How much work a SA should do? Forum

[Anonymous User]

It's my fourth week of summer program, and I am having at least one day per week in which I don't have any substantive assignment to work on. The firm says we just need to complete one project per week but it seems more for litigation folks because I have already done eight projects as a corporate summer associate (some of them just required 2-3 hours). I don't want to compare, but one of peers in my group seems to be constantly onboard on something, which makes me bit worried. I have reached out to associates in my group, but they seem quite busy and have a hard time in finding "summer" assignments. I am spending such slow days working on a program-wide long-term assignment or networking (say hello to attorneys in my office). So far feedback on my work product is generally positive. What else I can do? I would appreciate any recommendations.

[icansortofmath]

Judging by recent posts, your situation seems to be normal and SAs aren’t supposed to get that much work.

[JHP]

Honestly, short of literally making up an assignment out of thin air for the summers, it is difficult to make sure each summer has the same number of projects, nonetheless the same type of project. It's really hard to make sure the summers are getting an even spread of work. Some summers get un/lucky (depending on how you see it) being staffed on something that may be a really busy deal that needs a lot of hands so the summer will actually need to do some work, or being staffed on a project in hopes that something comes up that the team trusts is the summer can handle.

Don't worry so much if some people are busier than you--probably just a luck of the draw.

[Anonymous User]

During my summer 1/3 of the associates hung out eating breakfast until 11:30, 1/3 billed 4-6 hours a day, and an unlucky few got recruited to research a Partner's law review articles and had a ton of work.

Everyone got offered.

[Anonymous User]

I’m having the same issue. Some days I have lots of work (4-8 billable hrs) and other days I literally have nothing to do (0-2 billables). I’ve reached out to multiple people and asked them if they needed any sort of help. Responses I got were “we will get back you you when we have something.” That’s all I can really do, right? Afraid if I keep asking I’ll just come off as annoying + I know they’re really busy.

It also doesn’t help that my office mate has been getting a lot of work and he keeps asking me every hour, “so what are you working on?”

[icansortofmath]

Totally normal. Anything beyond is gunnerish, which isn’t actually good, since you’d just be getting more opportunities to fuck up.

Unless you really want to weasel your way into a partner’s group, there really isn’t a reason to demand extra work. Enjoy your summer.