HYSC Median bid list Forum

[Anonymous User]

Targeting SF/NY (mild lean NY), would consider Chi. Semi-strong ties to SF and Chi. Solidly median (best grades in core doctrinals, if that matters, though slight downward trend between semesters). Litigation-focused, but would be interested in EC/VC. Any obvious contenders I'm forgetting/mistakes I'm making? Worth tossing an aggro bid at Munger/Keker (almost certainly wouldn't get them, but a girl can dream).

1. Latham NY
2. Orrick SF
3. Latham SF
4. Fenwick NY
5. Simpson Thacher NY
6. Goodwin SF
7. Covington SF
8. Gibson SF
9. MoFo SF Lit
10. Sullivan & Cromwell NY
11. Covington NY
12. Gibson NY
13. Paul Weiss SF
14. Debevoise SF
15. Milbank NY
16. Wilmer NY
17. Cleary NY
18. Davis Polk NY
19. Cooley NY
20. Debevoise NY
21. Cravath
22. A&P NY
23. Paul Weiss NY
24. K&E NY
25. Perkins Coie SF
26. MoFo NY
27. Sidley NY
28. Ropes & Grey NY
29. Davis Polk SV
30. MoFo SF Corp
31. Gunderson NY
32. Weil NY
33. Freshfields NY
34. Sidley Chicago
35. A&P Chicago
36. Jenner Chicago

---

Editing but not bumping for posterity's sake. Here was my final bidlist, with results. Note that "skipped" means that that firm only allows one interview in total so any lower bids for other offices aren't considered as bids.

1. Latham NY (Yes)
2. Orrick SF (No)
3. Latham SF (Skipped)
4. STB NY (Yes)
5. Covington SF (Yes)
6. Gibson SF (Yes)
7. Covington NY (Yes)
8. Gibson NY (Skipped)
9. Wilmer NY (Yes)
10. A&P NY (Yes)
11. SullCrom NY (Yes)
12. Debevoise SF (Yes)
13. Paul Weiss SF (Yes)
14. Cravath (Yes)
15. MoFo SF (Yes)
16. O'Melveney SF (Yes)
17. Milbank NY (Yes)
18. Debevoise NY (Yes)
19. Paul Weiss NY (Yes)
20. Cleary NY (Yes)
21. Cooley NY/SF (Yes)
22. Davis Polk NY (Yes)
23. Ropes NY (No -- DC was sharing bid slots which meant this one was more overbid than expected)
24. Kirkland NY (No, but almost immediately slots opened up so I was able to add it in)
25. Jenner SF (Yes)
26. Perkins Coie SF (Yes)
27. MoFo NY (skipped)
28. Sidley NY (No, slots opened up but I didn't end up taking one)
29. Davis Polk SV (skipped)
30. Farella SF (Yes)
31. Skadden NY (Yes)
32. Weil NY (Yes)
33. Freshfields NY (Yes)
34. Sidley Chicago (Yes)
35. A&P Chicago (Skipped)
36. Jenner Chicago (Skipped)

So, 26 interviews out of 30 true bids (discounting skips). Added after the fact: WLRK, K&E NY, K&E SF, WilmerHale SF, Fenwick SF/NY, Goodwin SF, O'Melveney NY, Selendy NY. 34 interviews total. We'll see what happens.

One thing I would note if you're looking at this and trying to decide on bids: keep an eye not just on overbid percentage, but on how many total slots there are. While Latham NY is a tough one to get, everyone who listed it at 2 got it because they had more slots than Orrick SF, where everyone had to list it at 1. So SUF (discussed later in this thread) isn't a perfect metric but it very much does help. Also keep an eeye out for when popular cities (e.g. DC) are on the schedule with NY--that can make a theoretically easier NY bid hardeer because you're up against the DC gunners.

[jotarokujo]

Targeting SF/NY (mild lean NY), would consider Chi. Semi-strong ties to SF and Chi. Solidly median (best grades in core doctrinals, if that matters, though slight downward trend between semesters). Litigation-focused, but would be interested in EC/VC. Any obvious contenders I'm forgetting/mistakes I'm making? Worth tossing an aggro bid at Munger/Keker (almost certainly wouldn't get them, but a girl can dream).

