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I'm a first year associate at a big law firm and I'm bored out of my fucking mind. Does anyone else (everyone else?) feel that way?

I don't care about anything I'm doing or how well I do it. I thought law school was generally boring, but I expected it to get better in practice. Nope, I'm just as bored with the work, I just have to do it more often now. Will it get better?

I used to be a teacher. I thought it could be a sort of annoying job and, of course, didn't like the pay. Now that I'm seeing the mind-numbing drudgery of an office job, I'm thinking about going back.

LOL Biglaw is one of a handful of jobs where you're both bored and stressed out all the time for long hours

It doesn't get better..just more stressful.

As you become more senior, the work becomes somewhat less boring. But the level of responsibility increases, as does the stress.

What viable career options are there for someone with a liberal arts degree, a t6 law degree and 1 year of biglaw experience? I feel like I want to leave but I have nowhere to go..

Anonymous User wrote:What viable career options are there for someone with a liberal arts degree, a t6 law degree and 1 year of biglaw experience? I feel like I want to leave but I have nowhere to go..

Accept the sunk cost and get more education? Coding bootcamps don't take much time or $ and supposedly get you a pretty high paying job at the end. Whether it's actually better than biglaw is a whole other thing.

Danny Mothers wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:What viable career options are there for someone with a liberal arts degree, a t6 law degree and 1 year of biglaw experience? I feel like I want to leave but I have nowhere to go..

Accept the sunk cost and get more education? Coding bootcamps don't take much time or $ and supposedly get you a pretty high paying job at the end. Whether it's actually better than biglaw is a whole other thing.

That ship has pretty much sailed. Getting a CS degree isn't the gold mine it used to be (about 3-5 years ago). Now, everyone's coding. Friend of mine is a recruiter for Google and, at least in her department, she doesn't even consider candidates without a PhD.

You can always teach...

EDIT: Oh, I forgot the part that you were already a teacher. As ironic as it is to go full circle, I'm leaving my suggestion as-is.

Anonymous User wrote:I'm a first year associate at a big law firm and I'm bored out of my fucking mind. Does anyone else (everyone else?) feel that way?

I don't care about anything I'm doing or how well I do it. I thought law school was generally boring, but I expected it to get better in practice. Nope, I'm just as bored with the work, I just have to do it more often now. Will it get better?

I used to be a teacher. I thought it could be a sort of annoying job and, of course, didn't like the pay. Now that I'm seeing the mind-numbing drudgery of an office job, I'm thinking about going back.

Become a public defender or prosecuting attorney. I don't think you would find yourself as bored as you are in biglaw. At least in those two jobs you would be going to court and speaking with clients or other interested parties in the cases.

kellyfrost wrote:Become a public defender or prosecuting attorney. I don't think you would find yourself as bored as you are in biglaw. At least in those two jobs you would be going to court and speaking with clients or other interested parties in the cases.

Very true - neither public defenders or prosecutors are bored. Underpaid and understaffed.

Biglaw Investor wrote:

kellyfrost wrote:Become a public defender or prosecuting attorney. I don't think you would find yourself as bored as you are in biglaw. At least in those two jobs you would be going to court and speaking with clients or other interested parties in the cases.

Very true - neither public defenders or prosecutors are bored. Underpaid and understaffed.

It seems like an interesting gig. The work and pay probably isn't for everyone's tastes, but if OP is bored at biglaw and wants to try something a little bit different in the law, why not one of those gigs?

kellyfrost wrote:

Biglaw Investor wrote:

kellyfrost wrote:Become a public defender or prosecuting attorney. I don't think you would find yourself as bored as you are in biglaw. At least in those two jobs you would be going to court and speaking with clients or other interested parties in the cases.

Very true - neither public defenders or prosecutors are bored. Underpaid and understaffed.

It seems like an interesting gig. The work and pay probably isn't for everyone's tastes, but if OP is bored at biglaw and wants to try something a little bit different in the law, why not one of those gigs?

