Which partners at your firms are notoriously terrible to work for? Forum

[Anonymous User]

Easter used to be a major holiday too that was respected. Look around. Not surprised in the slightest.

[Anonymous User]

Easter used to be a major holiday too that was respected. Look around. Not surprised in the slightest.

Just say Jews this is taking forever.

[Anonymous User]

Also find it amusing no one ever even thinks about Hindu holidays, apparently only Abrahamic religions matter in biglaw.

[Anonymous User]

I can only speak for myself but my view is that all holidays should be respected. I think most firms these days do respect other holidays and of course Christian holidays are right there on the calendar.

That said, the Jewish holidays stand out because of the work restrictions for those who observe. A far as I'm aware, other religions don't have that. So it's not just "I want to spend time with family" it's literally against my religion to flip a light switch. There's also a ton of non-sabbath holidays that we just have to work through (eg no one takes off for Chanukah, or Chol HaMoed, or any of the lesser fast days).

[Anonymous User]

Jonathan Schechter and Chris Hartmann at the Kirkland NY real estate group. They’re so toxic more than half the group left in 2021. Kirkland NY real estate group in general has a terrible reputation internally in the firm.

I always look up the attorneys mentioned here, and I notice two common themes (not universal, but for the majority of these folks):

1. They look like they were the kids stuffed in lockers in high school.
2. They went to mediocre law schools (GW, Iowa, Minnesota, NY Law School, etc.).

Perhaps these factors have led to them having massive chips on their shoulders and taking it out on associates.

This is a weird take on multiple levels.

I actually agree with the above wild generalization. The most insufferable folks tend to have at least one of those two traits.

[Anonymous User]

If you're going to acknowledge holidays or religious events or themed things, you should do all of them or at least the major ones. Also, lots of partners take off for Jewish holidays, so it's really shitty and inexcusable to force Muslims to work on holidays that come up only twice every YEAR.

Do big law partners accept/consider that certain practicing Jews strictly observe Shabbat? Is their being unavailable after sunset on Fridays an issue? Always figured it would be in transactional practice.

[Anonymous User]

You have to stand up for yourself to protect holidays. Most of the partners I worked with didn’t share my religion and didn’t much care about my holidays. I still never worked those holidays - if something came in I’d say it’s X holiday today and I’ll look at it tomorrow. If I wanted to be a hero and work through the holiday they would’ve let me and wouldn’t have felt bad about it, but they also wouldn’t tell me I couldn’t enjoy my holiday and had to work.

[Anonymous User]

You have to stand up for yourself to protect holidays. Most of the partners I worked with didn’t share my religion and didn’t much care about my holidays. I still never worked those holidays - if something came in I’d say it’s X holiday today and I’ll look at it tomorrow. If I wanted to be a hero and work through the holiday they would’ve let me and wouldn’t have felt bad about it, but they also wouldn’t tell me I couldn’t enjoy my holiday and had to work.

+1. At my firm most of the partners assume any holiday is just a suggestion - religious or otherwise. Those who wanted to protect their Easter Sunday had to be proactive about it just as much as I had to do the same for my Passover seder. In general I think the only time off firms truly respect without boundary setting is a honeymoon or parental leave. Everything else is up to you to protect. It sucks, but that's just the way things are.

With that said, any partner pushes back or suggests you don't need to / shouldn't take time for a religious holiday (regardless of the religion) is clearly out of line and bucking what I've generally seen as the trend. Most are supportive if you gently remind them that you're unavailable.

[Anonymous User]

You have to stand up for yourself to protect holidays. Most of the partners I worked with didn’t share my religion and didn’t much care about my holidays. I still never worked those holidays - if something came in I’d say it’s X holiday today and I’ll look at it tomorrow. If I wanted to be a hero and work through the holiday they would’ve let me and wouldn’t have felt bad about it, but they also wouldn’t tell me I couldn’t enjoy my holiday and had to work.

+1. At my firm most of the partners assume any holiday is just a suggestion - religious or otherwise. Those who wanted to protect their Easter Sunday had to be proactive about it just as much as I had to do the same for my Passover seder. In general I think the only time off firms truly respect without boundary setting is a honeymoon or parental leave. Everything else is up to you to protect. It sucks, but that's just the way things are.

