JD/MBA bonus/advance standing Forum

[Anonymous User]

STB proactively offered my friend a class year bump + bonus without a concurrent jd/mba (she had her mba first). dpw does not offer a class year bump and, ime, doesn't always offer the bonus.

This year? Was told otherwise

[Anonymous User]

Skadden, Kirkland, STB, DPW, Latham

Not surprising when looking at that particular group of firms.

Do these firms give advanced standings or bonuses or both?

[Anonymous User]

DPW is 15k. Also, just to be clear it's only for JD/MBAs, not for MBAs who later went to law school and are starting at DPW.

Seems weird to me (not that I have any idea — no reason to think this is wrong). Any idea why they do it that way?

Agree that this seems weird.

Not weird at all. If you did MBA then went to law school, that means you're more or less on the legal careerpath; you have chosen to forego all the recruiting opportunities at business school. So no real concern that you might pursue different careerpath like JD/MBAs -> no need to offer bonus.

Or you got your MBA from a mediocre school (or why wouldn't you have just done a JD-MBA in the first place?) and if this is the case, no real discernible benefits to you having your MBA -> no real incentive to offer a bonus.

[Anonymous User]

Cleary offers 15K + class promotion for concurrent JD/MBAs. Only offered 15K to me. I have an MBA before the JD.

[Anonymous User]

What about JD -> MBA? I've seen some partners who have that (I have NO idea how they did an MBA while working as an associate). Do they get class bump/bonus etc? Paid for by firm? Did it help them make partner?

[The Lsat Airbender]

What about JD -> MBA? I've seen some partners who have that (I have NO idea how they did an MBA while working as an associate). Do they get class bump/bonus etc? Paid for by firm? Did it help them make partner?

Class bump/bonus: no. The purpose of an MBA bonus, at firms that do it, is to recruit JD/MBAs from top programs who presumably have access to offers from banks or MBB to compete with. Class-year bump makes no sense.

Paid for by firm: maybe your firm still does this but it sounds like more of a 20th-century thing for employers to do. Nowadays, your associate doing a part-time MBA:

1) limits their ability to bill and

2) makes them a flight risk

so why encourage that, let alone to the tune of $150k or whatever tuition is? Bear in mind that tuition used to be way cheaper, relative to salaries, so MBA night school was something a corporate lawyer could realistically cashflow.

Help them make partner: probably, on the margins, but it wouldn't save someone who isn't a serious contender to begin with.