Extremely basic question regarding OCI Forum

[NAMLEX]

Hi there,

I wondered if anyone could outline the basic format for applying for OCI interviews. Do applicants submit documents (cover letter, CV, references etc) before interviewing (I assume this to be the case) or are those provided at interview or after? If they are provided before, what sort of time period is it between applying for an interview and interviewing?

I notice that a lot of the OCI events are held quite early (July/Aug) and I'm just trying to get a general sense of the timeline.

Thanks

[UVA2B]

It depends entirely on the school, but at all schools I think you’ll have to load your documents onto their portal (likely symplicity) and the interviewers will have them in advance.

The key question is whether your school does lottery, pre-select, or some blend of the two.

[EminentDumain]

Your school should send out more info after finals are over, but yes, you submit all your docs online. Maybe the exception is a references page, especially if you want to use your 1L internship supervisor as a reference, because I think apps are due sometime in June usually.

The above comment about lottery/and bidding is also important to find out, as that will determine if you want to blast apps everywhere or if you need to come up with a strategy.

[NAMLEX]

It depends entirely on the school, but at all schools I think you’ll have to load your documents onto their portal (likely symplicity) and the interviewers will have them in advance.

The key question is whether your school does lottery, pre-select, or some blend of the two.

Thanks for this - very helpful.

What's the difference between lottery and pre-select?

[UVA2B]

Lottery means you rank firms, and interview slots are given out based on those ranked preferences regardless of your credentials (so you can bid a firm that you have not realistic shot at if you want it). Pre-select you’ll still put in preferences, but ultimately the firm controls who they interview based on every student who put them on their bid list. So even if it’s your number one choice, they control whether you’re given the time of day. And mixed is exactly that: some interviews given out via lottery, some from pre-selection.

[EminentDumain]

With the lottery system, if you’re bottom of the class and rank Cravath first choice, you could get an interview with them. But because you’re bottom of the class, your chance of getting an offer is probably very slim, and you’ve kind of wasted your bid. So with the lottery system, you need to be strategic about matching your ranked firms with your credentials.

[NAMLEX]

Thanks for these comments, they're very helpful.

I assumed that in any interview situation the employer would have some say in who they interview so in that respect the lottery system sounds like a good thing.

[NAMLEX]

With the lottery system, if you’re bottom of the class and rank Cravath first choice, you could get an interview with them. But because you’re bottom of the class, your chance of getting an offer is probably very slim, and you’ve kind of wasted your bid. So with the lottery system, you need to be strategic about matching your ranked firms with your credentials.

Are the employers aware how you ranked them?

[cavalier1138]

I assumed that in any interview situation the employer would have some say in who they interview so in that respect the lottery system sounds like a good thing.

Yes and no. Yes, it means that you might wow an interviewer and get a callback when they normally wouldn't have considered you. But it's more likely that you end up wasting screeners by prioritizing firms that you're simply not going to get a callback from. For example, if you have a 3.2 (I was going to name a school, but it really doesn't matter which one I pick), you could get a screener at Wachtell by bidding them high on your list. But you'd be wasting that interview slot, because you're not going to get an offer from Wachtell.

The key takeaway here is that you need to be strategic in your bidding. Throwing a few long-shots on your list isn't going to kill you, but if you're a median student at Michigan, don't bid exclusively DC firms, etc. Your career services office will let you know (if they haven't already) about GPA cutoffs for certain firms.

Are the employers aware how you ranked them?

Generally, no. But I don't want to guarantee that, because I only know how my school does this. That's likely to be true of anyone replying to you who isn't directly involved in firm hiring.

[NAMLEX]

I assumed that in any interview situation the employer would have some say in who they interview so in that respect the lottery system sounds like a good thing.

Yes and no. Yes, it means that you might wow an interviewer and get a callback when they normally wouldn't have considered you. But it's more likely that you end up wasting screeners by prioritizing firms that you're simply not going to get a callback from. For example, if you have a 3.2 (I was going to name a school, but it really doesn't matter which one I pick), you could get a screener at Wachtell by bidding them high on your list. But you'd be wasting that interview slot, because you're not going to get an offer from Wachtell.

The key takeaway here is that you need to be strategic in your bidding. Throwing a few long-shots on your list isn't going to kill you, but if you're a median student at Michigan, don't bid exclusively DC firms, etc. Your career services office will let you know (if they haven't already) about GPA cutoffs for certain firms.

Are the employers aware how you ranked them?

Generally, no. But I don't want to guarantee that, because I only know how my school does this. That's likely to be true of anyone replying to you who isn't directly involved in firm hiring.

Thanks for that, again, very helpful.

