NYC Firms that Transfer Associates to Foreign Offices? Forum

[Anonymous User]

Rising 2L assembling a bid list for NYC. I'm interested in corporate work (M&A, capital markets, etc.) and my academics are solid for most of the V100.

I want to pick firms that will give me the opportunity as a Junior/Mid-Level Associate to transfer (long-term/permanently) from NYC to a foreign office.

It's easy enough to find out which firms have foreign offices but does anyone know which firms are more or less likely to offer transfer opportunities?

[JamMasterJ]

I think the magic circle firms are pretty good about this.

[hyakku]

Magic circle firms as JMJ suggests (although idk if Freshfields does, but I'm almost certain Linklaters and Allen & Overy do, can't recall if clifford chance does). Also Shearman & Sterling does (or at least did last summer and I believe are doing so this summer), and I'm pretty sure some of their "white shoe" counterparts do as well, but not sure of which ones. Chambers - associate inside view is pretty solid for figuring this out, although it would be better if they had a centralized list of places doing this. Places with strong international practices (CM, IPF, etc.) are probably best to look for if you're interested in doing this.

[Helmholtz]

Probably the best way to gauge this is to look at how many lawyers are in the office in the particular country you're interested in, and how many transferred from the US office.

From what I've seen, the process through which one is able to rotate international offices as a summer associate is much different than the process through which one is able to do a "permanent" transfer to a foreign office.

[Anonymous User]

whether you can get a posting or not depends on what foreign languages you speak. The firms I know of that send people abroad usually want you to speak the language of that country . Cleary and DPW sent summer associates abroad and send junior associates abroad, but they want you to be fluent in Chinese/Spanish/French etc.

Both these firms also have London offices but I imagine those spots would be hard to get given there isn't the limiting factor of language skills reducing the pool of potential candidates.

[Anonymous User]

believe latham sends people to Europe/Middle East/Asia pretty regularly. language skills help depending on country but not a pre-requisite

[Anonymous User]

Davis Polk sends people to Hong Kong often if the Asia market is hot (gotta speak Mandarin though)

[Anonymous User]

off the top of my head...

magic circle firms - A & O, clifford chance, LL, Freshfields

ny firms with integration across international offices - Skadden, Cleary, Latham, Shearman, Davis Polk, White & Case, Milbank

"International" McFirms (franchise model) - Baker McKenzie, DLA Piper, Jones Day, Fulbright Jaworski

[Anonymous User]

off the top of my head...

magic circle firms - A & O, Clifford Chance, LL, Freshfields

ny firms with integration across international offices - Skadden, Cleary, Latham, Shearman, Davis Polk, White & Case, Milbank

"International" McFirms (franchise model) - Baker McKenzie, DLA Piper

Worked at one of the "International" McFirms as an SA in Hong Kong recently. I wouldn't count on getting transferred to a foreign office. Most of the regions have their own headquarters and operate with quite a bit of autonomy, since they grew by picking up offices in those countries anyways. I met only one associate who had transferred between countries, aside from secondments. Your best bet is probably one of the more prestigious firms that grew their own international offices (I want to say V-20 but I am sure there are exceptions in both directions) or in one of the magic circle firms.