With that said, any partner pushes back or suggests you don't need to / shouldn't take time for a religious holiday (regardless of the religion) is clearly out of line and bucking what I've generally seen as the trend. Most are supportive if you gently remind them that you're unavailable.

Part of the concern is not that if you push back you'd still be forced to work. It's the fact that the onus is on you to push back, so it will stand out, and there will be unstated, implicit feelings once you do push back ("this associate isn't as serious about making partner" or "this associate isn't as serious about making partner as these other associates") because the other major religious holidays are defaults.

[Anonymous User]

You have to stand up for yourself to protect holidays. Most of the partners I worked with didn’t share my religion and didn’t much care about my holidays. I still never worked those holidays - if something came in I’d say it’s X holiday today and I’ll look at it tomorrow. If I wanted to be a hero and work through the holiday they would’ve let me and wouldn’t have felt bad about it, but they also wouldn’t tell me I couldn’t enjoy my holiday and had to work.

+1. At my firm most of the partners assume any holiday is just a suggestion - religious or otherwise. Those who wanted to protect their Easter Sunday had to be proactive about it just as much as I had to do the same for my Passover seder. In general I think the only time off firms truly respect without boundary setting is a honeymoon or parental leave. Everything else is up to you to protect. It sucks, but that's just the way things are.

With that said, any partner pushes back or suggests you don't need to / shouldn't take time for a religious holiday (regardless of the religion) is clearly out of line and bucking what I've generally seen as the trend. Most are supportive if you gently remind them that you're unavailable.

Part of the concern is not that if you push back you'd still be forced to work. It's the fact that the onus is on you to push back, so it will stand out, and there will be unstated, implicit feelings once you do push back ("this associate isn't as serious about making partner" or "this associate isn't as serious about making partner as these other associates") because the other major religious holidays are defaults.

You’re really overthinking it. Nobody is losing out on partnership for visiting their mom and going to church on Easter. The whole point of standing up for yourself and setting a boundary is to show they can’t walk all over you literally every day. If they can’t even give you a holiday off, you probably won’t want to be a partner there anyway, and if you do, you probably won’t try to set the boundary to begin with.

[Anonymous User]

If you're going to acknowledge holidays or religious events or themed things, you should do all of them or at least the major ones. Also, lots of partners take off for Jewish holidays, so it's really shitty and inexcusable to force Muslims to work on holidays that come up only twice every YEAR.

Do big law partners accept/consider that certain practicing Jews strictly observe Shabbat? Is their being unavailable after sunset on Fridays an issue? Always figured it would be in transactional practice.

I've never had an issue. I communicate with the team, put an OOO, and log back in right after havdalah. I've heard through the grapevine that here and there you may encounter partners that are difficult.

[Anonymous User]

Jonathan Schechter and Chris Hartmann at the Kirkland NY real estate group. They’re so toxic more than half the group left in 2021. Kirkland NY real estate group in general has a terrible reputation internally in the firm.

I always look up the attorneys mentioned here, and I notice two common themes (not universal, but for the majority of these folks):

1. They look like they were the kids stuffed in lockers in high school.
2. They went to mediocre law schools (GW, Iowa, Minnesota, NY Law School, etc.).

Perhaps these factors have led to them having massive chips on their shoulders and taking it out on associates.

This is a weird take on multiple levels.

I actually agree with the above wild generalization. The most insufferable folks tend to have at least one of those two traits.

Possibly. But I also find this bullying attitude just as insufferable.

[Anonymous User]

You have to stand up for yourself to protect holidays. Most of the partners I worked with didn’t share my religion and didn’t much care about my holidays. I still never worked those holidays - if something came in I’d say it’s X holiday today and I’ll look at it tomorrow. If I wanted to be a hero and work through the holiday they would’ve let me and wouldn’t have felt bad about it, but they also wouldn’t tell me I couldn’t enjoy my holiday and had to work.