1. Latham NY
2. Orrick SF
3. Latham SF
4. Fenwick NY
5. Simpson Thacher NY
6. Goodwin SF
7. Covington SF
8. Gibson SF
9. MoFo SF Lit
10. Sullivan & Cromwell NY
11. Covington NY
12. Gibson NY
13. Paul Weiss SF
14. Debevoise SF
15. Milbank NY
16. Wilmer NY
17. Cleary NY
18. Davis Polk NY
19. Cooley NY
20. Debevoise NY
21. Cravath
22. A&P NY
23. Paul Weiss NY
24. K&E NY
25. Perkins Coie SF
26. MoFo NY
27. Sidley NY
28. Ropes & Grey NY
29. Davis Polk SV
30. MoFo SF Corp
31. Gunderson NY
32. Weil NY
33. Freshfields NY
34. Sidley Chicago
35. A&P Chicago
36. Jenner Chicago

if NY is your top choice in city, even though it's only a mild lean it's still one of the most important differentiating factors imo. so i would in general move all of your NYs up, especially paul weiss NY and Deb ny. I also think median gets cravath more often than you might think and you should move it way up

[Anonymous User]

Targeting SF/NY (mild lean NY), would consider Chi. Semi-strong ties to SF and Chi. Solidly median (best grades in core doctrinals, if that matters, though slight downward trend between semesters). Litigation-focused, but would be interested in EC/VC. Any obvious contenders I'm forgetting/mistakes I'm making? Worth tossing an aggro bid at Munger/Keker (almost certainly wouldn't get them, but a girl can dream).

1. Latham NY 3.1
2. Orrick SF 2.0
3. Latham SF 1.7
4. Fenwick NY 1.5
5. Simpson Thacher NY 1.5
6. Goodwin SF 1.4
7. Covington SF insufficient data
8. Gibson SF 1.4
9. MoFo SF Lit 1.2
10. Sullivan & Cromwell NY 1.1
11. Covington NY 1.3
12. Gibson NY 1.3
13. Paul Weiss SF insufficient data
14. Debevoise SF insufficient data
15. Milbank NY 1.3, but caused by an outlier 2020. 2019 and 2021 were both 0.9
16. Wilmer NY 1.3
17. Cleary NY 1.0
18. Davis Polk NY 0.8
19. Cooley NY 1.0
20. Debevoise NY 0.9
21. Cravath 1.0
22. A&P NY 1.2
23. Paul Weiss NY 0.9
24. K&E NY 1.1
25. Perkins Coie SF 1.1
26. MoFo NY didn't calculate this for some reason
27. Sidley NY insufficient data
28. Ropes & Grey NY 1.1
29. Davis Polk SV 1.0
30. MoFo SF Corp 0.9
31. Gunderson NY 0.9
32. Weil NY 0.8
33. Freshfields NY 0.7
34. Sidley Chicago 0.4
35. A&P Chicago insufficient data
36. Jenner Chicago insufficient data

if NY is your top choice in city, even though it's only a mild lean it's still one of the most important differentiating factors imo. so i would in general move all of your NYs up, especially paul weiss NY and Deb ny. I also think median gets cravath more often than you might think and you should move it way up

Historically those have been underbid or exactly filled, so I'm not too concerned. If you're curious, I added the 3-year slot utilization factor (i.e. average bids/slots) to your quote in bold. For reference, anything under 1.0 gets, on average, fewer bids than they have total slots. SF firms tend to have relatively few slots at OCI, so they get overbid quickly which is why I tended to rank them at the top even over NY firms I would, all else equal, prefer.

I reordered slightly on the advice of OCS after purely ranking on the SUF, and I think that threw things out of wack. Most obvious are dropping Mofo SF lit down a few pegs, pulling A&P/Wilmer to up right after Gibson NY, moving Ropes up a few slots, and maybe moving K&E NY up a few slots (though that depends on how my upcoming K&E Chi callback goes ig).

Edit: Actually, would also appreciate advice re: cities. I'm torn because while most of my college friends are in NY, and most of my law school friends are focused on NY/DC, my main hobbies (mountain biking, surfing, skiing) are all far easier to do in SF. I know biglaw won't give me all that much time for either, but would you go where you know more people or where you can do the things you like? I know its not exactly hard to get from one to the other (and as you can see, most firms I'm applying to have offices in both and I expect WFH will make inter-office transfers easier, even on a temporary basis), but where makes more sense for a "home base."

[Anonymous User]

Litigation-focused, but would be interested in EC/VC.

My two cents:

-- A little confused, since to me litigation and EC/VC are pretty much at the opposite end on the firm spectrum, i.e. firms with strong EC/VC don't have the strongest litigation practices, and firms with strong litigation don't have the strongest (if any) EC/VC practices. If you're primarily targeting litigation, not sure why e.g. Fenwick NY is in top 5 instead of a stronger litigation firm, especially given that litigation is generally more competitive. I'd personally replace Gunderson if EC/VC is secondary to litigation.