I agree with you. They are interesting gigs, in part because they're underpaid and understaffed so they end up with a lot more experience and work. The ADAs always have interesting stories to tell at the end of each day at the bar.

1styearlateral wrote:

Danny Mothers wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:What viable career options are there for someone with a liberal arts degree, a t6 law degree and 1 year of biglaw experience? I feel like I want to leave but I have nowhere to go..

Accept the sunk cost and get more education? Coding bootcamps don't take much time or $ and supposedly get you a pretty high paying job at the end. Whether it's actually better than biglaw is a whole other thing.

That ship has pretty much sailed. Getting a CS degree isn't the gold mine it used to be (about 3-5 years ago). Now, everyone's coding. Friend of mine is a recruiter for Google and, at least in her department, she doesn't even consider candidates without a PhD.

You can always teach...

EDIT: Oh, I forgot the part that you were already a teacher. As ironic as it is to go full circle, I'm leaving my suggestion as-is.

For Google, yeah that's not really good enough, but a lot of start ups hire out of coding bootcamps.

That said, not everyone is cut out for coding, and I would assume most lawyers/liberal arts majors couldn't do it well.

Anonymous User wrote:

1styearlateral wrote:

Danny Mothers wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:What viable career options are there for someone with a liberal arts degree, a t6 law degree and 1 year of biglaw experience? I feel like I want to leave but I have nowhere to go..

Accept the sunk cost and get more education? Coding bootcamps don't take much time or $ and supposedly get you a pretty high paying job at the end. Whether it's actually better than biglaw is a whole other thing.

That ship has pretty much sailed. Getting a CS degree isn't the gold mine it used to be (about 3-5 years ago). Now, everyone's coding. Friend of mine is a recruiter for Google and, at least in her department, she doesn't even consider candidates without a PhD.

You can always teach...

EDIT: Oh, I forgot the part that you were already a teacher. As ironic as it is to go full circle, I'm leaving my suggestion as-is.

For Google, yeah that's not really good enough, but a lot of start ups hire out of coding bootcamps.

That said, not everyone is cut out for coding, and I would assume most lawyers/liberal arts majors couldn't do it well.

I would assume most biglaw lawyers out of t14s could code just fine.

WestOfTheRest wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:

1styearlateral wrote:

Danny Mothers wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:What viable career options are there for someone with a liberal arts degree, a t6 law degree and 1 year of biglaw experience? I feel like I want to leave but I have nowhere to go..

Accept the sunk cost and get more education? Coding bootcamps don't take much time or $ and supposedly get you a pretty high paying job at the end. Whether it's actually better than biglaw is a whole other thing.

That ship has pretty much sailed. Getting a CS degree isn't the gold mine it used to be (about 3-5 years ago). Now, everyone's coding. Friend of mine is a recruiter for Google and, at least in her department, she doesn't even consider candidates without a PhD.

You can always teach...

EDIT: Oh, I forgot the part that you were already a teacher. As ironic as it is to go full circle, I'm leaving my suggestion as-is.

For Google, yeah that's not really good enough, but a lot of start ups hire out of coding bootcamps.

That said, not everyone is cut out for coding, and I would assume most lawyers/liberal arts majors couldn't do it well.

I would assume most biglaw lawyers out of t14s could code just fine.

Yea u don't learn programming or get jobs because of some scammy bootcamp. U get jobs because you are good which u can do by fucking googling, and having some good shit in ur portfolio

ballouttacontrol wrote:Yea u don't learn programming or get jobs because of some scammy bootcamp. U get jobs because you are good which u can do by fucking googling, and having some good shit in ur portfolio

That's not to say that learning to code is useless. Sure, you won't have a technical degree and you won't be able to sit for the patent bar, but at least you'll be able to converse with your tech-savvy and tech-centered clients.

I'd almost rather be a non-tech degree holding attorney who can code so as to not pigeonhole myself into a patent prosecution position. Then again, it's not the 80's anymore and there's far more coders/engineers going to law school today.

