career at STB/DPW/CSM. At Kirkland? A promotion.

This isn't to excuse the partners at these other top firms - see prior threads on this board for lurid details, like locking M&A associates in a conference room for 75+ hours a week, or running groups with 90% annual attrition rates, and basically every associate on some type of anti-anxiety/anti-depressant medication, and still undergoing insomnia and nervous breakdowns.

So imagine dealing with all that as a senior, dealing with partners divorced three times who never see their kids, partners bitter about devoting their life to work and having no spouse or kids, partners on who knows what medications/stimulants, partners who are self selected to have incredibly difficult and nitpicky personalities, and who are eager to turn you into a workaholic with no hobbies and no life. So imagine dealing with all of that, on a daily basis, and then having juniors who get a very simple term sheet with instructions to incorporate into a precedent document, who then put the interest rate at 14% rather than 5%, who fail to change the party names, who fail to include key terms from the term sheet, who make utterly asinine edits rather than reaching out with questions, and who generally do a terrible half-hearted job. You then stay up all night fixing the horror show, and send them a redline against their version with instructions to review. Even a five year old would notice the red markings all over, examine the changes, compare to the term sheet, and realize that they failed the task spectacularly. Obviously and apology is in order. Obviously the need for desperate improvement ASAP is clear. But now imagine...crickets...no apology...no promise to do better next time...no apparent realization that their work is hilariously sub-par. Just really clear the associate is there to cruise for a couple of years, pay back some loans and do the bare minimum work. No interest in the job, the firm, the clients, the work, how to be a better lawyer, how to be a good team member, or basically anything. Just pure apathy and indifference.

And so a senior associate who is barely treading water as is should try to "train" and "mentor" these completely unmotivated juniors, who will be gone within 2 years anyway, instead of cutting them off from billables and finding juniors who actually care?

Alice in Wonderland indeed.

[Anonymous User]

Go ask the toxic STB equity partners how much they care about associate development.

Since you raised it, not all the equity partners at STB are toxic. There are some who actively see mentoring as part of their roles, will sit with you at 10 or 11pm and explain why they've made some changes and not others to a document, or talk in general terms about how to keep clients happy. Some years ago there were stories of people who were held back a year for partnership expressly because they were considered to be a'holes to their juniors, and so had to clean up their act before being given the ring.

Is this everyone at STB? No, absolutely not. But some of the partners who have been bigger rainmakers do seem to take this stuff seriously. I can attest that as a senior associate, there have been things I've been told as part of feedback (at STB and at another firm) that are focused on being a more effective manager as much as they are on being a more effective lawyer.

(Anon for obvious reasons.)

Please offer some examples. Senior associate at STB. These people are sick in the head and are not your friend. Clearly your a lateral, did you ever wonder where all your classmates went who were hired straight from LS??? Even the weird flex in your email post is toxic. Who the fuck wants to flip pages at 10 or 11 pm?????? Classic STB disconnected from reality.

That was terrifying, to be honest. What the fuck.

For redline psycho, this is the kind of culture that you create by not training your juniors. “You must not love the job if you don’t want to flip pages at 10pm.” Maybe work harder, put some work into your teams and you won’t have to flip at 10, you can flip at a normal time because your junior associate from public school with straight Cs from his T14 likes you and doesn’t want us all up at 2AM again. Sure some people don’t give a fuck.

But most come in with an open mind and literal socially disabled people like you are too afraid of getting your hands dirty! You are as good as your weakest link. If your juniors suck, your team suffers, why not try to make it less terrible for them?

[Anonymous User]

I don't even know what we're talking about in this thread anymore. I'm happy for you tho. Or sorry that happened.

[Anonymous User]

Why should I spend my valuable time training third rate juniors when the people running the firm treat everyone else like trash? The juniors are welcome to review the redlines on their own. This isn't some warm happy family - biglaw is all about the benjamins, and you should do whatever maximizes your benjamins, not whatever makes juniors feel warm and fuzzy inside.

"My valuable time" get over yourself bro (I assume this is redline psycho back for another ass whooping). I wish I could take myself half as seriously as you do yourself. K&E must be the home of fragile egos and small...