+1. At my firm most of the partners assume any holiday is just a suggestion - religious or otherwise. Those who wanted to protect their Easter Sunday had to be proactive about it just as much as I had to do the same for my Passover seder. In general I think the only time off firms truly respect without boundary setting is a honeymoon or parental leave. Everything else is up to you to protect. It sucks, but that's just the way things are.

With that said, any partner pushes back or suggests you don't need to / shouldn't take time for a religious holiday (regardless of the religion) is clearly out of line and bucking what I've generally seen as the trend. Most are supportive if you gently remind them that you're unavailable.

Part of the concern is not that if you push back you'd still be forced to work. It's the fact that the onus is on you to push back, so it will stand out, and there will be unstated, implicit feelings once you do push back ("this associate isn't as serious about making partner" or "this associate isn't as serious about making partner as these other associates") because the other major religious holidays are defaults.

If an associate is this concerned about how something like this impacts their partnership prospects, it seems unlikely they would make partner in the first place. Part of the partner hunt is making yourself important enough that you have the space to ask for important days off without causing any issues or doubts in the partners above you that will be advocating for you when the vote comes up. In a weird way, some partners can interpret it as weakness when an associate never stands up for themselves.

Of course importantly, it's all completely arbitrary and pretty much no one one should expect to make partner as a matter of course. At my V10 the heir-apparents are very, very clear and everyone else knows they'll be lateraling if they want to make partner. One thing I know for sure is that the "favored associates" in my group are definitely the type of people that stand up for themselves when they need to, and the partners respect it. They're also rising stars in their field who are already appearing in legal publications, so I suppose they have some leverage.

[Anonymous User]

Also find it amusing no one ever even thinks about Hindu holidays, apparently only Abrahamic religions matter in biglaw.

Other than the Birth of the Bab, Baháʼí holidays are almost completely ignored

[Anonymous User]

Also find it amusing no one ever even thinks about Hindu holidays, apparently only Abrahamic religions matter in biglaw.

Other than the Birth of the Bab, Baháʼí holidays are almost completely ignored

I don't think it's about people thinking that only certain holidays matter, it's just lack of knowledge of those holidays. And even if people have a sense of what the holidays are (more and more people have heard of Diwali, for instance), there is not a clear sense of when they fall. I'd argue that broad cultural awareness of holidays doesn't even extend to all the Abrahamic faiths -- most people only really know Christian and Jewish holidays, and may know about Ramadan if/when it coincides with Christian and Jewish holidays. Overall, I don't think people's ignorance should be interpreted as animosity, just a simple lack of knowledge that the vast majority of people are open to being remedied, so if you are a member of a tradition that is less visible in the US and you want your holiday, you will likely have to speak up about it and then it will likely be respected.

[Anonymous User]

I have never gotten flack from a partner for taking Eid off. In fact, most partners have made clear to me (and other associates) that I shouldn't be expected to respond on Eid. Unfair to put the burden on the associate to set that boundary. Partners expecting responsiveness on religious holidays (Muslim, Jewish, Bahai, Hindu, Wiccan, who cares) are assholes.

[Anonymous User]

I have never gotten flack from a partner for taking Eid off. In fact, most partners have made clear to me (and other associates) that I shouldn't be expected to respond on Eid. Unfair to put the burden on the associate to set that boundary. Partners expecting responsiveness on religious holidays (Muslim, Jewish, Bahai, Hindu, Wiccan, who cares) are assholes.

If they don’t know what it is or when it is, it is on the associate to set that boundary. In a perfect world everyone would know everyone’s holidays, but we don’t live in that world. Once you’ve made them aware, then yes they’re an asshole if they expect responsiveness. If you’ve given them no reason to be aware, it’s hard to blame them.

[Anonymous User]

You have to stand up for yourself to protect holidays. Most of the partners I worked with didn’t share my religion and didn’t much care about my holidays. I still never worked those holidays - if something came in I’d say it’s X holiday today and I’ll look at it tomorrow. If I wanted to be a hero and work through the holiday they would’ve let me and wouldn’t have felt bad about it, but they also wouldn’t tell me I couldn’t enjoy my holiday and had to work.

