Hey T14 2Ls Forum

[Anonymous User]

Wanted to post a message for the T14 rising 2Ls that I wish I’d gotten browsing this site before OCI/EIP. Don’t blow it. Reddit law school and law school admissions, upper-level students, professors, administrators, career counselors all make it seem like you have to really fuck up to not get a big law job. After all, the point of going to one of these schools is that big law is handed to you on a silver platter! Wasn’t true for me or the several others I know of at my T14 who struck out. (And no, before the comments, it’s a school much higher ranked than Georgetown.) I know plenty more who ended up places they’re unhappy with. You can have good grades, a normal personality, and a solid resume and still strike out if you’re lazy about this process. It’s not merit based, it’s about flexing connections and other attributes like diversity and practice area interest. Be especially wary if you’re at a school with opaque OCI/EIP data for bidding. And don’t believe the myth that if you strike out, your school’s career office has connections to get you a job anyway. Upper level students don’t share negative experiences out of pride, so it’s easy to believe the hype when you’re a 1L. Maybe the overall sense is less positive now anyways due to the economy, but please take advantage of the time before OCI/EIP to network heavily and secure some offers. You don’t get a do-over if you realize mid-August you’re fucked.

[Anonymous User]

True - a needed reminder especially now that pre-OCI is taking maybe up to one third or half of available offers in the market.

Classic T14 mistakes I’ve seen from people that have great credentials and good personalities but leave empty handed:

1) going for the gold in bidding with no safeties (usually litigators shooting for DC, but also corporate types that list Vault NYC right down the line and believe the internet tales of “easy to get” firms).
2) not doing pre-OCI
3) overemphasizing politics or other non-corporate client helping professional interests on the resume and in the interview (if you tell yourself that “I don't want a firm that won't accept me as I am” consider yourself at risk of whiffing at OCI. Get an offer you can live with first then let your freak flag fly.)

[mardash]

I’ll allow it, but I expect a “It’s Not Too Late” post in mid-August.

[papermateflair]

Pre-OCI can be a huge opportunity, and even if you can't land something then, having done ANY sort of networking before OCI can give you a leg up when it comes to getting a callback at OCI. When I do OCI, if a candidate comes into the OCI screener and tells me they've already talked to a couple of people at the firm, and the people at the firm they already talked to tell someone that they were impressed by the candidate, it's almost an automatic callback. I know it feels like everyone at the firm is constantly being inundated with pre-OCI requests...but that's not true. I have never been contacted by a law student to chat pre-OCI. If someone from my undergrad or law school reached out I would be happy to talk to them (I'd be happy to talk to anyone, but I get that it would be hard to find an "angle" to talk to someone who you have nothing in common with). It takes 15 minutes to send an email - send one a day for the next month and see where it takes you.

[Anonymous User]

I’ll allow it, but I expect a “It’s Not Too Late” post in mid-August.

I mean it was too late for me. Things have changed with pre-OCI, there was more of a post-OCI market a few years ago I hear. T14 career counselor was visibly annoyed to be talking to me when I had no offers mid-August and told me to (1) reach out to family connections at big law firms if I had any (2) wait to see if any firms would contact the career office about remaining spots. They sent me listings for Stroock and a couple firms in small markets where I had no connections. I actually did a callback for one of those firms and they spent the entire time drilling me about where I was from, what I liked in a place to live, etc. And this was after my school discouraged pre-OCI and hyped up our school’s placement power all of 1L.

[Anonymous User]

Sorry to hear about the tough time OP.

What this post should hammer home for people is the importance of pre-OCI. It is incredibly important and central to the process these days. Don't sleep on it. Get an offer before OCI and then you can bid as aggressively as you want.

[Anonymous User]

Sorry to hear about the tough time OP.

What this post should hammer home for people is the importance of pre-OCI. It is incredibly important and central to the process these days. Don't sleep on it. Get an offer before OCI and then you can bid as aggressively as you want.

This 100%. Schools that limit pre-OCI are really screwing students over.

[Anonymous User]

Sorry to hear about the tough time OP.

What this post should hammer home for people is the importance of pre-OCI. It is incredibly important and central to the process these days. Don't sleep on it. Get an offer before OCI and then you can bid as aggressively as you want.