It's amazing to me how regularly these "biglaw sucks" threads turn into "coding is great" threads.

1styearlateral wrote:

ballouttacontrol wrote:Yea u don't learn programming or get jobs because of some scammy bootcamp. U get jobs because you are good which u can do by fucking googling, and having some good shit in ur portfolio

That's not to say that learning to code is useless. Sure, you won't have a technical degree and you won't be able to sit for the patent bar, but at least you'll be able to converse with your tech-savvy and tech-centered clients.

I'd almost rather be a non-tech degree holding attorney who can code so as to not pigeonhole myself into a patent prosecution position. Then again, it's not the 80's anymore and there's far more coders/engineers going to law school today.

Or do what I'm trying to do (Patent Attorney at mid-sized corp, doing mainly prosecution)... Get my company to pay for a MBA.

I would rather be lawyer than a programmer / coder. Especially if you approach the two occupations from the vantage point of "which of these would be less boring?"

kellyfrost wrote:I would rather be lawyer than a programmer / coder. Especially if you approach the two occupations from the vantage point of "which of these would be less boring?"

Have you practiced law?

rpupkin wrote:

kellyfrost wrote:I would rather be lawyer than a programmer / coder. Especially if you approach the two occupations from the vantage point of "which of these would be less boring?"

Have you practiced law?

Software companies definitely have better work environments. No doubt about that. And I can see how one could find the striking similarities between drafting/reviewing hundreds of legal documents and writing thousands of lines of code. For me, I'd personally like to work the legal side of the tech industry; I find the issues more interesting than the actual coding itself.

kellyfrost wrote:I would rather be lawyer than a programmer / coder. Especially if you approach the two occupations from the vantage point of "which of these would be less boring?"

I haven't programmed much (although my dad was a programmer for 40+ years). Depending on where you work, programming can require long hours, but I think it's much less stressful on average and on average has better QOL.

Law is just both boring and stressful. Compound that with long hours, it's a shitty profession.

To get off of the constant TLS circle jerk of coding, I second DA/PD work. If you get into a good county you can make about the same amount of $ (well over 100 for asst PD in chill CA countiesy). And the work seems fun as fuck, totally the opposite of biglaw. Seems like it'd be way more fun than 98% of mundane office jobs

rpupkin wrote:

kellyfrost wrote:I would rather be lawyer than a programmer / coder. Especially if you approach the two occupations from the vantage point of "which of these would be less boring?"

Have you practiced law?

Yes. In fact, I've done both. I'm not sure if you have ever practiced law or programmed, but if you have, you would know that the law is certainly the least "boring" of the two.

The work of a DA/PD is even awesome in small rural counties as well. Sometimes I wish I would have pursued that route.

kellyfrost wrote:

rpupkin wrote:

kellyfrost wrote:I would rather be lawyer than a programmer / coder. Especially if you approach the two occupations from the vantage point of "which of these would be less boring?"

Have you practiced law?

Yes. In fact, I've done both. I'm not sure if you have ever practiced law or programmed, but if you have, you would know that the law is certainly the least "boring" of the two.

Certainly the least boring? If you have actually programmed and have actually practiced law for a decent length of time, you would know that there are different types of programmers and different types of lawyers. Your categorical statement is ridiculous.

rpupkin wrote:

kellyfrost wrote:

rpupkin wrote:

kellyfrost wrote:I would rather be lawyer than a programmer / coder. Especially if you approach the two occupations from the vantage point of "which of these would be less boring?"

Have you practiced law?

Yes. In fact, I've done both. I'm not sure if you have ever practiced law or programmed, but if you have, you would know that the law is certainly the least "boring" of the two.

Certainly the least boring? If you have actually programmed and have actually practiced law for a decent length of time, you would know that there are different types of programmers and different types of lawyers. Your categorical statement is ridiculous.

You aren't a very good lawyer, are you?