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First-year big law associate. I joined this firm after a hard-sell by a partner, in whose practice group I am primarily working. This partner is also the firm's assignment coordinator. My cases for this partner were slow, so I planned to seek work from another practice group I am interested in. As a courtesy I informed the partner of my intention. He then quickly conjured up some billable work for me to do. Well, that work is over, and now yet again I have nothing billable to do.

If I tell the partner again that I want to seek work from another practice area, I worry that he will be annoyed. On the other hand, I do not want to be on this partner's leash. I have no problem being enterprising and seeking other work, plus I need to hit hours so that I can get a market bonus and pay off loans.

Perhaps I should have joined a "free market" firm.

Any advice would be appreciated.

You're a brand new associate and it's the slow holiday period. Chill. And enjoy—It won't last.

Why do you think he's "depressing" your hours? IOW, why are you assuming nefarious intent here? I'm not getting anything suspicious out of what you've described so far.

If this is malicious, then yeah, maybe you want to branch out. If it's not, you literally just started; stop worrying so much about what's going to happen 9+ months from now.

Anonymous User wrote:First-year big law associate. I joined this firm after a hard-sell by a partner, in whose practice group I am primarily working. This partner is also the firm's assignment coordinator. My cases for this partner were slow, so I planned to seek work from another practice group I am interested in. As a courtesy I informed the partner of my intention. He then quickly conjured up some billable work for me to do. Well, that work is over, and now yet again I have nothing billable to do.

If I tell the partner again that I want to seek work from another practice area, I worry that he will be annoyed. On the other hand, I do not want to be on this partner's leash. I have no problem being enterprising and seeking other work, plus I need to hit hours so that I can get a market bonus and pay off loans.

Perhaps I should have joined a "free market" firm.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Dude free market is the worst. Be glad that all you have to do is the work this partner is giving him. I'd love to be able to go to someone and say, "Hey, I'm slow can I have work." And if they don't give it to you, not your fault. Who cares about getting a bonus. I'd take making 180k working less hours than the additional 15k or whatever you get your first year.

Are you less than six months in? If so relax. You will quickly learn that these are lean times before the storm. You don't need to be the hero. (Also the worst thing you could do would be to reach out to partners in other groups, get staffed on their cases, and then the other partner's stuff blows up. Great way to piss everyone off.)

Lacepiece23 wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:First-year big law associate. I joined this firm after a hard-sell by a partner, in whose practice group I am primarily working. This partner is also the firm's assignment coordinator. My cases for this partner were slow, so I planned to seek work from another practice group I am interested in. As a courtesy I informed the partner of my intention. He then quickly conjured up some billable work for me to do. Well, that work is over, and now yet again I have nothing billable to do.

If I tell the partner again that I want to seek work from another practice area, I worry that he will be annoyed. On the other hand, I do not want to be on this partner's leash. I have no problem being enterprising and seeking other work, plus I need to hit hours so that I can get a market bonus and pay off loans.

Perhaps I should have joined a "free market" firm.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Dude free market is the worst. Be glad that all you have to do is the work this partner is giving him. I'd love to be able to go to someone and say, "Hey, I'm slow can I have work." And if they don't give it to you, not your fault. Who cares about getting a bonus. I'd take making 180k working less hours than the additional 15k or whatever you get your first year.

The bonus is a big part of my debt repayment plan (I am a non-citizen so can't just do IBR). Also, your hours determine not only your bonus but also your continued employment and reputation at the firm.

I'd be interested in hearing you elaborate about free market firms. You can't just approach people for work when you're slow in those firms?

Anonymous User wrote:The bonus is a big part of my debt repayment plan (I am a non-citizen so can't just do IBR). Also, your hours determine not only your bonus but also your continued employment and reputation at the firm.

I'd be interested in hearing you elaborate about free market firms. You can't just approach people for work when you're slow in those firms?

First piece of advice is not to rely on a bonus for repayment plans (or really, any plans). You should always think of a bonus as a literal bonus to your income: something that helps you get from A to B, but not something you're required to have to get from A to B.