-- Is the reason you're not bidding on SF offices Cooley/Fenwick/Gunderson because you can only bid on one office? If not, seems odd that you're not bidding on those. Also add WSGR.

-- Seems like you're not interested in SV? (But then why DPW SV?)

[Anonymous User]

Litigation-focused, but would be interested in EC/VC.

My two cents:

-- A little confused, since to me litigation and EC/VC are pretty much at the opposite end on the firm spectrum, i.e. firms with strong EC/VC don't have the strongest litigation practices, and firms with strong litigation don't have the strongest (if any) EC/VC practices. If you're primarily targeting litigation, not sure why e.g. Fenwick NY is in top 5 instead of a stronger litigation firm, especially given that litigation is generally more competitive. I'd personally replace Gunderson if EC/VC is secondary to litigation.

-- Is the reason you're not bidding on SF offices Cooley/Fenwick/Gunderson because you can only bid on one office? If not, seems odd that you're not bidding on those. Also add WSGR.

-- Seems like you're not interested in SV? (But then why DPW SV?)

It's more that I have pre-LS experience working with small companies/founders, and I liked that element of the work even if I prefer some elements of litigation. Also,as you can see if you look at the version w/ the SUF, Fenwick gets 1.5 bids per slot normally, so if I'm getting that interview I want to put it high. By contrast, Cooley and Gunderson get 1.0 and 0.9 bids, respectively, so I felt comfortable bidding them lower.

Fenwick, Gunderson, Cooley, Ropes, and several other firms have unified schedules for some offices--for those, I listed only my top choice office (NY for all) even though I also subranked SF and SV.

I'm not really interested in SV, but I've met a couple partners at DPW there who seem chill. Also, as mentioned, I've subranked SV for several firms so even if it doesn't look like it's there, it's there.

[Anonymous User]

What’s even harder in biglaw is creating another community for yourself and making friends in a new city. I would not discount how important it is to have a good circle of people around you who you can spend time with outside of work (and rant to/with about biglaw life).

Outdoorsy things like mountain biking and surfing are definitely harder to find in NYC, but I say friends > hobbies. This is coming from an SF associate

[LBJ's Hair]

you can just say Chicago lol

[Anonymous User]

It's more that I have pre-LS experience working with small companies/founders, and I liked that element of the work even if I prefer some elements of litigation. Also,as you can see if you look at the version w/ the SUF, Fenwick gets 1.5 bids per slot normally, so if I'm getting that interview I want to put it high. By contrast, Cooley and Gunderson get 1.0 and 0.9 bids, respectively, so I felt comfortable bidding them lower.

Fenwick, Gunderson, Cooley, Ropes, and several other firms have unified schedules for some offices--for those, I listed only my top choice office (NY for all) even though I also subranked SF and SV.

I'm not really interested in SV, but I've met a couple partners at DPW there who seem chill. Also, as mentioned, I've subranked SV for several firms so even if it doesn't look like it's there, it's there.

Same anon. That makes more sense, the clarification is helpful. My point wasn't that Fenwick is too high given SUF, but rather that if litigation is your primary target, you should put a firm with stronger litigation practice with similar/higher SUF in your top 5. But it sounds like litigation isn't necessarily your primary target (or at least in the way I define "primary target").

I suppose my overall concern would be getting suboptimal bid results for both litigation and EC/VC by trying to capture both. Or similarly, suboptimal bid results for all of the cities you're bidding on. But I have no clue about the location aspect because I personally had bid on one market during my OCI.

Good luck with OCI.

[Anonymous User]

you can just say Chicago lol

Idk they said "semester."

[Anonymous User]

It's more that I have pre-LS experience working with small companies/founders, and I liked that element of the work even if I prefer some elements of litigation. Also,as you can see if you look at the version w/ the SUF, Fenwick gets 1.5 bids per slot normally, so if I'm getting that interview I want to put it high. By contrast, Cooley and Gunderson get 1.0 and 0.9 bids, respectively, so I felt comfortable bidding them lower.

Fenwick, Gunderson, Cooley, Ropes, and several other firms have unified schedules for some offices--for those, I listed only my top choice office (NY for all) even though I also subranked SF and SV.

I'm not really interested in SV, but I've met a couple partners at DPW there who seem chill. Also, as mentioned, I've subranked SV for several firms so even if it doesn't look like it's there, it's there.

Same anon. That makes more sense, the clarification is helpful. My point wasn't that Fenwick is too high given SUF, but rather that if litigation is your primary target, you should put a firm with stronger litigation practice with similar/higher SUF in your top 5. But it sounds like litigation isn't necessarily your primary target (or at least in the way I define "primary target").