Literally everybody in this thread has answered your question like 10x. You just refuse to see it peaking out from behind the view of the shit stains from your own asshole.

Is redline psycho at K&E? I got the impression that he was pointing to both STB and K&E as examples of places that are “even more intense” than his firm, and using them as an example to drive home his point.

Which (as someone who is actually at K&E) is silly. Also, to redline psycho: I have criticized your weird “senior” bullshit ITT and also worked with Andy Calder; no nervous breakdowns here bro. Trying use him as a sort of weird bogeyman to scare juniors into dealing with your nonsense reveals how fucking dumb and asocial you are. It also proves to me that you’re projecting all sorts of super weird stuff onto SPs that isn’t accurate (because you named someone I’ve personally worked with) and then using it to justify your own bad behavior. Psycho stuff my friend.

Oh boy, the K&E recruiting team has made their obligatory appearance. We talking about the same Andy Calder? The Andy Calder of this "sign up for bankruptcy work or get fired" email blast? https://abovethelaw.com/2020/05/partner ... ne-at-all/ - "the math is not going to work out well for you at the end of the year" "That doesn't mean you have an annuity here" "This isn't a gravy train where you can just chill and be along for the ride".

I mean, I have a lot of complaints about horror show partners at STB/DPW/CSM, but this one takes the cake. A pathetic, disgraceful email like that would mean the end of your career at STB/DPW/CSM. At Kirkland? A promotion.

This isn't to excuse the partners at these other top firms - see prior threads on this board for lurid details, like locking M&A associates in a conference room for 75+ hours a week, or running groups with 90% annual attrition rates, and basically every associate on some type of anti-anxiety/anti-depressant medication, and still undergoing insomnia and nervous breakdowns.

So imagine dealing with all that as a senior, dealing with partners divorced three times who never see their kids, partners bitter about devoting their life to work and having no spouse or kids, partners on who knows what medications/stimulants, partners who are self selected to have incredibly difficult and nitpicky personalities, and who are eager to turn you into a workaholic with no hobbies and no life. So imagine dealing with all of that, on a daily basis, and then having juniors who get a very simple term sheet with instructions to incorporate into a precedent document, who then put the interest rate at 14% rather than 5%, who fail to change the party names, who fail to include key terms from the term sheet, who make utterly asinine edits rather than reaching out with questions, and who generally do a terrible half-hearted job. You then stay up all night fixing the horror show, and send them a redline against their version with instructions to review. Even a five year old would notice the red markings all over, examine the changes, compare to the term sheet, and realize that they failed the task spectacularly. Obviously and apology is in order. Obviously the need for desperate improvement ASAP is clear. But now imagine...crickets...no apology...no promise to do better next time...no apparent realization that their work is hilariously sub-par. Just really clear the associate is there to cruise for a couple of years, pay back some loans and do the bare minimum work. No interest in the job, the firm, the clients, the work, how to be a better lawyer, how to be a good team member, or basically anything. Just pure apathy and indifference.

And so a senior associate who is barely treading water as is should try to "train" and "mentor" these completely unmotivated juniors, who will be gone within 2 years anyway, instead of cutting them off from billables and finding juniors who actually care?

Alice in Wonderland indeed.

lol I forgot that implying something even vaguely positive about K&E is illegal here. All I said is that I’ve worked with Andy and not had a nervous breakdown like you said someone criticizing you would. You are using a firm you don’t work at, and a partner you’ve never worked with, to justify the way you treat juniors. Whatever other flaws K&E may have, I just came here to say that you can’t validly point to K&E or Calder with your bogeyman bullshit to say “my crazy work style and attitude are correct, just look at K&E and Calder - they’re even worse!!!!”

Nope. Neither of those things are worse than you. In fact, reading this thread makes me grateful that (for all their other imperfections) the seniors and partners I work with here at K&E are not as psycho as you. I hope you never lateral here.

[Anonymous User]

Why should I spend my valuable time training third rate juniors when the people running the firm treat everyone else like trash? The juniors are welcome to review the redlines on their own. This isn't some warm happy family - biglaw is all about the benjamins, and you should do whatever maximizes your benjamins, not whatever makes juniors feel warm and fuzzy inside.