+1. At my firm most of the partners assume any holiday is just a suggestion - religious or otherwise. Those who wanted to protect their Easter Sunday had to be proactive about it just as much as I had to do the same for my Passover seder. In general I think the only time off firms truly respect without boundary setting is a honeymoon or parental leave. Everything else is up to you to protect. It sucks, but that's just the way things are.

With that said, any partner pushes back or suggests you don't need to / shouldn't take time for a religious holiday (regardless of the religion) is clearly out of line and bucking what I've generally seen as the trend. Most are supportive if you gently remind them that you're unavailable.

Part of the concern is not that if you push back you'd still be forced to work. It's the fact that the onus is on you to push back, so it will stand out, and there will be unstated, implicit feelings once you do push back ("this associate isn't as serious about making partner" or "this associate isn't as serious about making partner as these other associates") because the other major religious holidays are defaults.

Others have responded appropriately but I want to chime in that this is a totally bullshit response that could only makes matters worse. The fewer people who push back, the more "stand out[ish]" pushing back could sound. But regardless, we're not there yet on religious holidays, so don't push your own insecurities off on others in an effort to make an issue out of nothing. Just take the time and stop overthinking it.

To be clear, this advice doesn't apply to everything you might want time off for. But on the spectrum from "yeah they probably shouldn't respond to emails while they are in a coma" to "picking your nose is no excuse for sitting this doc review out," any religious obligation is leagues closer to the former.

[Anonymous User]

I have never gotten flack from a partner for taking Eid off. In fact, most partners have made clear to me (and other associates) that I shouldn't be expected to respond on Eid. Unfair to put the burden on the associate to set that boundary. Partners expecting responsiveness on religious holidays (Muslim, Jewish, Bahai, Hindu, Wiccan, who cares) are assholes.

If they don’t know what it is or when it is, it is on the associate to set that boundary. In a perfect world everyone would know everyone’s holidays, but we don’t live in that world. Once you’ve made them aware, then yes they’re an asshole if they expect responsiveness. If you’ve given them no reason to be aware, it’s hard to blame them.

No. This is just flat-out wrong. We're not saying individual partners should go out and Google "what are the holidays Muslims celebrate and what dates do they fall on this year?" We're saying the firm should proactively publish this material internally in just the way it proactively publishes material internally re firm's dates off for holidays like Christmas, or sends email blasts that it's Women's Month, or Black History Month, or whatever.

Big Law employs not just associates, paralegals, and partners. You think Jon Ballis writes those end-of-week emails and holiday/monthly theme blasts himself?

[Anonymous User]

I can only speak for myself but my view is that all holidays should be respected. I think most firms these days do respect other holidays and of course Christian holidays are right there on the calendar.

That said, the Jewish holidays stand out because of the work restrictions for those who observe. A far as I'm aware, other religions don't have that. So it's not just "I want to spend time with family" it's literally against my religion to flip a light switch. There's also a ton of non-sabbath holidays that we just have to work through (eg no one takes off for Chanukah, or Chol HaMoed, or any of the lesser fast days).

In my experience most frum biglaw attorneys with kids take off some or all of chol hamoed (with the usual caveats for a trial or major deal closing, etc.) and volunteer to be on call on Thanksgiving, between Christmas and New Years, etc. It tends to balance out in the end.

[Anonymous User]

I have never gotten flack from a partner for taking Eid off. In fact, most partners have made clear to me (and other associates) that I shouldn't be expected to respond on Eid. Unfair to put the burden on the associate to set that boundary. Partners expecting responsiveness on religious holidays (Muslim, Jewish, Bahai, Hindu, Wiccan, who cares) are assholes.

If they don’t know what it is or when it is, it is on the associate to set that boundary. In a perfect world everyone would know everyone’s holidays, but we don’t live in that world. Once you’ve made them aware, then yes they’re an asshole if they expect responsiveness. If you’ve given them no reason to be aware, it’s hard to blame them.

