Bidding Strategy? ~40% at Boalt Forum

[timbs4339]

My future schoolmate: The advice career services gave you seemed reasonable, why do you have misgivings? After all, it's their job to give good advice and in the school's best interest to help you succeed at OCI. I don't think non-Boalt TLSers should have any standing regarding your OCI strategy. Best of luck to you!

You can't be serious. This is a joke/sarcasm, right?

Why? Was being totally sincere.

In terms of bidding strategy: I would expect that a career service office at any school would have a sense of their students' past profiles, how those students bid at past OCIs, and which strategies were or were not successful. This therefore makes such an office a repository of useful data that a student can apply to their own profile and bidding strategy. While on the other hand, as fun as TLS is, to me it seems primarily a repository of personal opinions, anecdotes, and supposition (as opposed to useful data).

In terms of the value of a WOA grade: Again, I would expect that the career service office would be basing a claim like this on Boalt students' past data, while here on TLS opinions are based for the most part on nothing concrete. However, what might be worth paying attention to in terms of primary anecdotal information, as I alluded to at the end of my previous post, would be if TLSers from Boalt came forward and posted that they had received an HH in WOA and were confident that it didn't do much for them.

Are you a 0L?

I don't go to Boalt (I go to another T10 school). But our career services is vehemently opposed to using any kind of data or doing any kind of statistical analysis more complex than
"X number of students participated in OCI and X number of students got jobs." I know this because I've asked them why they don't do this and they told me it would take too much work (apparently nobody's career hangs in the balance here- including theirs when they don't show good placement numbers).

Reports from other top schools about their career services offices are just as bad. For example, Michigan's OCS apparently told all their students to bid on Chicago the year there turned out to be about 250 SA spots in the entire city.

This all makes sense when you realize most Career Services offices are staffed by washed-up lawyers who are scared to death of numbers.

[rayiner]

My future schoolmate: The advice career services gave you seemed reasonable, why do you have misgivings? After all, it's their job to give good advice and in the school's best interest to help you succeed at OCI. I don't think non-Boalt TLSers should have any standing regarding your OCI strategy. Best of luck to you!

You can't be serious. This is a joke/sarcasm, right?

Why? Was being totally sincere.

In terms of bidding strategy: I would expect that a career service office at any school would have a sense of their students' past profiles, how those students bid at past OCIs, and which strategies were or were not successful. This therefore makes such an office a repository of useful data that a student can apply to their own profile and bidding strategy. While on the other hand, as fun as TLS is, to me it seems primarily a repository of personal opinions, anecdotes, and supposition (as opposed to useful data).

In terms of the value of a WOA grade: Again, I would expect that the career service office would be basing a claim like this on Boalt students' past data, while here on TLS opinions are based for the most part on nothing concrete. However, what might be worth paying attention to in terms of primary anecdotal information, as I alluded to at the end of my previous post, would be if TLSers from Boalt came forward and posted that they had received an HH in WOA and were confident that it didn't do much for them.

Are you a 0L?

I don't go to Boalt (I go to another T10 school). But our career services is vehemently opposed to using any kind of data or doing any kind of statistical analysis more complex than
"X number of students participated in OCI and X number of students got jobs." I know this because I've asked them why they don't do this and they told me it would take too much work (apparently nobody's career hangs in the balance here- including theirs when they don't show good placement numbers).

Reports from other top schools about their career services offices are just as bad. For example, Michigan's OCS apparently told all their students to bid on Chicago the year there turned out to be about 250 SA spots in the entire city.

This all makes sense when you realize most Career Services offices are staffed by washed-up lawyers who are scared to death of numbers.

I don't think Michigan's OCS was at fault for telling people to bid Chicago. for 2008, early 2009, NYC laid off about twice as many lawyers per capita as Chicago. Going into OCI in late 2009, then, telling people to bid Chicago didn't seem so bad. It's not like they could've predicted that Chicago would go into a hiring freeze for two years.

And not all other CSOs are bad. At NU we get detailed statistics. Min/median/max callback GPA per firm. Ours was one of the only CSOs to break out OCI 2009 data from OCI 2005-2008 data. And the folks there do keep on top of what's happening in the market: http://www.law.northwestern.edu/career/markettrends/

[Rock-N-Roll]

Are you a 0L?

I don't go to Boalt (I go to another T10 school). But our career services is vehemently opposed to using any kind of data or doing any kind of statistical analysis more complex than
"X number of students participated in OCI and X number of students got jobs." I know this because I've asked them why they don't do this and they told me it would take too much work (apparently nobody's career hangs in the balance here- including theirs when they don't show good placement numbers).

Reports from other top schools about their career services offices are just as bad. For example, Michigan's OCS apparently told all their students to bid on Chicago the year there turned out to be about 250 SA spots in the entire city.

This all makes sense when you realize most Career Services offices are staffed by washed-up lawyers who are scared to death of numbers.

I don't think Michigan's OCS was at fault for telling people to bid Chicago. for 2008, early 2009, NYC laid off about twice as many lawyers per capita as Chicago. Going into OCI in late 2009, then, telling people to bid Chicago didn't seem so bad. It's not like they could've predicted that Chicago would go into a hiring freeze for two years.

And not all other CSOs are bad. At NU we get detailed statistics. Min/median/max callback GPA per firm. Ours was one of the only CSOs to break out OCI 2009 data from OCI 2005-2008 data. And the folks there do keep on top of what's happening in the market: http://www.law.northwestern.edu/career/markettrends/

@timbs4339: Yes I am a 0L. I am sad to hear that your career services office is that way. What is the point of your school having them there if they don't help you make informed career decisions?

@rayiner: Thank you for the info about the NU career services office. That is more like what I thought a typical career services office provided.

[Staberinde]

Who did you talk to at CDO?

Jones Day and Sidley are fine reaches. WilmerHale will depend on the office. You have almost no shot at Gibson Dunn in SF and LA. I don't say this to discourage you, but it may not be worth burning a high bid on them.

OP here. Just my with the career office and I was advised to include more reaches in my bidding strategy. Specifically, the counselor I spoke with told me that because one of my HH's was in WOA, firms will expect good work-product out of me and may give me a second look over others that are similarly ranked. We discussed such reaches as WilmerHale, Jones Day, Sidley, and Gibson Dunn.

The last thing I want to do, though, is strike out because of a poor bidding strategy. And I am learning towards being as conservative as possible.

So what do you all think? Is my CDO's advice reliable? Or would it be too risky for me to potentially waste bids like that?

Thanks!

[Anonymous User]

What does it mean to bid conservatively? No reaches? How do you find out what is conservative w/non-letter grades @ Boalt?

[Anonymous User]

Who did you talk to at CDO?

Rather not say in the forum. PM'ed.

To be fair, I threw GD in the mix. WH, JD, and Sidley were the firms we discussed, and I was under the impression that GD was similarly competitive; but that seems to have been my mistake.

[Anonymous User]

OP here again. Question: how much would it increase my likelihood of success if I made NY my target market?

[Anonymous User]

Boalt's CDO is offering terrible advice. You have a poor shot Wilmer and no shot at GDC.

If you were to bid on New York, you'd have a much better shot than if you were to bid on CA biglaw. To be honest, I don't think your odds on CA biglaw (especially SF) are that great. You definitely have a shot, because you have HH's, but it's by no means secure. If you aren't picky about markets, I'd think seriously about bidding elsewhere, or at least splitting your bids.

[Staberinde]

OP here again. Question: how much would it increase my likelihood of success if I made NY my target market?

Significantly. Class sizes in SF are tiny. LA class sizes are bigger, but still not nearly as large as NY.