"My valuable time" get over yourself bro (I assume this is redline psycho back for another ass whooping). I wish I could take myself half as seriously as you do yourself. K&E must be the home of fragile egos and small...

Literally everybody in this thread has answered your question like 10x. You just refuse to see it peaking out from behind the view of the shit stains from your own asshole.

Is redline psycho at K&E? I got the impression that he was pointing to both STB and K&E as examples of places that are “even more intense” than his firm, and using them as an example to drive home his point.

Which (as someone who is actually at K&E) is silly. Also, to redline psycho: I have criticized your weird “senior” bullshit ITT and also worked with Andy Calder; no nervous breakdowns here bro. Trying use him as a sort of weird bogeyman to scare juniors into dealing with your nonsense reveals how fucking dumb and asocial you are. It also proves to me that you’re projecting all sorts of super weird stuff onto SPs that isn’t accurate (because you named someone I’ve personally worked with) and then using it to justify your own bad behavior. Psycho stuff my friend.

Oh boy, the K&E recruiting team has made their obligatory appearance. We talking about the same Andy Calder? The Andy Calder of this "sign up for bankruptcy work or get fired" email blast? https://abovethelaw.com/2020/05/partner ... ne-at-all/ - "the math is not going to work out well for you at the end of the year" "That doesn't mean you have an annuity here" "This isn't a gravy train where you can just chill and be along for the ride".

I mean, I have a lot of complaints about horror show partners at STB/DPW/CSM, but this one takes the cake. A pathetic, disgraceful email like that would mean the end of your career at STB/DPW/CSM. At Kirkland? A promotion.

This isn't to excuse the partners at these other top firms - see prior threads on this board for lurid details, like locking M&A associates in a conference room for 75+ hours a week, or running groups with 90% annual attrition rates, and basically every associate on some type of anti-anxiety/anti-depressant medication, and still undergoing insomnia and nervous breakdowns.

So imagine dealing with all that as a senior, dealing with partners divorced three times who never see their kids, partners bitter about devoting their life to work and having no spouse or kids, partners on who knows what medications/stimulants, partners who are self selected to have incredibly difficult and nitpicky personalities, and who are eager to turn you into a workaholic with no hobbies and no life. So imagine dealing with all of that, on a daily basis, and then having juniors who get a very simple term sheet with instructions to incorporate into a precedent document, who then put the interest rate at 14% rather than 5%, who fail to change the party names, who fail to include key terms from the term sheet, who make utterly asinine edits rather than reaching out with questions, and who generally do a terrible half-hearted job. You then stay up all night fixing the horror show, and send them a redline against their version with instructions to review. Even a five year old would notice the red markings all over, examine the changes, compare to the term sheet, and realize that they failed the task spectacularly. Obviously and apology is in order. Obviously the need for desperate improvement ASAP is clear. But now imagine...crickets...no apology...no promise to do better next time...no apparent realization that their work is hilariously sub-par. Just really clear the associate is there to cruise for a couple of years, pay back some loans and do the bare minimum work. No interest in the job, the firm, the clients, the work, how to be a better lawyer, how to be a good team member, or basically anything. Just pure apathy and indifference.

And so a senior associate who is barely treading water as is should try to "train" and "mentor" these completely unmotivated juniors, who will be gone within 2 years anyway, instead of cutting them off from billables and finding juniors who actually care?

Alice in Wonderland indeed.

lol I forgot that implying something even vaguely positive about K&E is illegal here. All I said is that I’ve worked with Andy and not had a nervous breakdown like you said someone criticizing you would. You are using a firm you don’t work at, and a partner you’ve never worked with, to justify the way you treat juniors. Whatever other flaws K&E may have, I just came here to say that you can’t validly point to K&E or Calder with your bogeyman bullshit to say “my crazy work style and attitude are correct, just look at K&E and Calder - they’re even worse!!!!”

