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Say you split your 2L summer and have gotten offers to return from both firms you worked for over the summer - has anyone ever successfully negotiated a higher offer for their post-graduation job using one offer against the other? Is this just not done? Bad idea?

My top choice firm doesn't pay as highly as the other, and the cost of living is higher in that city, so it'd be great if I could use the offer I want less to at least raise my potential pay at the firm I want to go to - but I also clearly don't want to shoot myself in the foot and lose the offer I want to accept or lose goodwill at that firm...

Any feedback is appreciated. Thanks in advance.

We are not hot commodities. They can replace incoming first years in about ten minutes. If you try to pit one firm against the other, they could rescind your offer (or you could seriously piss off your future employer before you ever start working there).

If this is a big firm, they aren't going to change the entire lockstep system because they have a first year who got two summer offers

Don't do this. Just take one

Gotcha. That's what I was thinking. Thanks. Didn't want to do anything stupid.

While I think generally what Mr. hands may be true it's clearly not true in all cases. A friend of mine had an offer from a top firm in DC where the market rate is 160K. He also had an offer from a firm in Pittsburgh where the market is between 15-25K lower. He went back to Pittsburgh firm and basically said I'd love to come to the firm but I would be leaving a ton of money on the table. They ended up matching the starting salary of the DC firm. Once again this not common, and those circumstances were unique, but it does happen. Also, for jobs other than firms, negotiations are much more common. When I got my in-house position we had three rounds of negotiation.

I say go for it, you really have nothing to lose as long as you're professional about it. IMHO, if a firm does not use lockstep raises, you might have better luck, but that's pure speculation.

Thanks guys, I'm going to keep thinking about it. One is in a smaller market so I think it might help and be worthwhile... thanks!

Anonymous User wrote:I say go for it, you really have nothing to lose as long as you're professional about it. IMHO, if a firm does not use lockstep raises, you might have better luck, but that's pure speculation.

I want to reiterate that this would be potentially very damaging. They'll probably brush it off unless you have an additional post-bachelor's degree, anyway.

Also, think of how weird this would look to your classmates because trust me, this stuff gets out.

JamMasterJ wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:I say go for it, you really have nothing to lose as long as you're professional about it. IMHO, if a firm does not use lockstep raises, you might have better luck, but that's pure speculation.

I want to reiterate that this would be potentially very damaging. They'll probably brush it off unless you have an additional post-bachelor's degree, anyway.

Also, think of how weird this would look to your classmates because trust me, this stuff gets out.

At many firms, including where I summered, comp is not lockstep, so people in the same years were making different $. So I don't see how coming in slightly higher would be any different than if you got more than your buddy your 2nd year.

Also, supposing you would otherwise turn down the lower paying one, why not try to get some more $$$ out of them to sweeten the pot? In this case, absolutely nothing to lose