My target practice area is very specific so I would not be bidding on firms on the basis of general prestige. My choices would be determined by the firms practice groups - there is one firm that would undoubtedly be my first choice and 3-4 firms beyond that would be up there too. (I don't think any of those firms are in the top ten in terms of general prestige but they're probably all in the top 30.)

[cavalier1138]

My target practice area is very specific so I would not be bidding on firms on the basis of general prestige. My choices would be determined by the firms practice groups - there is one firm that would undoubtedly be my first choice and 3-4 firms beyond that would be up there too. (I don't think any of those firms are in the top ten in terms of general prestige but they're probably all in the top 30.)

It's not always a "general prestige" thing. Depending on which practice area you're referring to (i.e. not a specialized area that you already have relevant experience in), the issue is that firms often have observable GPA cutoffs for certain schools. Wachtell was just an obvious example. But there are a lot of firms that median or below-median T13 students don't have a shot at, and those numbers are school-specific. For example, a firm that extends callbacks to CCN students with a 3.3+ might require a 3.5+ from a lower T13. So if your five top firms all appear to be long-shots based on the data from career services, you need to make sure you have interviews at other firms, too. Dumb bidding at OCI can lock you out of a job.

It's hard to talk about this in the abstract, because so much depends on information that is highly specific to you and your school. If you have specific questions about your desired firms, you should bring them to your career services office after you have second semester grades.

[NAMLEX]

My target practice area is very specific so I would not be bidding on firms on the basis of general prestige. My choices would be determined by the firms practice groups - there is one firm that would undoubtedly be my first choice and 3-4 firms beyond that would be up there too. (I don't think any of those firms are in the top ten in terms of general prestige but they're probably all in the top 30.)

It's not always a "general prestige" thing. Depending on which practice area you're referring to (i.e. not a specialized area that you already have relevant experience in), the issue is that firms often have observable GPA cutoffs for certain schools. Wachtell was just an obvious example. But there are a lot of firms that median or below-median T13 students don't have a shot at, and those numbers are school-specific. For example, a firm that extends callbacks to CCN students with a 3.3+ might require a 3.5+ from a lower T13. So if your five top firms all appear to be long-shots based on the data from career services, you need to make sure you have interviews at other firms, too. Dumb bidding at OCI can lock you out of a job.

It's hard to talk about this in the abstract, because so much depends on information that is highly specific to you and your school. If you have specific questions about your desired firms, you should bring them to your career services office after you have second semester grades.

Thank you, most helpful.

[hreed]

In terms of what materials you provide, at my school the employer picks what is required or optional. Most employers only accepted a resume and transcript, although a few did ask for a cover letter or writing sample. Cravath required your undergraduate transcript, probably the one firm to do so. I do not think any asked for references.

[QContinuum]

In terms of what materials you provide, at my school the employer picks what is required or optional. Most employers only accepted a resume and transcript, although a few did ask for a cover letter or writing sample. Cravath required your undergraduate transcript, probably the one firm to do so. I do not think any asked for references.

I applied to two that did ask for references, but I don't think either ended up actually calling them (I received SA offers from both). But I'd just try to have two names in mind. I think I used one pre-law school reference and one 1L prof. Again, though, I don't think it mattered because I checked with one of my references afterward and they said they were never contacted.

Agreed that generally a resume and transcript were enough, with the occasional request for a CL/WS.

[hreed]

I wanted to say that if you want to be super prepared to get a copy of your undergraduate transcript because there was a guy who was working the hospitality suites and someone asked for his undergrad transcript. He hard time getting it and had to call the school and everything.

About references, I actually did just get an internship where they asked for references at the end of interview, which is really rare; but did not check. I think they might have just been trying to throw me a hint it was a "yes" but that is obviously just speculation. I do think it would be really rare for someone to actually check the references but not make an offer, especially for students. I think it is usually more of a due diligence thing, although obviously occasionally there could be an issue there.

There is actually law on this, a case where a physician left his previous hospital because he was stealing medication but the hospital still provided either a provided positive reference or only confirmed his employment (I do not remember which). I don't remember the holding and it is difficult to identify the tort but I want say it was some sort of breach of implied contract theory and while it would usually be okay to just confirm employment a professional duty existed to disclose adverse information like that. They might have lied and said they never give out references beyond confirming employment when actually they ordinarily would. The new hospital had suffered some sort of damages as a result of the physician in question's negligence. We read a few really nuanced cases about references so I could be misremembering. There was also a case where someone succeeded with a slander claim because a reference said something untrue, so this is all just a long way of saying, that if references are smart they will say very little decreasing the utility of the exercise. Ideally, of course, folks do not have adverse events in their background and would not ask, nor would references agree, if they knew of something adverse.

