Lateral - treated like I’m below my class year Forum

[Anonymous User]

Just wanted to see if this is normal or not.

I’m a 3rd year (can’t believe almost 4th) corporate associate. I’ve been at my new firm for over two months now and I’ve been busy - hit over 200 hours last month. I didn’t really have a problem getting integrated.

The issue I’m dealing with is that there is nobody below my class year in the office/group. So, naturally, I’m the low man on the totem pole. What this means is I’m doing tasks a first or second year would do and I do very little substantive work. When I left my old firm, I was starting to run deals and draft primary docs.

Part of the reason why I left my old firm is I didn’t feel like I was developing appropriately for my experience. It was a very general practice so I very rarely did the same thing often, leading to bad growth. Here, I’m a bit more specialized (but definitely have my fingers in a lot of pies), but I’m doing low level work.

Now, I’m not an ambitious person. I’m just cruising til I get a good in house gig. So, doing menial tasks is kind of nice. It’s not a lot of stress and stuff I know how to do quite well. On the flip side, being the bottom b-word again sucks and I have no one to delegate to. And, I don’t really think I’m developing.

Is this normal in my situation because they’re still feeling me out to figure out what I can handle? Or is this just the natural consequence of being the most junior person?

[UnfrozenCaveman]

Seems normal for being the most junior attorney. I don't mean this the way it reads, but did you think about the fact that there were no juniors before you lateralled?

[Yea All Right]

Seems to be expected considering you're the most junior. Can you delegate to junior associates in a general corporate group (if your firm has one), associates in other offices, paralegals, etc?

[Anonymous User]

Seems normal for being the most junior attorney. I don't mean this the way it reads, but did you think about the fact that there were no juniors before you lateralled?

Not really, didn’t really cross my mind. I figured I’d be too expensive to do most of this stuff. It’s a pretty interconnected firm so for big projects (e.g. M&A diligence) we will pull in juniors from other offices and that’s what was sold to me as normal practice.

The reality is that even if we do that I’m lumped in with them (though I personally have no problem having them report to me and giving them tasks) or if it’s smaller (e.g. equity financing diligence) it’s just me.

[UnfrozenCaveman]

I feel ya but honestly sounds like pretty normal 3rd year stuff ((at least in your bottom of the totem pole scenario).

[papermateflair]

I think that's just the nature of specialized (and smaller) groups. There are 3 associates total in my group, so even though I'm a senior associate, I have to do "first year" work from time to time. You'll also find that in a small group, there's no real standard for what a first/second year does vs a third/fourth year - it's not like there's a giant flashing light that pops up every time someone senior to you gives you work below your class level, you know? As a senior associate, I just want the work to get done so I don't have to do it, and honestly I'd rather a 3rd year do it sometimes than a 1st year, even if it's more expensive, because I know a 3rd year will do it right with less supervision.

Also, it sounds like you've landed in a busy group that may or may not be behind on work and needs you to help them out (how else do you bill 200 hours on your second month? that would never happen in my group). Give it a few months, and if you stay that busy, then maybe it's time to talk to the partners about making sure you get the type of work you're interested in, or hiring a first year. In the meantime, enjoy having the opportunity to be the "go-to" person for literally EVERYONE in the group, and work on building your reputation for excellent work (if it's really as easy as you say, you can crush it and build credibility for when you want to take on bigger projects).