Original Muslim associate here. I’m not advocating for people to just straight up disappear on religious holidays. But I’ll send out a heads up the prior week explaining that it’s Eid and then have an out-of-office up on Eid itself. Emails addressed to me on Eid itself usually have some type of “NOT URGENT, NO NEED TO REPLY UNTIL YOURE BACK.”

I was under the impression these KE guys ignored all of the prior heads up and that people ITT placed the burden on associates for not drawing that boundary.

[Anonymous User]

I have never gotten flack from a partner for taking Eid off. In fact, most partners have made clear to me (and other associates) that I shouldn't be expected to respond on Eid. Unfair to put the burden on the associate to set that boundary. Partners expecting responsiveness on religious holidays (Muslim, Jewish, Bahai, Hindu, Wiccan, who cares) are assholes.

If they don’t know what it is or when it is, it is on the associate to set that boundary. In a perfect world everyone would know everyone’s holidays, but we don’t live in that world. Once you’ve made them aware, then yes they’re an asshole if they expect responsiveness. If you’ve given them no reason to be aware, it’s hard to blame them.

No. This is just flat-out wrong. We're not saying individual partners should go out and Google "what are the holidays Muslims celebrate and what dates do they fall on this year?" We're saying the firm should proactively publish this material internally in just the way it proactively publishes material internally re firm's dates off for holidays like Christmas, or sends email blasts that it's Women's Month, or Black History Month, or whatever.

Big Law employs not just associates, paralegals, and partners. You think Jon Ballis writes those end-of-week emails and holiday/monthly theme blasts himself?

How are they supposed to know what religion you are and therefore when to just expect you to be unavailable if you don’t tell them? Should they just assume based on how you look? That seems not great. The alternative is the firm asking everyone their religion - also something they don’t want to do and employees don’t want to answer. The only option that isn’t obviously problematic involves just telling the people you work with when you’ll be unavailable.

[Anonymous User]

I have never gotten flack from a partner for taking Eid off. In fact, most partners have made clear to me (and other associates) that I shouldn't be expected to respond on Eid. Unfair to put the burden on the associate to set that boundary. Partners expecting responsiveness on religious holidays (Muslim, Jewish, Bahai, Hindu, Wiccan, who cares) are assholes.

If they don’t know what it is or when it is, it is on the associate to set that boundary. In a perfect world everyone would know everyone’s holidays, but we don’t live in that world. Once you’ve made them aware, then yes they’re an asshole if they expect responsiveness. If you’ve given them no reason to be aware, it’s hard to blame them.

Original Muslim associate here. I’m not advocating for people to just straight up disappear on religious holidays. But I’ll send out a heads up the prior week explaining that it’s Eid and then have an out-of-office up on Eid itself. Emails addressed to me on Eid itself usually have some type of “NOT URGENT, NO NEED TO REPLY UNTIL YOURE BACK.”

I was under the impression these KE guys ignored all of the prior heads up and that people ITT placed the burden on associates for not drawing that boundary.

Count yourself lucky! I've been in the position where I sent the heads-up email a week in advance and the partner just forgets about it, proceeding to email me work on my religious day-off.

More to the point though, the folks ITT saying "it's on you to tell them" miss the point, which is that the default is, but should not be, that specifically Christian and Jewish days off are on everyone's calendars already and for the rest of us, well, it's on us. The Overton window can and should shift. Just b/c it's been only Christian and Jewish holidays for the last whatever-many decades as the default does not mean it has to be. What it takes to shift the Overton window is precisely NOT that we all, individually, just be proactive in specific cases. What it takes is resisting the default baseline as though it's something ethched in stone, or the most reasonable and fair policy already. We can, and should, point out that if the firm as a whole is going to recognize holidays/themed weeks etc., it can do so in a more thoughtful and systematic way.

[BrowsingTLS]

Love how this thread has gone far enough off track that we're debating and discussing firm treatment of holidays. FWIW, I think every religious (or no religious) holiday should be recognized to the same degree.

[Anonymous User]

Lol I just want the world to know how horrible the KE NY real estate group is and how unbelievably toxic and racist/sexist the partners there are. If you are a law student or junior associate, avoid avoid avoid!