Entire school classes of 10 - 12 folks are getting scooped pre-OCI for some of the larger firms. Literally no spots left during OCI. Had to see it with my own eyes to believe it.

[Anonymous User]

I would also note that if you are nondiverse, targeting litigation, and don't have out of this world grades (top 10% or better), weird things can happen. I feel like my T14's career services office wasn't really upfront about how tough being a nondiverse litigation candidate can be, and it nearly led to me striking out. I got lucky and landed something I was really happy with, but got nothing throughout all of pre-OCI and did quite poorly at OCI itself as well.

[Anonymous User]

The real dilemma is what to do if you're at a school like Penn that is experimenting with a system based on Harvard's that severely limits pre-OCI opportunities. Just go for it, and eschew the official OCI? Just go for it, don't notify the school, and bid for OCI too? Not sure what the best course of action would be for a nondiverse lit candidate worried about options.

[Anonymous User]

There are no grades so strong that putting all of your eggs in the DC lit basket makes sense. Especially if you’re not diverse and don’t have ties.

But if you do it, apply all over the place in DC. Vault etc. are overrated for lit in general and DC in particular—everyone does pretty similar stuff and everyone is pretty to very selective.

[Anonymous User]

There are no grades so strong that putting all of your eggs in the DC lit basket makes sense. Especially if you’re not diverse and don’t have ties.

But if you do it, apply all over the place in DC. Vault etc. are overrated for lit in general and DC in particular—everyone does pretty similar stuff and everyone is pretty to very selective.

True. And unlike some markets I don't think ties in the sense of DC native matter too much. Matters more if you worked at DOJ antitrust before law school, etc.

[Anonymous User]

Adding my two cents. If you don’t have any lawyers in your family and are thinking lit because you don’t know what corporate does, seriously consider corporate. My experience has been as follows in the absence of having received such advice.

Struck out at OCI trying to go lit. Ended up at way below market lit boutique for 2L summer and was no offered because they couldn’t support hiring two summers. Was Top 40% of my class at the time of OCI, graduated Top 1/3. T10 law school.

Finally learned what Corp was through my Fed Tax and Corporate classes, and how shitty lit is from having had countless interviews and my summer experience. IMO, it comes down to the people and openness to creative ideas that seems more unique to corporate.

3L OCI, got picked up at a big regional firm for corporate work. Was then offered a bankruptcy clerkship in NY (not SDNY) but declined; tired of being broke and wanted to make $$$. 12 months later, I lateraled to non-NY major market V50 (corporate/PE) as a first year. Now senior associate and have a cognizable shot at partner. I also make more $$$ as a senior associate than partners at the firm that no offered me.

In the course of diligence for acquisitions and portfolio management, I regularly work with litigators. Prepared a cease and desist just the other day. Really like employment litigators, but very happy I don’t live in their world.

Your experience may be different than mine. I’m more business minded than lit. You could be a phenomenal litigator and love it. Just don’t go down the lit track solely because you have no idea what options are actually on the table. Read the book Gods at War and get an idea of what corporate is.

[jotarokujo]

Adding my two cents. If you don’t have any lawyers in your family and are thinking lit because you don’t know what corporate does, seriously consider corporate. My experience has been as follows in the absence of having received such advice.

Struck out at OCI trying to go lit. Ended up at way below market lit boutique for 2L summer and was no offered because they couldn’t support hiring two summers. Was Top 40% of my class at the time of OCI, graduated Top 1/3. T10 law school.

Finally learned what Corp was through my Fed Tax and Corporate classes, and how shitty lit is from having had countless interviews and my summer experience. IMO, it comes down to the people and openness to creative ideas that seems more unique to corporate.

3L OCI, got picked up at a big regional firm for corporate work. Was then offered a bankruptcy clerkship in NY (not SDNY) but declined; tired of being broke and wanted to make $$$. 12 months later, I lateraled to non-NY major market V50 (corporate/PE) as a first year. Now senior associate and have a cognizable shot at partner. I also make more $$$ as a senior associate than partners at the firm that no offered me.

In the course of diligence for acquisitions and portfolio management, I regularly work with litigators. Prepared a cease and desist just the other day. Really like employment litigators, but very happy I don’t live in their world.

