Let's talk in-house salaries Forum

[Anonymous User]

Any IP Lit biglaw -> inhouse associates ?

I'm making this transition now. Details below...

Experience: 4-5 years of biglaw IP lit experience, no in-house experience yet.
Market: Secondary market (e.g., Denver, Houston, Seattle)
Compensation: $185k-200k with 18%-20% target bonus. $20k signing bonus. But raises seem unlikely in the near future.
Benefits: Strong 401k match (probably an extra ~$10k per year), 4 weeks paid vacation, 2 weeks paid sick leave, good holiday schedule. Allegedly free health insurance.
Type of Work: IP litigation (managing outside counsel and the like)
Hours: Not sure since I haven't started yet. During interviews, folks sold me on the QoL difference and promised an 8:30 to 6:00 type of gig with lots of teleworking flexibility. Will report back in a couple of months to update.

Sounds awesome. Thanks for replying. Did you go through a legal recruiter? I'd like to go in-house at some point down the road (think 3-5 years) but I just keep hearing there just aren't enough in-house gigs taking in IP Lit associates

[Anonymous User]

Any IP Lit biglaw -> inhouse associates ?

I'm making this transition now. Details below...

Experience: 4-5 years of biglaw IP lit experience, no in-house experience yet.
Market: Secondary market (e.g., Denver, Houston, Seattle)
Compensation: $185k-200k with 18%-20% target bonus. $20k signing bonus. But raises seem unlikely in the near future.
Benefits: Strong 401k match (probably an extra ~$10k per year), 4 weeks paid vacation, 2 weeks paid sick leave, good holiday schedule. Allegedly free health insurance.
Type of Work: IP litigation (managing outside counsel and the like)
Hours: Not sure since I haven't started yet. During interviews, folks sold me on the QoL difference and promised an 8:30 to 6:00 type of gig with lots of teleworking flexibility. Will report back in a couple of months to update.

Sounds awesome. Thanks for replying. Did you go through a legal recruiter? I'd like to go in-house at some point down the road (think 3-5 years) but I just keep hearing there just aren't enough in-house gigs taking in IP Lit associates

No problem, happy to help and answer questions.

I did not use a recruiter. Someone internal at my future company reached out to me and asked if I was interested in interviewing for the position. I had worked with him on a prior case a couple of years back.

IP lit gigs do seem to be rare. The vast majority (~90%) of folks in my department who have gone in-house are doing IP prosecution. I have nothing against prosecution at all, but I think I would get bored after a year or two of churning applications and office actions.

[Anonymous User]

How are you guys copping these in-house jobs with just 2 or 3 years firm experience? TELL US YOUR SECRETS.

I'm the healthcare poster. We've been actively recruiting for folk with 1-3 years experience. If you're in health law, you should be able to find the position in the usual places. My advice would be to make sure you fully understand any position you're applying for and carefully tailor your resume to match.

Is this true for litigation associates as well?

[1styearlateral]

SF Bay Area
Graduated law school in 2015
1 year in-house (previously at a boutique real estate firm)
Real Estate Developer (20 employees, me & general counsel as the legal dept)
Base salary is $130K
Bonus is 10% of salary (could be more depending upon performance of company)
no 401K match
11 PTO (includes vacation & sick days)
Equity after 3-4 years
Hours are 8:30AM-6:30PM M-F, plus I've worked maybe 2 or 3 weekends out of the year.

Can you elaborate on the type of work you did at the boutique? I am in the same position you were with the goal of working in-house with a property manager.

[Anonymous User]

What if you're not in health law?

Then it's going to be harder to break in, just because of your lack of experience with the regulatory oversight. That said, hospitals do a lot of regular law too so if you carefully craft a resume you could still break into the field. Particularly if you have a few years of experience in a heavily regulated field, you could try and push that.

[Anonymous User]

How are you guys copping these in-house jobs with just 2 or 3 years firm experience? TELL US YOUR SECRETS.

