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I'm a 3L at a Top 30 school who has worked in-house doing transactional IP stuff for over a year (part time during school / full-time during summer). Late last year my boss said that an offer might be coming my way. Well, it doesn't look so good because he told me that he had talked with the GC a few times about a long-term offer and basically was shot down because of budgeting concerns.

So now I am guessing that I need to officially think about doing something else. The only problem is I am so late in the game that I am worried that there won't be anything left or looking for a job right now would otherwise be futile because most employers won't hire until after bar results are posted.

Anybody have any ideas about what might be best for me to do now to find employment?

Sorry to hear that. I worked in-house for a while as well but they made it clear that it wouldn't lead to post-grad employment. Though business are increasingly hiring recent grads for in-house positions, the practice remains relatively rare.

As for what to do, your situation is no different from that of any jobless 3L, and there is a ton of threads on this topic. But you have the small added benefit of personally knowing and having worked with a bunch of in-house lawyers. During the time you have left, go chat with each one in their offices and ask them to see if anyone in their professional network is looking to hire a 3L. Some of them should be willing to go to bat for you. That's what I would do.

I have an SA, but I've been wondering how to best maintain contact with the lawyers I worked with in-house for networking purposes.

If you're background is in electric, Finnegan is currently hiring 3Ls in several offices, according to my school's Symplicity

If he likes you, but can't hire you for budget reasons, can another unit (compliance, finance/accounting, etc) hire you? What about subsidiaries/parents? Or their outside counsel? Or competitors/regional peers? You're in a good situation that an in-house lawyer liked you enough to want to hire you out of law school. See what he can do for you and be sure to mention it in your networking.

OP here. Thank you for the great replies and support everyone. The way I see it, I have a few options:
1. Try and leverage the good rapport I have currently with my boss to see if I can convince the GC that the investment justifies the cost.
2. Leverage the contacts that my boss has with other attorney's and firms. From what I gather in my contacts with other attorneys, he is fairly well-known in the local legal market.
3. Do the whole mass-mail campaign after graduation.

I am obviously more excited about the first two options because I just think option 3 won't bring that much success this late in the game.

Just a word of caution, I was in a pretty similar situation with OP a few months ago, and I tried everything I could do with my supervisor, who's quiet a big figure in a secondary market. It might has something to do with the market itself but none of the connections he provided turned into an offer for me. I was still glad that I made lots of contacts in the meanwhile, but just to say that be prepared to do the hard work of networking on your own besides relying on his recommendations.

Anonymous User wrote:Just a word of caution, I was in a pretty similar situation with OP a few months ago, and I tried everything I could do with my supervisor.

I am the OP. So how did things workout? Do you have a job now?

If I stick with option 1, would a good approach be to write both my boss and the GC a letter demonstrating my interest in staying with the company along with sending both a copy of my updated resume? I was thinking that an updated resume would reflect some of the past years' accomplishments in school (updated GPA, law review, moot court). On the other hand, the resume might not really mean that much to them if they are already very impressed with my work (which they have both told me on several occasions).

What are everyone's opinions on this approach to option 1?