ending up at a place I didn't even consider bidding on Forum

[Anonymous User]

I've ended up at one of the most terrific groups for my area of law - quite accidentally - I bid them #16 on my OCI, and I didn't land screening interviews for the #15 or #17 bids, but I did land a screener for this #16 spot with some really good fortune.

Ended up getting several offers, and chose this particular firm, after it rocketed to #1 on my list of priorities when I started doing some heavy duty research on the industry. Turns out, my #1 bid @ OCI (where I was also offered a gig) wasn't THAT good for my area of interest anyway, whereas my #2 bid (offered here as well) laid off half its class last summer. Funny how horse #16 became my #1 stallion AFTER the fact, and I've had the good fortune of landing that gig.

Its weird when I reflect back on how close I was to never even getting a screening interview there to begin with.

Anybody else with a similar experience?

I'm gonna preempt this with the usual - cool story, bro.

[bk1]

So you're saying that you didn't do a lot of research before bidding but still ended up lucking into the SA position you are doing?

[Anonymous User]

So you're saying that you didn't do a lot of research before bidding but still ended up lucking into the SA position you are doing?

Basically, yes, I consider myself incredibly lucky because I would've bid #1 on the firm I am headed if I had to go back in time.

[bk1]

Could you have found out this information earlier? If so, why didn't you?

Or did you think you already knew it and found out you were wrong? If so, why were you so convinced of it?

[Anonymous User]

Could you have found out this information earlier? If so, why didn't you?

Or did you think you already knew it and found out you were wrong? If so, why were you so convinced of it?

I decided, unwisely, to just bid on all the top Vault firms that I had heard of, which had a big enough group for what I wanted to do, and then do most of the heavy lifting @ research once I had a set of callbacks to work with.

Very dangerous approach. THEN, I learned about NALP data on SA->offer, firm financials, Chambers band information, partner-associate ratio, exit options, and who the superstars are for what I want to do - AFTER I had already passed the deadline for bidding. I'm a lucky, lucky SOB.

I hated talking about jobs on campus all the time, which is basically what 80% of people in my law school do, but now I see that from those conversations - one learns a hell of a lot about which places to avoid, which places to seek, etc. etc.

:-/

[Anonymous User]

Not exactly the same experience I had, but I got a total of 5 callback interviews in my target market (Boston):

One Through targeted mailing, another through a resume drop, another through picking up an extra bid on Symplicity when they reopened bidding for open slots, another by calling a firm who I did not get a lottery interview with and asking if they could squeeze me in, the last through a small OCI two weeks after my school's major recruiting event (I think this is partly because I changed my initial interview strategy). Of the 15 or so more conventional screeners I had, no callbacks. I have two offers now. Moral to my story, try every strategy you can think of to get more interviews, any one could be your path to a SA.

[Anonymous User]

Ended up at a lottery pick. Didn't know a lot about the firm prior to the screening interview but it turned out to be my first choice after all my interviews and call backs. Fate????

[Anonymous User]

Ended up at a lottery pick. Didn't know a lot about the firm prior to the screening interview but it turned out to be my first choice after all my interviews and call backs. Fate????

+1 for me (op).

Frankly, none of the callbacks have informed me at all about which firm is better over which other firm, because I go in with a skeptical "they're gonna b/s me" attitude about them. The one stat that I am most impressed by, no matter what the firm, is what % of summers were offered full time jobs in the most recent cycle, and what the class sizes have been through this recession as a percentage of the firm's size.

Maybe I'm a total idiot, but these are things I didn't even know to look for early on when I had 0 offers to begin with. At first, my mindset was, GET A JOB, now - I apply all these other filters.

[Anonymous User]

my level of sophistication regarding this whole law firm research business spiked once I had multiple job offers. Frankly, one of my callback interviewers at cooley llp taught me how to go about picking a firm. (1. look at type of clients they represent, 2. look at the % of summers who got jobs there, 3. look and see if the firm has an alumni website (weird one), 4. look at whether the type of law you want to practice is a main engine of the firm overall)

Before then, all I cared about was ONE big law firm job, so thank God for the Vault 100 list, for whatever its worth.

[Anonymous User]

I got an offer from my #16 bid. I will probably be going too.

[Anonymous User]

I got an offer from my #16 bid. I will probably be going too.

I interviewed for multiple (2ndary-market) offices of a very large firm as my 12th bid, and ended up getting a callback for my second choice of the three offices for which they were interviewing. Turns out, it's an amazing office, and I'm going there, despite getting offers at much more prestigious firms.

[Anonymous User]

I accepted an offer with a firm that I used my third-to-last bid on. I also didn't know much about the firm, but about 15 minutes into my callback, I knew I wanted to work there.

[Anonymous User]

my experience was similar, but mainly because I didn't initially target the market I ended up in

[Anonymous User]

Going to the #29 firm on my bid list. The firm was near the top of my preference list: it just happened to be in a market where most of my classmates don't dare go, so I knew I could snatch an interview no matter how low I bid.

[180orbust]

I didn't even bid... open sign up just because I had a free slot and why not? Got an offer today, and its looking like #1. Crazy.

[rcb5142]

Not exactly the same experience I had, but I got a total of 5 callback interviews in my target market (Boston):

One Through targeted mailing, another through a resume drop, another through picking up an extra bid on Symplicity when they reopened bidding for open slots, another by calling a firm who I did not get a lottery interview with and asking if they could squeeze me in, the last through a small OCI two weeks after my school's major recruiting event (I think this is partly because I changed my initial interview strategy). Of the 15 or so more conventional screeners I had, no callbacks. I have two offers now. Moral to my story, try every strategy you can think of to get more interviews, any one could be your path to a SA.

This is really inspirational. Great effort!

[Anonymous User]

Grabbed an open signup slot at a V10 on a lark. Winged the interview and was kinda confrontational during the callback. Found it had a practice niche I really liked. Took offer. Life is weird sometimes...

[MrKappus]

Grabbed an open signup slot at a Vxxx on a lark. Winged the interview and was kinda confrontational during the callback. Found it had a practice niche I really liked. Took offer. Life is weird sometimes...

You should delete the firm range and give us some examples of confrontation. You know, for the LULZ.

[Anonymous User]

Grabbed an open signup slot at a Vxxx on a lark. Winged the interview and was kinda confrontational during the callback. Found it had a practice niche I really liked. Took offer. Life is weird sometimes...

You should delete the firm range and give us some examples of confrontation. You know, for the LULZ.

Subtle stuff. "So I'm not that interested in finance... I mean I suppose its interesting... do you work with other sorts of clients?" At a firm known for representing financial institutions, sigh.

[Anonymous User]

My two OCI callbacks came from my 17th and 39th bids. So hopefully, I'll be accepting an offer from one of the two. My bidding was pretty haphazard (its a cautionary tale -- do more firm research, big more strategically), so it isn't really a reflection on the firms, I just bid basically on whether the firm sounded good from 30 seconds of research.