The "free market firm" approach is where any partner from anywhere comes and asks you to help them. It means you may have as many as 10 partners hounding you at any given point in time for work, assuming you have nothing better to do than to do their work, and not accepting "But five other guys I already work for asked be to do things" as an excuse unless you've already billed an exorbitant amount of hours that month. The upside is that you work with a lot of people, learn more by seeing how all these people deal with similar law, and you're probably not going to run out of work when 10 people are chasing you; the downside being that it's hard to keep more than half happy at any given point in time, leaving the other half bitter about it come review time, that you'll be incredibly busy trying to make everyone happy, and at the end of the day partners who are only 10% invested in you are not going to bat for you as much as a partner who is 90% invested in you, under the majority of circumstances.

Anonymous User wrote:The bonus is a big part of my debt repayment plan (I am a non-citizen so can't just do IBR). Also, your hours determine not only your bonus but also your continued employment and reputation at the firm.

Your hours as a first-year associate do not determine your reputation at the firm. Calm down.

Figure out whether that partner has clout and stick with him/her. If hours continue to be a problem, talk to the partner about it. But it sounds like you're on someone's good side and you're working to get off it.

rpupkin wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:The bonus is a big part of my debt repayment plan (I am a non-citizen so can't just do IBR). Also, your hours determine not only your bonus but also your continued employment and reputation at the firm.

Your hours as a first-year associate do not determine your reputation at the firm. Calm down.

Also, you're working under one partner. Your reputation with him primarily matters because you won't really be working with anyone else. I have friends in this situation and it's almost like a mini practice group. A partner and a couple associates (or just one). There won't really be a "reputation at the firm" because you're isolated within your mini group. Said partner can also go to bat for you since all your work flows from him.

If you're telling me that you just get to chill and work like 9-6 and only do stuff for one partner because he likes you that much and he's that protective of you and you only bill like 1000 hours a year and only get paid like 20K less a year I guarantee you that literally every big lawyer on this site would trade places with you in a second.

IN A SECOND

As everyone else said:

A) Your perception is not reality

B) If it is reality then you don't know how good you have it and you need to open your eyes

elendinel wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:The bonus is a big part of my debt repayment plan (I am a non-citizen so can't just do IBR). Also, your hours determine not only your bonus but also your continued employment and reputation at the firm.

I'd be interested in hearing you elaborate about free market firms. You can't just approach people for work when you're slow in those firms?

First piece of advice is not to rely on a bonus for repayment plans (or really, any plans). You should always think of a bonus as a literal bonus to your income: something that helps you get from A to B, but not something you're required to have to get from A to B.

The "free market firm" approach is where any partner from anywhere comes and asks you to help them. It means you may have as many as 10 partners hounding you at any given point in time for work, assuming you have nothing better to do than to do their work, and not accepting "But five other guys I already work for asked be to do things" as an excuse unless you've already billed an exorbitant amount of hours that month. The upside is that you work with a lot of people, learn more by seeing how all these people deal with similar law, and you're probably not going to run out of work when 10 people are chasing you; the downside being that it's hard to keep more than half happy at any given point in time, leaving the other half bitter about it come review time, that you'll be incredibly busy trying to make everyone happy, and at the end of the day partners who are only 10% invested in you are not going to bat for you as much as a partner who is 90% invested in you, under the majority of circumstances.

And don't forget if your firm is slow, you have to fight with every other associate over work. Good times.

You can, but get ready for the I don't have anything right now, but I'll keep you in mind. Then either a) they never get back to you or b) they give you a one off assignment a month later that you can't turn down because you asked for work. And you're there until 3 a.m. for no good reason, and it's normally something they want the next day, but the associate they like got too busy or was unavailable. Then you may here from them again, but more likely, they'll go back to using their favorite associate staffed on the case from the beginning.

Fucking gunners, man....

The bit about the bonus being the grand strategy to pay back the loans was pretty funny though.

Anonymous User wrote:You can, but get ready for the I don't have anything right now, but I'll keep you in mind. Then either a) they never get back to you or b) they give you a one off assignment a month later that you can't turn down because you asked for work. And you're there until 3 a.m. for no good reason, and it's normally something they want the next day, but the associate they like got too busy or was unavailable. Then you may here from them again, but more likely, they'll go back to using their favorite associate staffed on the case from the beginning.

Yep. That or you'll now be the partner's go-to last minute associate, to whom they'll give all projects that need to be done last-minute, because now they've found a sucker who will do what even their favorite associate doesn't want to do.