I suppose my overall concern would be getting suboptimal bid results for both litigation and EC/VC by trying to capture both. Or similarly, suboptimal bid results for all of the cities you're bidding on. But I have no clue about the location aspect because I personally had bid on one market during my OCI.

Good luck with OCI.

I could move Fenwick down and move Cov/Gibson SF up, since I anticipate Cov SF having a high SUF based on my OCS advisor's commentary. Looking at our OCI's firm list, I don't really see major firms I haven't bid on in NY/SF, and given that NY is a disfavored market (at least on SUF) for us, I expect NY to be relatively easy. My main concern is not losing the good SF firms (Latham/Cov/Gibson/Orrick) given their high SUFs. The New York firms to worry about are, in order of SUF: Latham, STB, Cov, Gibson, Wilmer, A&P, Ropes, K&E, SullCrom, and maybe Cravath.

Part of the issue, especially with the firms right at 1.0-1.1, is that we don't know if the behavior generating those numbers is that a few interested people are ranking them high and they're otherwise not ranked, or if they're ranked all across peoples' bid lists and its only the occasional person who ranks them really low who misses. For some firms (Cooley), I think it's the former, while for others (Cravath) it may very well be the latter.

Also I realize I never answered why not WSGR. They're focused on later-stage companies for their EC/VC practice and don't do very much litigation, so including them didn't make sense to me.

[Anonymous User]

you can just say Chicago lol

Idk they said "semester."

unless they've changed how they do it the point thing also isn't a chicago thing

[Anonymous User]

you can just say Chicago lol

Idk they said "semester."

unless they've changed how they do it the point thing also isn't a chicago thing

a) not saying my school for privacy reasons
b) the point thing is just my calculation based on the information OCS gave us. I wish we had what Columbia does with the first failed bid calculation, because that would be much more informative.

[Anonymous User]

Okay, made some modifications based on your feedback; SUF calc included:

1. Latham NY 3.1
2. Orrick SF 2.0
3. Latham SF 1.7
4. Simpson Thacher NY 1.5
5. Covington SF insufficient data
6. Gibson SF 1.4
7. Covington NY 1.3
8. Gibson NY 1.3
9. Wilmer NY 1.3
10. A&P NY 1.2
11. SullCrom NY 1.1
12. Fenwick NY 1.5 (I'm betting a lot of SF/SV focused people put Fenwick as a backup to Cooley/WSGR)
13. Goodwin SF 1.4 (same)
14. Paul Weiss SF insufficient data
15. Debevoise SF insufficient data
16. Cravath 1.0
17. Milbank NY 1.3, but caused by an outlier 2020. 2019 and 2021 were both 0.9
18. K&E NY 1.1
19. Cleary NY 1.0.
20. Davis Polk NY 0.8
21. Cooley NY 1.0
22. Debevoise NY 0.9
23. Paul Weiss NY 0.9
24. MoFo SF 1.2 (Too risky to have them this low? I would take most of the NY firms listed above over MoFo, so idk if it makes sense to have them any higher)
25. Perkins Coie SF 1.1
26. Ropes & Gray NY 1.2 (Is this too low?)
27. MoFo NY didn't calculate this for some reason
28. Sidley NY insufficient data
29. Davis Polk SV 1.0
30. MoFo SF Corp 0.9
31. Gunderson NY 0.9
32. Weil NY 0.8
33. Freshfields NY 0.7
34. Sidley Chicago 0.4
35. A&P Chicago insufficient data
36. Jenner Chicago insufficient data

Edit: I'm almost tempted to jump 14/15/16 over 12/13 to maximize chances at PW/Deb SF and Cravath, especially with the report that deb SF is a growth center (one thing I'm weighing heavily is when a firm is growing its presence signficiantly--imo that likely increases partnership chances pretty significantly). That would likely kill Fenwick and Goodwin, though. Thinking about this vs when I first created the list, I'm probably okay with that but I would have to think about it.

Edit 2: Actually, what if I cut Fenwick and Gunderson, added Skadden and Akin NY (placement based on their SUF)? That would likely let me put Deb SF/PW SF/Cravath in 12/13/14 and really tighten my focus on NY/SF lit.

[Anonymous User]

Edit: I'm almost tempted to jump 14/15/16 over 12/13 to maximize chances at PW/Deb SF and Cravath, especially with the report that deb SF is a growth center (one thing I'm weighing heavily is when a firm is growing its presence signficiantly--imo that likely increases partnership chances pretty significantly). That would likely kill Fenwick and Goodwin, though. Thinking about this vs when I first created the list, I'm probably okay with that but I would have to think about it.

