NY firm culture question & Georgetown bid list Forum

[Anonymous User]

There doesn't seem to be a lot of info out there on what firm cultures are really like, but it seems like an important consideration (especially for more introverted people like me). I was wondering what NY firms have a culture that is not too aggressive and not too fratty, but more progressive and maybe more serious/reserved/geeky. Lots of IP departments seem to fit the bill for me, but I was wondering if there were some firms as a whole that have a similar culture. From what I've seen of their non-NYC offices, Orrick might be a good fit for me so far as culture goes, but I was wondering if there are others which more or less fit this bill.

Firms I'm looking at (top 25% at GULC, so feel free to comment on the appropriateness of this list from that perspective, too):

Freshfields
Milbank
Orrick
Sidley Austin
Jones Day
Linklaters
Stroock
Allen & Overy
Fried Frank
Shearman
Chadbourne
Kramer Levin
Willkie
Dewey
Proskauer
Cahill
McDermott
Akin Gump
Paul Hastings
Arnold & Porter
Kasowitz
Pillsbury
White & Case
clifford chance
Weil

Thanks.

[deneuve39]

Cleary has a more reserved, quirky, and intellectual culture. Not sure what their IP department is like though, and they're pretty internationally-focused.

[RVP11]

Cleary has a more reserved, quirky, and intellectual culture. Not sure what their IP department is like though, and they're pretty internationally-focused.

OP has no chance at Cleary and didn't even list them.

[como]

From what I understand, all of the London-based firms (A&O, Freshfields, Linklaters, etc.) tend to be progressive yet professional (how very English). They also tend to hire people with a demonstrated international focus, so that may or may not be positive for you.

Also, I might add that your bid-list looks almost entirely the same as mine.

[deneuve39]

Cleary has a more reserved, quirky, and intellectual culture. Not sure what their IP department is like though, and they're pretty internationally-focused.

OP has no chance at Cleary and didn't even list them.

Sorry! I was just adding what I knew in case other interested people are looking at the thread.

OP, I've heard Weil is pretty aggressive and fratty (also, they have a very small summer class and will be tough to get at Georgetown top 25%). I agree with como's comment re: British firms, and have also heard that Arnold and Porter has a friendly and open culture, but is not too agressive. Haven't heard much about Orrick's culture, but their class is very small as well (like 10 people, and apparently this summer it's all 1Ls...)

[edcrane]

I get the impression that Jones Day (at least NY) tilts towards the aggressive/fratty end of the spectrum.

I've been told that Wilkie associates often socialize with each other outside of work.

[Anonymous User]

OP here.

Thanks for all the helpful replies. It's kind of hard to know who is too big a reach at Georgetown, as the hiring medians for Weil, Latham, and Shearman are lower than that for Willkie NYC (and all are under 3.5, while Skadden and Gibson Dunn are both at 3.5), while Sidley and Jones Day are in the mid 3.3s (i.e., right around the top-third cutoff under the old curve). These seem like relatively big reaches to me, as I don't think top 25% at Georgetown gets these kind of firms any more.

[Anonymous User]

I am an incoming Stroock associate if you have any questions about them.

[como]

I am an incoming Stroock associate if you have any questions about them.

I do. What kinds of questions were you asked in your screening and call-back? Do you feel like there is adequate training during SA? Are the lines of communication from partners to junior associates pretty open, or does it seem like the firm has pretty opaque decision-making? As a SA, do you think you would have a chance to work with the project finance group, or is it pretty much just split corporate/litigation? What is the culture like? Do they seem poised to make offers to an entire SA class?

[Anonymous User]

I am an incoming Stroock associate if you have any questions about them.

I do. What kinds of questions were you asked in your screening and call-back? Do you feel like there is adequate training during SA? Are the lines of communication from partners to junior associates pretty open, or does it seem like the firm has pretty opaque decision-making? As a SA, do you think you would have a chance to work with the project finance group, or is it pretty much just split corporate/litigation? What is the culture like? Do they seem poised to make offers to an entire SA class?

