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What are my options if I live in a "BigLaw" city (NYC) but don't necessarily want to go into BigLaw... right away or at all?

What can I do if I am not interested in litigating but would love to clerk, or would love to work for city or local government, but would also have an option to go into BigLaw or go in house after a few years?

I am mostly interested in regulatory, competition, anti-trust, or intellectual property work. Litigation is not my thing.

big fed, clerkship, or midlaw. that's about it. as with anything, there are exceptions.

What is an example of "big fed" and "midlaw?"

If litigation isn’t your thing, I’d cross out clerking now. Not only will you do exclusively litigation work, it’s going to be difficult to get a job outside of litigation. As the above poster said, of course there are exceptions.

Thanks for the reply!

It's my thing to the extent that I do not want to litigate, myself (but I have no objections at all about clerking). I don't know if I am making myself clear. I much prefer policy, transactional law, contracts, all the behind the scenes stuff, etc.

Essentially, I just want to be able to keep my options open. What would be an example of "big fed"?

Regulatory, competition and anti-trust sounds like Federal Government agency work that could eventually lead into biglaw. But, you are on the right website if you can get HB to respond.

Strikes me as a tax lawyer working for the IRS or a securities specialist at the SEC.

Anonymous User wrote:What is an example of "big fed" and "midlaw?"

big fed is a federal agency. IRS, SEC, FTC are examples. Midlaw is any medium sized law firm with middle market clients.

Got it! Seems like I want to aim for federal work then.

The most common people to go into big law from outside of law firms that are not litigators are (1) tax attorneys (from accounting firms), (2) patent attorneys, (3) healthcare attorneys and (4) FDA attorneys. There are other types of attorneys that do this, of course, but these are the most common.

If you are interested in tax, you could get a position with an accounting firm. The more specialized you are (ERISA, international tax, etc.) the more likely you would be to be able to get a job with a large law firm later. If you are just doing general tax it would be difficult. If you do this in NYC, you could also get an LLM in tax at NYU and this would make you more employable with big firms later as well.

Outside of that, you could potentially become a patent attorney if you have the background necessary to take the patent bar. You could then work for a corporation as a patent attorney or any number of organizations. If you were specialized enough and good at this you could get a job with a large law firm later. Patent law is more difficult and in demand than trademark law.

If you like healthcare-related law, you could work for a hospital or healthcare organization--these sorts of attorneys are in demand and attorneys go from these sorts of environments back to law firms all the time. There are not enough healthcare attorneys for the amount of demand in the market.

If you are interested in food and drug law, you could also try and get a job with the FDA and get a position with a law firm later. Food and drug attorneys are also in demand in the market--especially those from the FDA.

Outside of these disciplines, any type of law where there are going to be very few of (and the work is respected and in demand by large law firm) you in the market is likely to be the most helpful for working in a large law firm.

What about working for the SEC or DOJ or IRS or similar?

HarrisonBarnes wrote:
Outside of these disciplines, any type of law where there are going to be very few of (and the work is respected and in demand by large law firm) you in the market is likely to be the most helpful for working in a large law firm.

Would you argue that Data, Privacy and Cybersecurity law experience would fit into that category?