I'm the healthcare poster. We've been actively recruiting for folk with 1-3 years experience. If you're in health law, you should be able to find the position in the usual places. My advice would be to make sure you fully understand any position you're applying for and carefully tailor your resume to match.

Is this true for litigation associates as well?

Our litigation associates are generally more experienced. Typically hospital litigation associates spend a lot of time managing cases and outside lawyers, since almost everything actually being litigated (as in on the court docket) will be handled by an outside firm.

[Anonymous User]

How are you guys copping these in-house jobs with just 2 or 3 years firm experience? TELL US YOUR SECRETS.

I wouldn't say there's a secret other than to make sure someone who is not in HR gets your resume. Few corporate HR folks know what a good legal resume looks like. If you see a listing for a job, find someone you know (or a friend of a friend) who works at the company and can forward your resume. You'd be amazed how big your network is if you do some legwork.

This is so important. I know classmates have applied for positions in our department and made no attempt to contact me, even though LinkedIn would readily have identified I work here. Their entire application would be helped by inside knowledge allowing them to carefully craft the resume to match the position.

[zot1]

What if you're not in health law?

Then it's going to be harder to break in, just because of your lack of experience with the regulatory oversight. That said, hospitals do a lot of regular law too so if you carefully craft a resume you could still break into the field. Particularly if you have a few years of experience in a heavily regulated field, you could try and push that.

That's a good tip. Thank you!

[Anonymous User]

SF Bay Area
Graduated law school in 2015
1 year in-house (previously at a boutique real estate firm)
Real Estate Developer (20 employees, me & general counsel as the legal dept)
Base salary is $130K
Bonus is 10% of salary (could be more depending upon performance of company)
no 401K match
11 PTO (includes vacation & sick days)
Equity after 3-4 years
Hours are 8:30AM-6:30PM M-F, plus I've worked maybe 2 or 3 weekends out of the year.

Can you elaborate on the type of work you did at the boutique? I am in the same position you were with the goal of working in-house with a property manager.

My work at the botique firm was very specialized (HOA/condos in the Bay Area market) and the company I am at now is expanding into multi-family residential development. I knew the entitlement process very well and my current company thought they could use this to their advantage. Also, by practicing for a short time in such a specialized area of real estate (the boutique firm, but before that, interning at a construction law practice), my current company knew that I was serious about real estate. I hope that helps! Let me know if you want to chat privately.

[Anonymous User]

I have a generalist in house interview coming up and I have no idea what to do if asked about salary. When it came up in preliminary interviews I just sort of stammered and asked to talk about it later.

It's a public company in a pretty remote part of the country with roughly 15 people in the legal department. I know what the GC makes, but other than that I have no data points to base a number on. Pretty worried about asking too much, but of course I also don't want to leave money on the table.

My advice is to just say you're flexible with Salary and leave it at that. If they push you for a number, don't give it to them! Let them throw out the first number and go from there. Nothing good will come from you giving them an arbitrary number especially if you're not sure. Too low and you're selling yourself short. Too high and you just look greedy.

I always thought the best approach if forced for numbers is to say "I currently make x Dollars, how much are you willing to pay to get me to switch jobs? Though that line is more appropriate post offer if pushed for numbers

Thanks, I appreciate the response. As you hint at though, I don't think I'm at that stage.

[Anonymous User]

Third-year biglaw associate interviewing for an in-house corporate position at large insurance company (on the West Coast). They are offering 140-150k inclusive of bonuses (120k base). This is pretty low, right? Inclined to decline and keep looking.

[Anonymous User]

Third-year biglaw associate interviewing for an in-house corporate position at large insurance company (on the West Coast). They are offering 140-150k inclusive of bonuses (120k base). This is pretty low, right? Inclined to decline and keep looking.

Yes, this is low. I am a 3rd year biglaw associate (but started early so been here 6 months longer than most 3rd years) as well and recently received an in-house offer which is over $250k all in. The right opportunity exists, as this thread points out, you just have to search and be patient. $150k all in sounds extremely low (especially for West Coast where COL is high).