The screening was pretty innocuous. They sent a senior associate who is a really nice, laid back guy. We mostly talked about my outside interests, and I asked a bit about the firm. At the time I interviewed Stroock had a rather unusual recruiting/marketing campaign that was a good conversation starter (and showed that I had researched the firm a bit). See: http://www.axisgraphics.com/portfolio/s ... index.html (Cached website from when I was looking at Stroock).

The callback was with two associates, the director of recruiting, and two partners (five interviews total). I was impressed that they actually had two of the big rainmaker partners doing the interviews. Kind of intimidating, but it shows that they take recruiting seriously.

Management can sometimes be a bit opaque, but that's to be expected in biglaw. You do get to have breakfast with the managing partner as a SA, where you can ask him anything about the firm. He was pretty candid with mine- even directly telling us the exact numbers for firm financials. One thing they really hammer into you is that Stroock is run very conservatively. They don't want to merge, they don't want to expand to new cities, they don't want to grow much. Stroock has been around for almost 130 years and they don't plan on changing their ways any time soon. Fun fact: the original Stroock was good friends with justice Cardozo.

You should have an opportunity to do whatever interests you as long as you make a request. I didn't have a particular interest in project finance, so I didn't do anything in that domain. The SA experience can be a bit litigation heavy, mostly because summers are completely worthless for anything else. Plan on doing a LOT of pro-bono (that was about 1/2 my summer). Stroock is really, really, into the pro-bono thing.

There is a LOT of training for the summers- almost too much sometimes. About 1/2 your day will be in training for the first couple weeks. That said, the trainings can be very valuable. For example, we did set of mock depositions with two partners standing by to critique us. It was a bit intimidating, but I learned a lot- to the point that I'm sure I could depose someone tomorrow if I had to. There is also a mock-deal, with similar feedback with partners.

As for offers, your guess is as good as mine. Stroock was traditionally a 100% offer shop. One of the junior associates told me that they used to have a champaign toast on the last day for everyone getting offers. My experience was unfortunately not so easy. The offer rate my year was about 65%- about par for the course in NYC that year. Half of the no-offers were pretty expected- there were a few people who just didn't take things seriously enough, but there were definitely some great people who were no-offered. The summer class is much smaller this year (19 as opposed to 28), so I imagine they will have room for a much larger percentage of the class- hopefully nearly everyone.

As a final note, remember that the name rhymes with "book"- some people mess it up in the interview.

[Anonymous User]

I get the impression that Jones Day (at least NY) tilts towards the aggressive/fratty end of the spectrum.

I've been told that Wilkie associates often socialize with each other outside of work.

JD = anti-fratty. Maybe a bit aggressive.

[como]

I am an incoming Stroock associate if you have any questions about them.

I do. What kinds of questions were you asked in your screening and call-back? Do you feel like there is adequate training during SA? Are the lines of communication from partners to junior associates pretty open, or does it seem like the firm has pretty opaque decision-making? As a SA, do you think you would have a chance to work with the project finance group, or is it pretty much just split corporate/litigation? What is the culture like? Do they seem poised to make offers to an entire SA class?

The screening was pretty innocuous. They sent a senior associate who is a really nice, laid back guy. We mostly talked about my outside interests, and I asked a bit about the firm. At the time I interviewed Stroock had a rather unusual recruiting/marketing campaign that was a good conversation starter (and showed that I had researched the firm a bit). See: http://www.axisgraphics.com/portfolio/s ... index.html (Cached website from when I was looking at Stroock).

The callback was with two associates, the director of recruiting, and two partners (five interviews total). I was impressed that they actually had two of the big rainmaker partners doing the interviews. Kind of intimidating, but it shows that they take recruiting seriously.

Management can sometimes be a bit opaque, but that's to be expected in biglaw. You do get to have breakfast with the managing partner as a SA, where you can ask him anything about the firm. He was pretty candid with mine- even directly telling us the exact numbers for firm financials. One thing they really hammer into you is that Stroock is run very conservatively. They don't want to merge, they don't want to expand to new cities, they don't want to grow much. Stroock has been around for almost 130 years and they don't plan on changing their ways any time soon. Fun fact: the original Stroock was good friends with justice Cardozo.