Nope. Neither of those things are worse than you. In fact, reading this thread makes me grateful that (for all their other imperfections) the seniors and partners I work with here at K&E are not as psycho as you. I hope you never lateral here.

Always amazing how you can tell a KE bro from a mile away. Something in the water?

We provided you with very specific direct, and absolutely horrible, quotes from your buddy Andy. A more horrific email could scantly be imagined.

And maybe I'm a bit confused about the way I "treat" juniors. I send them redlines and ask them to review. I give them a couple of chances to improve, and if they don't then I find someone else to work with. I don't berate them, I don't yell at them, I don't call them into my office and tell them they are on the road to getting fired, I don't reduce them to tears, or anything horrible of that sort. Can your buddy Andy Calder say the same? The same guy threatening to fire people for not doing bankruptcy work? As an aside, no one "trained" or "mentored" me, I would just run redlines on my own (gasp!), note what changes were made, and improve my future work product accordingly.

But hey, I get it, Kirkland has absolute bottom of the barrel recruiting standards, and anyone with a pulse is welcome at this point (and for laterals throw in huge signing bonuses to boot). You are going to have a very weak pool of junior associates, and perhaps you do need extensive training to get them to any kind of adequate standard (though given the recent work product I have received from Kirkland, it isn't working). That also explains why working at Kirkland is such a poor choice if you want to get promoted to SP, and why you constantly need to poach partners from other firms to get decent SPs. It's just good business sense, Kirkland knows how much fundamentally better people trained at other firms are relative to the homegrown folk.

But hey, good luck lasting on the gravy train for as long as you can.

[Anonymous User]

We provided you with very specific direct, and absolutely horrible, quotes from your buddy Andy. A more horrific email could scantly be imagined.

The email was bad but lol. I love going against OC who write briefs like this. We have probably been across from each other if you're in lit.

[Artaserse]

This is a complete train smash of a thread. It just keeps getting worse & worse.

[Anonymous User]

Why should I spend my valuable time training third rate juniors when the people running the firm treat everyone else like trash? The juniors are welcome to review the redlines on their own. This isn't some warm happy family - biglaw is all about the benjamins, and you should do whatever maximizes your benjamins, not whatever makes juniors feel warm and fuzzy inside.

"My valuable time" get over yourself bro (I assume this is redline psycho back for another ass whooping). I wish I could take myself half as seriously as you do yourself. K&E must be the home of fragile egos and small...

Literally everybody in this thread has answered your question like 10x. You just refuse to see it peaking out from behind the view of the shit stains from your own asshole.

Is redline psycho at K&E? I got the impression that he was pointing to both STB and K&E as examples of places that are “even more intense” than his firm, and using them as an example to drive home his point.

Which (as someone who is actually at K&E) is silly. Also, to redline psycho: I have criticized your weird “senior” bullshit ITT and also worked with Andy Calder; no nervous breakdowns here bro. Trying use him as a sort of weird bogeyman to scare juniors into dealing with your nonsense reveals how fucking dumb and asocial you are. It also proves to me that you’re projecting all sorts of super weird stuff onto SPs that isn’t accurate (because you named someone I’ve personally worked with) and then using it to justify your own bad behavior. Psycho stuff my friend.

Oh boy, the K&E recruiting team has made their obligatory appearance. We talking about the same Andy Calder? The Andy Calder of this "sign up for bankruptcy work or get fired" email blast? https://abovethelaw.com/2020/05/partner ... ne-at-all/ - "the math is not going to work out well for you at the end of the year" "That doesn't mean you have an annuity here" "This isn't a gravy train where you can just chill and be along for the ride".

I mean, I have a lot of complaints about horror show partners at STB/DPW/CSM, but this one takes the cake. A pathetic, disgraceful email like that would mean the end of your career at STB/DPW/CSM. At Kirkland? A promotion.

This isn't to excuse the partners at these other top firms - see prior threads on this board for lurid details, like locking M&A associates in a conference room for 75+ hours a week, or running groups with 90% annual attrition rates, and basically every associate on some type of anti-anxiety/anti-depressant medication, and still undergoing insomnia and nervous breakdowns.