[Anonymous User]

Third-year biglaw associate interviewing for an in-house corporate position at large insurance company (on the West Coast). They are offering 140-150k inclusive of bonuses (120k base). This is pretty low, right? Inclined to decline and keep looking.

Yes, this is low. I am a 3rd year biglaw associate (but started early so been here 6 months longer than most 3rd years) as well and recently received an in-house offer which is over $250k all in. The right opportunity exists, as this thread points out, you just have to search and be patient. $150k all in sounds extremely low (especially for West Coast where COL is high).

250k seems abnormally high for a 3rd year going in-house (I mean this is practically BigLaw salary with bonus), and 150k is probably a little too low. If you can negotiate 20 or 30k more, I think that'd be pretty good.

[ruski]

on the flip side, there are way more in house opportunities that pay around 150-170k than pay 200k+, even in large cities. you can be patient and wait for a 200k+ position but that may never come about. I guess it depends how desperate you are to leave biglaw, but don't think if you stay long enough you will eventually hit the jackpot.

[Anonymous User]

Third-year biglaw associate interviewing for an in-house corporate position at large insurance company (on the West Coast). They are offering 140-150k inclusive of bonuses (120k base). This is pretty low, right? Inclined to decline and keep looking.

Yes, this is low. I am a 3rd year biglaw associate (but started early so been here 6 months longer than most 3rd years) as well and recently received an in-house offer which is over $250k all in. The right opportunity exists, as this thread points out, you just have to search and be patient. $150k all in sounds extremely low (especially for West Coast where COL is high).

I’m going to differ here - IMO, 150k isn’t that low for a 3rd year (though not great) and 250k is quite high. Unless you’re counting all your RSUs in year one comp, in which case 250k isn’t unreasonable but it also isn’t really 250k.

I’m pretty sure Apple and Amazon don’t have their junior attorneys above 200k, let alone 250k. And those places are destroying your average LA entertainment studio in total comp, where a junior attorney might well be at like 120k (or less). If you land a place like Google or some elite finance in house job you’ll come in higher, but those jobs are rare even in the already rare set of in house jobs.

[Anonymous User]

Third-year biglaw associate interviewing for an in-house corporate position at large insurance company (on the West Coast). They are offering 140-150k inclusive of bonuses (120k base). This is pretty low, right? Inclined to decline and keep looking.

Yes, this is low. I am a 3rd year biglaw associate (but started early so been here 6 months longer than most 3rd years) as well and recently received an in-house offer which is over $250k all in. The right opportunity exists, as this thread points out, you just have to search and be patient. $150k all in sounds extremely low (especially for West Coast where COL is high).

I’m going to differ here - IMO, 150k isn’t that low for a 3rd year (though not great) and 250k is quite high. Unless you’re counting all your RSUs in year one comp, in which case 250k isn’t unreasonable but it also isn’t really 250k.

I’m pretty sure Apple and Amazon don’t have their junior attorneys above 200k, let alone 250k. And those places are destroying your average LA entertainment studio in total comp, where a junior attorney might well be at like 120k (or less). If you land a place like Google or some elite finance in house job you’ll come in higher, but those jobs are rare even in the already rare set of in house jobs.

I think you have to include the RSUs in total comp, that is the whole point of going to a public company in my mind. I only include the total annual RSUs, they take a long time to vest, but its real money each year as long as you plan to stay long-term. I think $250k is on the high end, but I think shooting for over $200 should be the goal. If you are not desperate to leave, I think you can find that with time.

[bruinfan10]

I had no idea biglaw attys in LA were routinely exiting to 9-6 PM jobs with little weekend work that pay 150-170k. Crazy. I was under the impression that 9-6 AM legal jobs that pay six figures were extraordinarily rare. Who knew.