You should have an opportunity to do whatever interests you as long as you make a request. I didn't have a particular interest in project finance, so I didn't do anything in that domain. The SA experience can be a bit litigation heavy, mostly because summers are completely worthless for anything else. Plan on doing a LOT of pro-bono (that was about 1/2 my summer). Stroock is really, really, into the pro-bono thing.

There is a LOT of training for the summers- almost too much sometimes. About 1/2 your day will be in training for the first couple weeks. That said, the trainings can be very valuable. For example, we did set of mock depositions with two partners standing by to critique us. It was a bit intimidating, but I learned a lot- to the point that I'm sure I could depose someone tomorrow if I had to. There is also a mock-deal, with similar feedback with partners.

As for offers, your guess is as good as mine. Stroock was traditionally a 100% offer shop. One of the junior associates told me that they used to have a champaign toast on the last day for everyone getting offers. My experience was unfortunately not so easy. The offer rate my year was about 65%- about par for the course in NYC that year. Half of the no-offers were pretty expected- there were a few people who just didn't take things seriously enough, but there were definitely some great people who were no-offered. The summer class is much smaller this year (19 as opposed to 28), so I imagine they will have room for a much larger percentage of the class- hopefully nearly everyone.

As a final note, remember that the name rhymes with "book"- some people mess it up in the interview.

Thank you very much for all of that.

[Anonymous User]

I am an incoming Stroock associate if you have any questions about them.

I do. What kinds of questions were you asked in your screening and call-back? Do you feel like there is adequate training during SA? Are the lines of communication from partners to junior associates pretty open, or does it seem like the firm has pretty opaque decision-making? As a SA, do you think you would have a chance to work with the project finance group, or is it pretty much just split corporate/litigation? What is the culture like? Do they seem poised to make offers to an entire SA class?

The screening was pretty innocuous. They sent a senior associate who is a really nice, laid back guy. We mostly talked about my outside interests, and I asked a bit about the firm. At the time I interviewed Stroock had a rather unusual recruiting/marketing campaign that was a good conversation starter (and showed that I had researched the firm a bit). See: http://www.axisgraphics.com/portfolio/s ... index.html (Cached website from when I was looking at Stroock).

The callback was with two associates, the director of recruiting, and two partners (five interviews total). I was impressed that they actually had two of the big rainmaker partners doing the interviews. Kind of intimidating, but it shows that they take recruiting seriously.

Management can sometimes be a bit opaque, but that's to be expected in biglaw. You do get to have breakfast with the managing partner as a SA, where you can ask him anything about the firm. He was pretty candid with mine- even directly telling us the exact numbers for firm financials. One thing they really hammer into you is that Stroock is run very conservatively. They don't want to merge, they don't want to expand to new cities, they don't want to grow much. Stroock has been around for almost 130 years and they don't plan on changing their ways any time soon. Fun fact: the original Stroock was good friends with justice Cardozo.

You should have an opportunity to do whatever interests you as long as you make a request. I didn't have a particular interest in project finance, so I didn't do anything in that domain. The SA experience can be a bit litigation heavy, mostly because summers are completely worthless for anything else. Plan on doing a LOT of pro-bono (that was about 1/2 my summer). Stroock is really, really, into the pro-bono thing.

There is a LOT of training for the summers- almost too much sometimes. About 1/2 your day will be in training for the first couple weeks. That said, the trainings can be very valuable. For example, we did set of mock depositions with two partners standing by to critique us. It was a bit intimidating, but I learned a lot- to the point that I'm sure I could depose someone tomorrow if I had to. There is also a mock-deal, with similar feedback with partners.

As for offers, your guess is as good as mine. Stroock was traditionally a 100% offer shop. One of the junior associates told me that they used to have a champaign toast on the last day for everyone getting offers. My experience was unfortunately not so easy. The offer rate my year was about 65%- about par for the course in NYC that year. Half of the no-offers were pretty expected- there were a few people who just didn't take things seriously enough, but there were definitely some great people who were no-offered. The summer class is much smaller this year (19 as opposed to 28), so I imagine they will have room for a much larger percentage of the class- hopefully nearly everyone.

As a final note, remember that the name rhymes with "book"- some people mess it up in the interview.

Thank you very much for all of that.

Yes, thank you indeed.