So imagine dealing with all that as a senior, dealing with partners divorced three times who never see their kids, partners bitter about devoting their life to work and having no spouse or kids, partners on who knows what medications/stimulants, partners who are self selected to have incredibly difficult and nitpicky personalities, and who are eager to turn you into a workaholic with no hobbies and no life. So imagine dealing with all of that, on a daily basis, and then having juniors who get a very simple term sheet with instructions to incorporate into a precedent document, who then put the interest rate at 14% rather than 5%, who fail to change the party names, who fail to include key terms from the term sheet, who make utterly asinine edits rather than reaching out with questions, and who generally do a terrible half-hearted job. You then stay up all night fixing the horror show, and send them a redline against their version with instructions to review. Even a five year old would notice the red markings all over, examine the changes, compare to the term sheet, and realize that they failed the task spectacularly. Obviously and apology is in order. Obviously the need for desperate improvement ASAP is clear. But now imagine...crickets...no apology...no promise to do better next time...no apparent realization that their work is hilariously sub-par. Just really clear the associate is there to cruise for a couple of years, pay back some loans and do the bare minimum work. No interest in the job, the firm, the clients, the work, how to be a better lawyer, how to be a good team member, or basically anything. Just pure apathy and indifference.

And so a senior associate who is barely treading water as is should try to "train" and "mentor" these completely unmotivated juniors, who will be gone within 2 years anyway, instead of cutting them off from billables and finding juniors who actually care?

Alice in Wonderland indeed.

lol I forgot that implying something even vaguely positive about K&E is illegal here. All I said is that I’ve worked with Andy and not had a nervous breakdown like you said someone criticizing you would. You are using a firm you don’t work at, and a partner you’ve never worked with, to justify the way you treat juniors. Whatever other flaws K&E may have, I just came here to say that you can’t validly point to K&E or Calder with your bogeyman bullshit to say “my crazy work style and attitude are correct, just look at K&E and Calder - they’re even worse!!!!”

Nope. Neither of those things are worse than you. In fact, reading this thread makes me grateful that (for all their other imperfections) the seniors and partners I work with here at K&E are not as psycho as you. I hope you never lateral here.

Always amazing how you can tell a KE bro from a mile away. Something in the water?

We provided you with very specific direct, and absolutely horrible, quotes from your buddy Andy. A more horrific email could scantly be imagined.

And maybe I'm a bit confused about the way I "treat" juniors. I send them redlines and ask them to review. I give them a couple of chances to improve, and if they don't then I find someone else to work with. I don't berate them, I don't yell at them, I don't call them into my office and tell them they are on the road to getting fired, I don't reduce them to tears, or anything horrible of that sort. Can your buddy Andy Calder say the same? The same guy threatening to fire people for not doing bankruptcy work? As an aside, no one "trained" or "mentored" me, I would just run redlines on my own (gasp!), note what changes were made, and improve my future work product accordingly.

But hey, I get it, Kirkland has absolute bottom of the barrel recruiting standards, and anyone with a pulse is welcome at this point (and for laterals throw in huge signing bonuses to boot). You are going to have a very weak pool of junior associates, and perhaps you do need extensive training to get them to any kind of adequate standard (though given the recent work product I have received from Kirkland, it isn't working). That also explains why working at Kirkland is such a poor choice if you want to get promoted to SP, and why you constantly need to poach partners from other firms to get decent SPs. It's just good business sense, Kirkland knows how much fundamentally better people trained at other firms are relative to the homegrown folk.

But hey, good luck lasting on the gravy train for as long as you can.

Absolutely hilarious to see associates from firms where any median student at Columbia can get into shit on each other's selectivity and quality of junior associates loll

[Anonymous User]

Why should I spend my valuable time training third rate juniors when the people running the firm treat everyone else like trash? The juniors are welcome to review the redlines on their own. This isn't some warm happy family - biglaw is all about the benjamins, and you should do whatever maximizes your benjamins, not whatever makes juniors feel warm and fuzzy inside.

"My valuable time" get over yourself bro (I assume this is redline psycho back for another ass whooping). I wish I could take myself half as seriously as you do yourself. K&E must be the home of fragile egos and small...

