biglaw associates: have you had to work on christmas day? Forum

[Anonymous User]

include your firm / hours / associate level

[swiftyredalbum]

I've heard of this happening 4 times in 4 years. I don't want to embarrass the firm by naming it. 3 of the times it involved a screw-up shortly before Christmas that had to be corrected rapidly. On the plus side a Partner sent eggnog.

[Anonymous User]

Yes, but not usually a full day or anything.

At Goodwin I had to work on pretty much every holiday (xmas the least, but more than once billed 8+ hours on Thanksgiving day and the Monday holidays were pretty much non-holidays even when not leading up to signing or closing).

[Anonymous User]

I’ve answered emails on my phone, but I’ve drawn the line at actual work (notwithstanding being asked to do so).

2300 / Seventh Year

[Anonymous User]

No longer a big law associate, but in the 8 years that I was an associate, I never worked on Christmas (Easter - definitely. Thanksgiving? Once or twice.). Gotta draw the line somewhere. Usually billed around 2000 hours as a tax attorney (about 60-70% of my time is spent supporting M&A).

[Anonymous User]

At this very moment the people on the other side of an M&A deal are trying to schedule closing on Christmas like a bunch of dickholes. Like bro... it’s not like we had to delay a December 21st closing and there’s nothing anyone could do, there’s plenty of time to avoid ruining the holidays for a few dozen people.

[Kikero]

My very first Christmas out of law school I was on a deal where our client was a losing bidder about a week before Christmas. On Christmas Eve our client got back into the process and Christmas through NYE were totally fucked. I remember getting a call in the parking lot outside of Christmas Eve mass with my family and had to take the car back home and work. Worst part is that our asshole clients never even had a realistic chance. When the refresh bids came in they were still the loser (by almost a billion dollars). So everyone called it the deal that was born on Christmas and died on New Year’s Day. Absolutely miserable.

Since then (about 7 years ago) I’ve had to send some emails on occasion but never really had to work on Christmas.

[SFSpartan]

Goodwin 7th year. Not once have I worked on Christmas beyond spending de minimis time responding to emails. Have been above 2600 each of the last 3 years.

[axiomaticapiary]

I'm disturbed by the "sending emails does not count as work" consensus in this thread

[SFSpartan]

I'm disturbed by the "sending emails does not count as work" consensus in this thread

It's just a different mental load. Replying to a handful of emails is fundamentally different than actual drafting.

[Anonymous User]

I think I can say this is one of the few days of the year (only?) I've never, ever worked, even in the worst times. And I have plenty of bad times stories, including working close to midnight on Christmas Eve one year from my parent's house (as a young associate) and working into the early morning of Easter Sunday from a hotel room (particularly regret that one although still managed to get myself together for church and brunch). Everyone has their line; Christmas is very special for me (like I'm sure many people) and I think that would be the one that triggered the "fuck it, I quit" from me, especially at the end of a stressful year.

I will say that, in general, December 24 - January 1 (and often the first week of January too) is an extremely quiet time at my firm (to be fair, I'm litigation not a tranny) and I work at a notorious workaholic place with some terrible partners. Even the partners seem to lie low for those two weeks before resuming their psychopathy.

[Anonymous User]

6th year, avg ~2100. Lucky to do zero work on Easter/ thanksgiving / xmas.

I get emails, but I don’t respond. A mix of luck and dodging partners who might think it’s OK to staff work then.

[Anonymous User]

not a tranny

can we not do that thanks

[Anonymous User]

Jones Day, 8th year, 3200 hours annualized, yes--turning documents on 12/25

[Anonymous User]

7th year, have generally billed 2000-2200. Never lifted a finger on christmas, one time sent one e-mail on Thanksgiving (confirming sign-off on something another party sent the night before)

[Anonymous User]

Jones Day, 8th year, 3200 hours annualized, yes--turning documents on 12/25

Quit

[Excellent117]

Jones Day, 8th year, 3200 hours annualized, yes--turning documents on 12/25

But why?

[12YrsAnAssociate]

My first year at a firm I spent 12 hours on Thanksgiving day doing "emergency" depo summaries for a partner. A month later the partner asked if I ever finished the depo summaries, and my head almost fucking exploded. The shithead hadn't even looked at the summaries I sent him on Thanksgiving, and they clearly weren't an emergency since he had sat on them for a month. I was "too busy" every time that douche asked me to work with him after that.

[JusticeChuckleNutz]

Jones Day, 8th year, 3200 hours annualized, yes--turning documents on 12/25

Quit

Seriously. You don't have to live like that. You know there are other firms that pay the same, and you work 1/3 less than you are rn?

[Anonymous User]

When I was a first year, a partner and I were drafting a client alert. He was trying to get me to turn edits of the client alert (which is not even fucking billable work) on Thanksgiving evening. I ignored his email and handled it the next day. Luckily, the partner left my firm shortly after.

[Anonymous User]

Never worked on Christmas, but luckily a partner I was working with told off a client who was trying to find a bank that would send wires on Christmas and I've gone to bat working for that partner since.

Did once close 8 deals in the 3 weekdays prior to Christmas eve though. Brutal.

[Anonymous User]

5th year in litigation and I only worked once on Christmas to revise some slides for a big client-facing strategy presentation. I probably could have done it on the 26th or 27th, but I was deep in my first year "I must turn edits within 24 hours or I'll get fired" phase. It only took 2 hours.

One other exception: I spend 0.1 every day before I get out of bed skimming through a targeted daily news update for client development purposes. Nothing important has come up on Christmas, but if it did I'd spend 0.1 forwarding the article to my team with a short summary. There's never any urgent follow-up, so I could probably skip it for a day and be fine. I'd put that in a different category from "emails don't count as working" folks. And I'm lucky enough that the firm gives me credit for it.

[Anonymous User]

I had to once as a third year. I’m not outing the firm because it was not due to the firm but a court deadline. We had a 23(f) Petition (interlocutory appeal of a class cert decision) due the day after Christmas. For anyone who has worked on class cert appeals knows, there’s only a 14-day window and it is very strict. So it was unavoidable.

[nealric]

I never had to work on Christmas as an associate. I think it helped that most of the partners in my group were Saturday sabbath observers and inherently understood the concept of turning off for major holidays (and didn't necessarily mind working Christmas themselves).

[Anonymous User]

I never once did a minute of work on Christmas Eve, Christmas, Thanksgiving or Easter in 5 years at a V30. I would have flatly refused. Fortunately nobody was sick enough to ask. I’ve had terrible Thanksgiving weekends, but Thanksgiving day was still radio silence. You need to draw the line somewhere - if you offer to do it, they’ll let you.