[nixy]

It’s true that a lot of employers will only confirm dates of employment, but that’s more of a background check thing. You should be providing as references people you’ve asked to be references, who have agreed and are willing actually to talk about you and what you’re like. (You’ll probably have profs anyway and they’re not former employers.) I agree that it isn’t likely to matter for OCI at all but it can matter for other jobs. You don’t give someone as a reference who’s only going to say “yes this person worked for me from Jan 2017-August 2018.”

[tommy77]

It depends entirely on the school, but at all schools I think you’ll have to load your documents onto their portal (likely symplicity) and the interviewers will have them in advance.

The key question is whether your school does lottery, pre-select, or some blend of the two.

This is the TCR

[notrub14]

Hi there,

I wondered if anyone could outline the basic format for applying for OCI interviews. Do applicants submit documents (cover letter, CV, references etc) before interviewing (I assume this to be the case) or are those provided at interview or after? If they are provided before, what sort of time period is it between applying for an interview and interviewing?

I notice that a lot of the OCI events are held quite early (July/Aug) and I'm just trying to get a general sense of the timeline.

Thanks

Harvard is bizarre and will not allow firms to request transcripts pre-interview. So everyone brings physical copies of their transcripts to interviews. I don't know if any other school does this though.

[NAMLEX]

Hi there,

I wondered if anyone could outline the basic format for applying for OCI interviews. Do applicants submit documents (cover letter, CV, references etc) before interviewing (I assume this to be the case) or are those provided at interview or after? If they are provided before, what sort of time period is it between applying for an interview and interviewing?

I notice that a lot of the OCI events are held quite early (July/Aug) and I'm just trying to get a general sense of the timeline.

Thanks

Harvard is bizarre and will not allow firms to request transcripts pre-interview. So everyone brings physical copies of their transcripts to interviews. I don't know if any other school does this though.

I also wondered about that - I would like to provide interviewers with hard copies of my documents. Is this generally done/acceptable? My reasons for applying to my top choice employers are quite specific and would certainly justify a dedicated cover letter to each employer.

[nixy]

You submit cover letters and resumes ahead of time, just not the transcript, and not in hard copy. There will be a deadline for submission in advance of the actual interviews, though I can’t remember how far in advance. Basically everyone submits materials electronically by date x, on date y the interview schedules are released, and on dates z onward the interviews take place.

[Wubbles]

You submit cover letters and resumes ahead of time, just not the transcript, and not in hard copy. There will be a deadline for submission in advance of the actual interviews, though I can’t remember how far in advance. Basically everyone submits materials electronically by date x, on date y the interview schedules are released, and on dates z onward the interviews take place.

Just in case some random person comes in here later, I would like to make note that most (all?) top law schools do not make use of cover letters for OCI

[nixy]

You submit cover letters and resumes ahead of time, just not the transcript, and not in hard copy. There will be a deadline for submission in advance of the actual interviews, though I can’t remember how far in advance. Basically everyone submits materials electronically by date x, on date y the interview schedules are released, and on dates z onward the interviews take place.

Just in case some random person comes in here later, I would like to make note that most (all?) top law schools do not make use of cover letters for OCI

Sorry, thanks for the correction. I’m most familiar with pre-select schools and I should have made that clear.

[Wubbles]

You submit cover letters and resumes ahead of time, just not the transcript, and not in hard copy. There will be a deadline for submission in advance of the actual interviews, though I can’t remember how far in advance. Basically everyone submits materials electronically by date x, on date y the interview schedules are released, and on dates z onward the interviews take place.

Just in case some random person comes in here later, I would like to make note that most (all?) top law schools do not make use of cover letters for OCI

Sorry, thanks for the correction. I’m most familiar with pre-select schools and I should have made that clear.

And that's why this thread is premature, especially now that I know the OP is asking because they're wanting to skirt around established procedures to somehow make a 2 year JD work

[nixy]

It sounds like what OP needs to do is mass mail and not rely on formal OCI.

[NAMLEX]

You submit cover letters and resumes ahead of time, just not the transcript, and not in hard copy. There will be a deadline for submission in advance of the actual interviews, though I can’t remember how far in advance. Basically everyone submits materials electronically by date x, on date y the interview schedules are released, and on dates z onward the interviews take place.

Just in case some random person comes in here later, I would like to make note that most (all?) top law schools do not make use of cover letters for OCI

Sorry, thanks for the correction. I’m most familiar with pre-select schools and I should have made that clear.

And that's why this thread is premature, especially now that I know the OP is asking because they're wanting to skirt around established procedures to somehow make a 2 year JD work

Hi Wubbles, I'm not trying to "skirt around established procedures", quite the opposite, I'm actually trying to comply with them!