Literally everybody in this thread has answered your question like 10x. You just refuse to see it peaking out from behind the view of the shit stains from your own asshole.

Is redline psycho at K&E? I got the impression that he was pointing to both STB and K&E as examples of places that are “even more intense” than his firm, and using them as an example to drive home his point.

Which (as someone who is actually at K&E) is silly. Also, to redline psycho: I have criticized your weird “senior” bullshit ITT and also worked with Andy Calder; no nervous breakdowns here bro. Trying use him as a sort of weird bogeyman to scare juniors into dealing with your nonsense reveals how fucking dumb and asocial you are. It also proves to me that you’re projecting all sorts of super weird stuff onto SPs that isn’t accurate (because you named someone I’ve personally worked with) and then using it to justify your own bad behavior. Psycho stuff my friend.

Oh boy, the K&E recruiting team has made their obligatory appearance. We talking about the same Andy Calder? The Andy Calder of this "sign up for bankruptcy work or get fired" email blast? https://abovethelaw.com/2020/05/partner ... ne-at-all/ - "the math is not going to work out well for you at the end of the year" "That doesn't mean you have an annuity here" "This isn't a gravy train where you can just chill and be along for the ride".

I mean, I have a lot of complaints about horror show partners at STB/DPW/CSM, but this one takes the cake. A pathetic, disgraceful email like that would mean the end of your career at STB/DPW/CSM. At Kirkland? A promotion.

This isn't to excuse the partners at these other top firms - see prior threads on this board for lurid details, like locking M&A associates in a conference room for 75+ hours a week, or running groups with 90% annual attrition rates, and basically every associate on some type of anti-anxiety/anti-depressant medication, and still undergoing insomnia and nervous breakdowns.

So imagine dealing with all that as a senior, dealing with partners divorced three times who never see their kids, partners bitter about devoting their life to work and having no spouse or kids, partners on who knows what medications/stimulants, partners who are self selected to have incredibly difficult and nitpicky personalities, and who are eager to turn you into a workaholic with no hobbies and no life. So imagine dealing with all of that, on a daily basis, and then having juniors who get a very simple term sheet with instructions to incorporate into a precedent document, who then put the interest rate at 14% rather than 5%, who fail to change the party names, who fail to include key terms from the term sheet, who make utterly asinine edits rather than reaching out with questions, and who generally do a terrible half-hearted job. You then stay up all night fixing the horror show, and send them a redline against their version with instructions to review. Even a five year old would notice the red markings all over, examine the changes, compare to the term sheet, and realize that they failed the task spectacularly. Obviously and apology is in order. Obviously the need for desperate improvement ASAP is clear. But now imagine...crickets...no apology...no promise to do better next time...no apparent realization that their work is hilariously sub-par. Just really clear the associate is there to cruise for a couple of years, pay back some loans and do the bare minimum work. No interest in the job, the firm, the clients, the work, how to be a better lawyer, how to be a good team member, or basically anything. Just pure apathy and indifference.

And so a senior associate who is barely treading water as is should try to "train" and "mentor" these completely unmotivated juniors, who will be gone within 2 years anyway, instead of cutting them off from billables and finding juniors who actually care?

Alice in Wonderland indeed.

lol I forgot that implying something even vaguely positive about K&E is illegal here. All I said is that I’ve worked with Andy and not had a nervous breakdown like you said someone criticizing you would. You are using a firm you don’t work at, and a partner you’ve never worked with, to justify the way you treat juniors. Whatever other flaws K&E may have, I just came here to say that you can’t validly point to K&E or Calder with your bogeyman bullshit to say “my crazy work style and attitude are correct, just look at K&E and Calder - they’re even worse!!!!”

Nope. Neither of those things are worse than you. In fact, reading this thread makes me grateful that (for all their other imperfections) the seniors and partners I work with here at K&E are not as psycho as you. I hope you never lateral here.

Always amazing how you can tell a KE bro from a mile away. Something in the water?

We provided you with very specific direct, and absolutely horrible, quotes from your buddy Andy. A more horrific email could scantly be imagined.

