Long term big law. Tax practice and others Forum

[Tax29]

Hi

Is it possible to survive Big Law for 10+ years without being invited to explore new paths (aka being fired) in a specialized area of ​​law, such as Tax?

All this assuming that you are not considered for partnership, but even in that case they prefer to have you working in the firm for your level of specialization and because there are few lawyers that handle your area.

With that premise, is a lawyer who specialized in Tax law less likely to be fired than someone who worked 7 years in Litigation or Corporate, because they are more fungible?

Is there any other group or specialty of law in which it is feasible to continue working in Big Law with more than 10 years of experience, in case of not being considered as a candidate for partnership?

[Anonymous User]

Hi

Is it possible to survive Big Law for 10+ years without being invited to explore new paths (aka being fired) in a specialized area of ​​law, such as Tax?

All this assuming that you are not considered for partnership, but even in that case they prefer to have you working in the firm for your level of specialization and because there are few lawyers that handle your area.

With that premise, is a lawyer who specialized in Tax law less likely to be fired than someone who worked 7 years in Litigation or Corporate, because they are more fungible?

Is there any other group or specialty of law in which it is feasible to continue working in Big Law with more than 10 years of experience, in case of not being considered as a candidate for partnership?

My biglaw firm has several tax counsel that will realistically never make partner but also won't ever get pushed out, unless maybe something really bad happens with the economy. Generally, those sort of people have a niche though, like partnership tax, financial products, etc.

I'm not sure a tax attorney is any less likely to get fired than a litigation or a corporate associate. It's rare for just one group of a firm to be adversely affected by the economy (BK is the only real exception I can think of off the top of my head). Normally the entire corporate practice and its support groups take a hit, so the theoretical layoff would involve corp, tax, compensation, etc. folks. If you happen to be in a tax practice that does a lot of controversy or non-M&A support work, then you might not have the same economic peaks and valleys as corporate, but you will definitely still have peaks and values.

Anything that is relatively niche, support group, or not a big money maker in relative terms lends itself to many counsel positions. For instance, tax, funds, trusts & estates, executive compensation, litigation, etc. normally have a good number of "counsel" positions.

[Anonymous User]

Hi

Is it possible to survive Big Law for 10+ years without being invited to explore new paths (aka being fired) in a specialized area of ​​law, such as Tax?

All this assuming that you are not considered for partnership, but even in that case they prefer to have you working in the firm for your level of specialization and because there are few lawyers that handle your area.

With that premise, is a lawyer who specialized in Tax law less likely to be fired than someone who worked 7 years in Litigation or Corporate, because they are more fungible?

Is there any other group or specialty of law in which it is feasible to continue working in Big Law with more than 10 years of experience, in case of not being considered as a candidate for partnership?

My biglaw firm has several tax counsel that will realistically never make partner but also won't ever get pushed out, unless maybe something really bad happens with the economy. Generally, those sort of people have a niche though, like partnership tax, financial products, etc.

I'm not sure a tax attorney is any less likely to get fired than a litigation or a corporate associate. It's rare for just one group of a firm to be adversely affected by the economy (BK is the only real exception I can think of off the top of my head). Normally the entire corporate practice and its support groups take a hit, so the theoretical layoff would involve corp, tax, compensation, etc. folks. If you happen to be in a tax practice that does a lot of controversy or non-M&A support work, then you might not have the same economic peaks and valleys as corporate, but you will definitely still have peaks and values.

Anything that is relatively niche, support group, or not a big money maker in relative terms lends itself to many counsel positions. For instance, tax, funds, trusts & estates, executive compensation, litigation, etc. normally have a good number of "counsel" positions.

Thank you!

Then, the conclusion would be that a tax attorney would be less likely to be pushed out than a corporate attorney in advanced years of his career, assuming both without possibilities of becoming a partner?

However, a corporate attorney would be more likely to become a partner than a niche attorney?

On the other hand, all this would not matter in an economic crisis where both, the tax attorney and the corporate attorney, have the same chances of being fired?

I ask because I am an international student and require a visa sponsor to work, so I prefer to choose an area where it is less likely that at 5-8 years I will be cordially asked to look for other options. This is because only the largest firms are willing to go through the visa process, being a position in a smaller firm or in-house gig more difficult to land.

[RedGiant]

It's too hard to generalize about things like this without knowing the firm and particular practice group dynamics. IME, knowing whether you'll even survive 5-8 years in biglaw is an enormous stretch. There are generally less "slots" for tax partners at most firms, period. It's an area of law where your knowledge base matters a ton...so if your firm has a few senior tax partners, unless your firm does a lot of certain types of work, it probably don't need a ton of junoir tax partners as well. If you like corporate, do corporate. If tax lights you up, there will be exit opps for you too, and some of them may sponsor you as well.