Your experience may be different than mine. I’m more business minded than lit. You could be a phenomenal litigator and love it. Just don’t go down the lit track solely because you have no idea what options are actually on the table. Read the book Gods at War and get an idea of what corporate is.

good lesson here - if you're not sure what you want to do, try different class

[mardash]

I’ll allow it, but I expect a “It’s Not Too Late” post in mid-August.

I mean it was too late for me. Things have changed with pre-OCI, there was more of a post-OCI market a few years ago I hear. T14 career counselor was visibly annoyed to be talking to me when I had no offers mid-August and told me to (1) reach out to family connections at big law firms if I had any (2) wait to see if any firms would contact the career office about remaining spots. They sent me listings for Stroock and a couple firms in small markets where I had no connections. I actually did a callback for one of those firms and they spent the entire time drilling me about where I was from, what I liked in a place to live, etc. And this was after my school discouraged pre-OCI and hyped up our school’s placement power all of 1L.

That’s rough, I’m sorry to hear that. It’s never been easy to get one after OCI but it’s not impossible. Career services were not exactly “placing” them, but I was able to arrange a few post-OCI callbacks in 2015. They were all from firm postings for specific practice areas that were mass forwarded by career services. I ended up accepting one of two offers in October. Not a fun process, but it also wasn’t “too late.”

[Anonymous User]

I’ll allow it, but I expect a “It’s Not Too Late” post in mid-August.

I mean it was too late for me. Things have changed with pre-OCI, there was more of a post-OCI market a few years ago I hear. T14 career counselor was visibly annoyed to be talking to me when I had no offers mid-August and told me to (1) reach out to family connections at big law firms if I had any (2) wait to see if any firms would contact the career office about remaining spots. They sent me listings for Stroock and a couple firms in small markets where I had no connections. I actually did a callback for one of those firms and they spent the entire time drilling me about where I was from, what I liked in a place to live, etc. And this was after my school discouraged pre-OCI and hyped up our school’s placement power all of 1L.

That’s rough, I’m sorry to hear that. It’s never been easy to get one after OCI but it’s not impossible. Career services were not exactly “placing” them, but I was able to arrange a few post-OCI callbacks in 2015. They were all from firm postings for specific practice areas that were mass forwarded by career services. I ended up accepting one of two offers in October. Not a fun process, but it also wasn’t “too late.”

Agree. Even if you don’t get what you want this summer, find something worthwhile/fulfilling and keep networking/applying. The biggest battle is getting your foot in the door. Once you succeed in that, it becomes more of a meritocracy rather than a beauty pageant.

[Anonymous User]

I’ll allow it, but I expect a “It’s Not Too Late” post in mid-August.

I mean it was too late for me. Things have changed with pre-OCI, there was more of a post-OCI market a few years ago I hear. T14 career counselor was visibly annoyed to be talking to me when I had no offers mid-August and told me to (1) reach out to family connections at big law firms if I had any (2) wait to see if any firms would contact the career office about remaining spots. They sent me listings for Stroock and a couple firms in small markets where I had no connections. I actually did a callback for one of those firms and they spent the entire time drilling me about where I was from, what I liked in a place to live, etc. And this was after my school discouraged pre-OCI and hyped up our school’s placement power all of 1L.

That’s rough, I’m sorry to hear that. It’s never been easy to get one after OCI but it’s not impossible. Career services were not exactly “placing” them, but I was able to arrange a few post-OCI callbacks in 2015. They were all from firm postings for specific practice areas that were mass forwarded by career services. I ended up accepting one of two offers in October. Not a fun process, but it also wasn’t “too late.”

2015 was a different world. Late August is the new October.

[Anonymous User]

Might be too late but, is it still worth doing pre-OCI if you haven’t networked very much? Should someone try to network while applying to firms pre-OCI?

[Anonymous User]

Might be too late but, is it still worth doing pre-OCI if you haven’t networked very much? Should someone try to network while applying to firms pre-OCI?

No need to network now. Firms will hire 80% or more via pre-OCI. Try to network but getting the app in is more important.

[existentialcrisis]

Might be too late but, is it still worth doing pre-OCI if you haven’t networked very much? Should someone try to network while applying to firms pre-OCI?