[Anonymous User]

I had no idea biglaw attys in LA were routinely exiting to 9-6 PM jobs with little weekend work that pay 150-170k. Crazy. I was under the impression that 9-6 AM legal jobs that pay six figures were extraordinarily rare. Who knew.

I don't know of any legitimate in-house opportunity that pays less than six figures after Biglaw. I agree that midlevels and higher should try to shoot for $200k+ but they should realize there is no guarantee of that at all, and I know in LA entertainment in-house (which is a large contingent of the positions available) pays lower than financial services and tech as well. However for junior level attorneys who move in-house, I think $150-$180k is very solid and not low at all. Also the figures being tossed around here are really more applicable to large companies. If you go in-house to a smaller company, expect lower pay.

[Anonymous User]

I've heard $160-170K base comp (plus 10-15% bonus) for Bay Area tech companies for a third year corporate associate. I've been asking for $180K and getting that back. Have been wondering if I've been doing it wrong. Have not gotten to a concrete offer yet. Would appreciate any insight as to whether I should go to a $170K ask.

So far HR has generally asked me for salary expectations at the beginning of the interview process and giving me those quotes.

[Anonymous User]

I've heard $160-170K base comp (plus 10-15% bonus) for Bay Area tech companies for a third year corporate associate. I've been asking for $180K and getting that back. Have been wondering if I've been doing it wrong. Have not gotten to a concrete offer yet. Would appreciate any insight as to whether I should go to a $170K ask.

So far HR has generally asked me for salary expectations at the beginning of the interview process and giving me those quotes.

depends on the company. AMZN/GOOG/FB pay a heck of a lot more than tiny startup. Tiny startup with lots of funding pays a lot more than tiny startup without it. Etc.

[Anonymous User]

Since this got bumped - I'm the poster above who mentioned healthcare positions. Once again, we're hiring and you can find the position by searching in the usual sites and specialty legal associations. 1-3 years experience, good hours, low cost of living, complex work and client time from the very beginning.

[Anonymous User]

Since this got bumped - I'm the poster above who mentioned healthcare positions. Once again, we're hiring and you can find the position by searching in the usual sites and specialty legal associations. 1-3 years experience, good hours, low cost of living, complex work and client time from the very beginning.

It's been 4 months since this thread was last in play. Any chance that you know of any current in-house healthcare openings?

[Anonymous User]

I've heard $160-170K base comp (plus 10-15% bonus) for Bay Area tech companies for a third year corporate associate. I've been asking for $180K and getting that back. Have been wondering if I've been doing it wrong. Have not gotten to a concrete offer yet. Would appreciate any insight as to whether I should go to a $170K ask.

So far HR has generally asked me for salary expectations at the beginning of the interview process and giving me those quotes.

This seems pretty in line for a good in-house position in most markets. I am in TX and this seems consistent with offers people here get.

[Anonymous User]

I had no idea biglaw attys in LA were routinely exiting to 9-6 PM jobs with little weekend work that pay 150-170k. Crazy. I was under the impression that 9-6 AM legal jobs that pay six figures were extraordinarily rare. Who knew.

I don't know of any legitimate in-house opportunity that pays less than six figures after Biglaw. I agree that midlevels and higher should try to shoot for $200k+ but they should realize there is no guarantee of that at all, and I know in LA entertainment in-house (which is a large contingent of the positions available) pays lower than financial services and tech as well. However for junior level attorneys who move in-house, I think $150-$180k is very solid and not low at all. Also the figures being tossed around here are really more applicable to large companies. If you go in-house to a smaller company, expect lower pay.

I totally agree that $150-180k wouldn't be love. I've heard Disney and a few other studios are in the $150-160k range for like 5th-6th years. I think making over $200k in-house is pretty rare for a mid-level in LA.

[Anonymous User]

FWIW, position in SoCal:

150K salary
15% bonus
5% 401K match.

Third year corp associate.

From my (fairly limited) knowledge, I'd say this is a decent baseline. Anything more is gravy.