Thank you emails after biglaw callback Forum

[ymmv]

Except "gratuity" is their livelihood.

egregious anti-LeSean McCoy trolling

they are guaranteed minimum wage from their employer even if tips dont cover it

1. Employers frequently don't do this.
2. IDK where you are from, but minimum wage is not a viable "livelihood" in this neck of the woods. And certainly not commensurate with the level of awful that is food service employment.

[First Offense]

Except "gratuity" is their livelihood. It's not weird to pay someone to do their job.

That's not what First Offense is saying. He's saying that it would generally be weird to constantly pay more than you are asked to pay for something (i.e. tipping). But our society says that this is normal and expected, thus if you don't do it then you look bad.

But I disagree with his premise that thank you notes for interviewers is the societal expectation (comparing it to tipping). I could be wrong, but I really don't see it.

The connection is thin admittedly. I said earlier I'm not a huge fan of thank you notes - just being argumentative I guess.

[Anonymous User]

I hate thank you notes. They always hit my inbox/mail tray right when I'm focused on getting something important done. FWIW, I always complete my evaluations immediately after interviews, so the thank you notes do nothing.

[XxSpyKEx]

OP here. What do you mean personal? No two people got exactly the same note, but I only wrote something very specific for one person (we had a common interest which we spoke about). For everyone else it was pretty generic, although I varied exactly what I said.

You want to include something specific in each one, so it doesn't appear to be a generic thank you note (e.g. common interest you discussed, something that you enjoyed (or at least you're pretending to have enjoyed) learning about the attorney's practice or the firm, etc.). A generic thank you note is kind of pointless. You'd be better off not sending anything.

This is why it's an inefficient use of time. Canned emails are awful, and taking the time to write a personal one for each interviewer would be an enormous investment of that time.

Yeah, I wouldn't do it for each interviewer. That's way overkill. Just sending one to one of the partners and asking them to extend your thanks to the others would be more than enough.

[Anonymous User]

I did a Thank You after every callback and went 8/8 on CB's...it will never ever make or break you, but I think it's the right thing to do. If you don't want to email everyone, email either your main recruiting contact or any attorney you really hit it off with and ask them to extend your thanks to the other interviewers.

Just to give the other side, I'm 7/9 without sending a single thank you.

Another voice for the opposition: 13/18 without a single thank-you. Although I did send thank-you's after offers were extended in response to those congratulations/nudge-to-come-here emails from the people I met with.

I can see sending personalized thank-you's after every CB if you only have a couple CBs, but if you have a lot it's frankly an exhausting use of time that could be better spent recovering or preparing for the next CB. As others have pointed out time and time again, they don't make a difference since your interviewers will have already filled out their evaluations by the time they get the thank-you's anyway.

8/8 guy here....well played, gentlemen. Touche.

6/6, and i sent personalized thank you's to everyone. granted, i'm bottom 35% k-jd, not urm, not ip, and have one other detractor, so i got those notes out within 12 hours of each cb.

[Anonymous User]

Short answer: yes, send

Long answer: every callback I've had included associates at lunch reminding me that short, well drafted, personal thank you notes matter. They have to stay an extra 30 minutes after work because they spent time with you; the least you could do is acknowledge their efforts

Personally, I'm in the YES camp. It always made me feel a little better to send them, even if I knew they were likely ignored. But I have to call BS on the idea that this was discussed at every callback, let alone the associates bringing it up every time. Just not plausible at all.

at the time, all. now, all but one.

[Anonymous User]

Short answer: yes, send

Long answer: every callback I've had included associates at lunch reminding me that short, well drafted, personal thank you notes matter. They have to stay an extra 30 minutes after work because they spent time with you; the least you could do is acknowledge their efforts

Personally, I'm in the YES camp. It always made me feel a little better to send them, even if I knew they were likely ignored. But I have to call BS on the idea that this was discussed at every callback, let alone the associates bringing it up every time. Just not plausible at all.

at the time, all. now, all but one.

Did thank you notes for callbacks if I didn't have any back-to-back in the same day or two days straight. All my offers (1 V10, 3 V30-V60, 1 non-V) came from firms I didn't send a thank you note to, including the firm I am accepting at. For the most part, I got the impression that many of then submitted evals before I could even send thank you notes. That being said, if I had time between callbacks and if they weren't back-to-back days, I would have written them anyways.