No need to network now. Firms will hire 80%or more via pre-OCI. Try to network but getting the app in is more important.

It's been a long time since I did OCI, but got any cites for this figure?

Also once again, this is the problem with unnecessary anon, because people have no way to know whether you're a remotely credible source or not

[Anonymous User]

Might be too late but, is it still worth doing pre-OCI if you haven’t networked very much? Should someone try to network while applying to firms pre-OCI?

No need to network now. Firms will hire 80%or more via pre-OCI. Try to network but getting the app in is more important.

It's been a long time since I did OCI, but got any cites for this figure?

Also once again, this is the problem with unnecessary anon, because people have no way to know whether you're a remotely credible source or not

As someone who just finished the process, I can vouch that pre-OCI is the name of the game now. I don’t know if the number is as high as 80% but I know that if you aren’t doing pre-OCI, you are shooting your self in the foot a bit.

[existentialcrisis]

Might be too late but, is it still worth doing pre-OCI if you haven’t networked very much? Should someone try to network while applying to firms pre-OCI?

No need to network now. Firms will hire 80%or more via pre-OCI. Try to network but getting the app in is more important.

It's been a long time since I did OCI, but got any cites for this figure?

Also once again, this is the problem with unnecessary anon, because people have no way to know whether you're a remotely credible source or not

As someone who just finished the process, I can vouch that pre-OCI is the name of the game now. I don’t know if the number is as high as 80% but I know that if you aren’t doing pre-OCI, you are shooting your self in the foot a bit.

This sounds right and was trending that way even many years ago. The 80% though reeks of fearmongering

[Anonymous User]

Might be too late but, is it still worth doing pre-OCI if you haven’t networked very much? Should someone try to network while applying to firms pre-OCI?

No need to network now. Firms will hire 80%or more via pre-OCI. Try to network but getting the app in is more important.

It's been a long time since I did OCI, but got any cites for this figure?

Also once again, this is the problem with unnecessary anon, because people have no way to know whether you're a remotely credible source or not

As someone who just finished the process, I can vouch that pre-OCI is the name of the game now. I don’t know if the number is as high as 80% but I know that if you aren’t doing pre-OCI, you are shooting your self in the foot a bit.

Last year, I had firm partners straight up tell me in callbacks they they planned to hire 50+% of their summer classes before OCI, and it’s obviously more now.

[Anonymous User]

Might be too late but, is it still worth doing pre-OCI if you haven’t networked very much? Should someone try to network while applying to firms pre-OCI?

No need to network now. Firms will hire 80%or more via pre-OCI. Try to network but getting the app in is more important.

It's been a long time since I did OCI, but got any cites for this figure?

Also once again, this is the problem with unnecessary anon, because people have no way to know whether you're a remotely credible source or not

As someone who just finished the process, I can vouch that pre-OCI is the name of the game now. I don’t know if the number is as high as 80% but I know that if you aren’t doing pre-OCI, you are shooting your self in the foot a bit.

This sounds right and was trending that way even many years ago. The 80% though reeks of fearmongering

Different anon here. I agree that a solid figure is impossible to know across firms. But I don't think 80% is too far off base. My firm hired 3/4s of its summer class via pre-OCI last year (Source: partner told me). At this point, if you skip pre-OCI, you are making a bad decision. Anon for obvious reasons.

[Anonymous User]

Might be too late but, is it still worth doing pre-OCI if you haven’t networked very much? Should someone try to network while applying to firms pre-OCI?

No need to network now. Firms will hire 80%or more via pre-OCI. Try to network but getting the app in is more important.

It's been a long time since I did OCI, but got any cites for this figure?

Also once again, this is the problem with unnecessary anon, because people have no way to know whether you're a remotely credible source or not

As someone who just finished the process, I can vouch that pre-OCI is the name of the game now. I don’t know if the number is as high as 80% but I know that if you aren’t doing pre-OCI, you are shooting your self in the foot a bit.

This sounds right and was trending that way even many years ago. The 80% though reeks of fearmongering

Latham had to be somewhat close to 80% last year already…? I don’t think it’s fear mongering at all to say some firms will fill 80% or more before OCI. In my Davis Polk callback last year, a partner told me they filled the majority of the summer class the previous year via pre-OCI (so in 2021 recruiting for 2022).