And maybe I'm a bit confused about the way I "treat" juniors. I send them redlines and ask them to review. I give them a couple of chances to improve, and if they don't then I find someone else to work with. I don't berate them, I don't yell at them, I don't call them into my office and tell them they are on the road to getting fired, I don't reduce them to tears, or anything horrible of that sort. Can your buddy Andy Calder say the same? The same guy threatening to fire people for not doing bankruptcy work? As an aside, no one "trained" or "mentored" me, I would just run redlines on my own (gasp!), note what changes were made, and improve my future work product accordingly.

But hey, I get it, Kirkland has absolute bottom of the barrel recruiting standards, and anyone with a pulse is welcome at this point (and for laterals throw in huge signing bonuses to boot). You are going to have a very weak pool of junior associates, and perhaps you do need extensive training to get them to any kind of adequate standard (though given the recent work product I have received from Kirkland, it isn't working). That also explains why working at Kirkland is such a poor choice if you want to get promoted to SP, and why you constantly need to poach partners from other firms to get decent SPs. It's just good business sense, Kirkland knows how much fundamentally better people trained at other firms are relative to the homegrown folk.

But hey, good luck lasting on the gravy train for as long as you can.

The two "but hey"s cannot get more cringy. Sounds like some pissed off failure gunner who is not smart enough to get a real prestigious job but finds solace and superiority in thinking that "my firm takes associates with 3.5 GPAs and your firm takes 3.4s".

[Anonymous User]

And so a senior associate who is barely treading water as is should try to "train" and "mentor" these completely unmotivated juniors, who will be gone within 2 years anyway, instead of cutting them off from billables and finding juniors who actually care?

Insanity is trying the same thing multiple times and expecting a different result. Anyway, I can hear Sarah McLachlan now. What a fucking sob story bro. Some other firm please adopt him and show him it doesn't have to be this way. Give him the training about training he deserves.

And maybe I'm a bit confused about the way I "treat" juniors. I send them redlines and ask them to review. I give them a couple of chances to improve, and if they don't then I find someone else to work with. I don't berate them, I don't yell at them, I don't call them into my office and tell them they are on the road to getting fired, I don't reduce them to tears, or anything horrible of that sort. Can your buddy Andy Calder say the same? The same guy threatening to fire people for not doing bankruptcy work? As an aside, no one "trained" or "mentored" me, I would just run redlines on my own (gasp!), note what changes were made, and improve my future work product accordingly.

I had a friend who told her (now ex) husband she wanted a divorce. His response was “why, it’s not like I beat you or anything?” I think you two would get along.

[Anonymous User]

As an aside, no one "trained" or "mentored" me, I would just run redlines on my own (gasp!), note what changes were made, and improve my future work product accordingly.

So you admit, then, that you received no training or management education? Shocker. Next you'll stun us by noting that you are a KJD or previously worked in "finance" or "consulting."

[Anonymous User]

And so a senior associate who is barely treading water as is should try to "train" and "mentor" these completely unmotivated juniors, who will be gone within 2 years anyway, instead of cutting them off from billables and finding juniors who actually care?

Insanity is trying the same thing multiple times and expecting a different result. Anyway, I can hear Sarah McLachlan now. What a fucking sob story bro. Some other firm please adopt him and show him it doesn't have to be this way. Give him the training about training he deserves.

And maybe I'm a bit confused about the way I "treat" juniors. I send them redlines and ask them to review. I give them a couple of chances to improve, and if they don't then I find someone else to work with. I don't berate them, I don't yell at them, I don't call them into my office and tell them they are on the road to getting fired, I don't reduce them to tears, or anything horrible of that sort. Can your buddy Andy Calder say the same? The same guy threatening to fire people for not doing bankruptcy work? As an aside, no one "trained" or "mentored" me, I would just run redlines on my own (gasp!), note what changes were made, and improve my future work product accordingly.

I had a friend who told her (now ex) husband she wanted a divorce. His response was “why, it’s not like I beat you or anything?” I think you two would get along.

And to extend the metaphor, the other husband doesn’t even beat his wife either lol.