Partnership chances is something I would not consider at all at this point unless you're considering somewhere with a non-generic Big Law business model (litigation boutique, etc). It's just so minute. An increase from 1% to 3% is really not that significant.

Re: WSGR, yes they do a lot of late stage work nowadays but they're still one of the top EC/VC shops and do a lot of early stage work. Their securities litigation isn't bad either (Band 4 nationwide and Band 1 in CA). Also iirc they snagged like 5 partners from Munger recently. Not sure about their NY office specifically though.

[Anonymous User]

Generally I'm not thinking about partnership chances, except as one of several reasons that may weigh in favor of picking a growth office over a mothership (the much bigger reason is exposure to current partners and likely more leanly staffed teams). IMO any growth office will, by its very nature, have more substantive work for juniors/midlevels than an office that's focused on maintaining size.

[Baron7]

Edit: I'm almost tempted to jump 14/15/16 over 12/13 to maximize chances at PW/Deb SF and Cravath, especially with the report that deb SF is a growth center (one thing I'm weighing heavily is when a firm is growing its presence signficiantly--imo that likely increases partnership chances pretty significantly). That would likely kill Fenwick and Goodwin, though. Thinking about this vs when I first created the list, I'm probably okay with that but I would have to think about it.

Partnership chances is something I would not consider at all at this point unless you're considering somewhere with a non-generic Big Law business model (litigation boutique, etc). It's just so minute. An increase from 1% to 3% is really not that significant.

Re: WSGR, yes they do a lot of late stage work nowadays but they're still one of the top EC/VC shops and do a lot of early stage work. Their securities litigation isn't bad either (Band 4 nationwide and Band 1 in CA). Also iirc they snagged like 5 partners from Munger recently. Not sure about their NY office specifically though.

This is the conventional TLS wisdom, but a line of reasoning that I think is somewhat misguided. Yes, partnership is incredibly unlikely at any firm, but as you mentioned not equally unlikely. If someone has a present desire for partnership, there is nothing wrong with acting to maximize the chances of fulfilling that desire. Removing partnership considerations from the equation altogether is self-defeating.

[jotarokujo]

Edit: Actually, would also appreciate advice re: cities. I'm torn because while most of my college friends are in NY, and most of my law school friends are focused on NY/DC, my main hobbies (mountain biking, surfing, skiing) are all far easier to do in SF. I know biglaw won't give me all that much time for either, but would you go where you know more people or where you can do the things you like? I know its not exactly hard to get from one to the other (and as you can see, most firms I'm applying to have offices in both and I expect WFH will make inter-office transfers easier, even on a temporary basis), but where makes more sense for a "home base."

regarding this, i would say it depends how easily you make new friends. i personally have a really hard time actually making new friends because i feel like i need to know someone for a while to actually be someone's friend. but i'm not like most people. if you can make friends at least at a normal/average rate, it's probably worth it to go to SF because it really is a lot better for your hobbies as you say

so sure, friends>hobbies (for some), but if you will eventually make friends in SF, then in the long run SF will be better. SF could get better in terms of friends over time while NY will never get better in terms of hobbies

[Anonymous User]

Edit: Actually, would also appreciate advice re: cities. I'm torn because while most of my college friends are in NY, and most of my law school friends are focused on NY/DC, my main hobbies (mountain biking, surfing, skiing) are all far easier to do in SF. I know biglaw won't give me all that much time for either, but would you go where you know more people or where you can do the things you like? I know its not exactly hard to get from one to the other (and as you can see, most firms I'm applying to have offices in both and I expect WFH will make inter-office transfers easier, even on a temporary basis), but where makes more sense for a "home base."

regarding this, i would say it depends how easily you make new friends. i personally have a really hard time actually making new friends because i feel like i need to know someone for a while to actually be someone's friend. but i'm not like most people. if you can make friends at least at a normal/average rate, it's probably worth it to go to SF because it really is a lot better for your hobbies as you say

so sure, friends>hobbies (for some), but if you will eventually make friends in SF, then in the long run SF will be better. SF could get better in terms of friends over time while NY will never get better in terms of hobbies

OP here. Dammit. I'm very much socially anxious around people until I get to know them extremely well (talked myself into thinking everyone at my 1L firm hated me and I was going to get no offered because my mentors weren't taking me out to lunch as much as the others -- turned out I was just being anxious and they both had small kids to deal with at home so were more WFH than others at the firm). I guess that means NY, huh? I'll still apply for SF firms but yeah focusing on NY seems the best bet. Maybe eventually I can move out here full time.