So you want to be a NY Corporate Associate? Forum

[7a1]

Tedium and the difficulty of making partner are real negatives. Most other careers offer promotions along the way and it isn't such an all-or-nothing proposition after a decade of work.

[jnwa]

Anyone have any advice for an 0L who thought he'd like biglaw then read this and cried but has a t14 full ride so he wont graduate with debt? Is there decent pay, decent hour legal jobs out of law school or is it just grind and make money in big law or grind and be poor doing public interest stuff. Also government doesnt work, im foreign.

[BernieTrump]

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[fliptrip]

I read through the entire thread and I still don't understand why you don't just quit.

and do what? fake SS disability?

I would quit for any non-law job that had any room for advancement. I'm willing to take an 80+% paycut. Nobody will even screen you.

Don't shoot me, please, but if you feel this way, why not say f* it, take the GMAT and go to the Stanford GSB (just for 2 years in paradise, HBS is also perfectly acceptable)? You are just a tick (but just a tick) old for b-school and you know that b-school is just about networking for your next step and you could easily get MBB and then you're off. You'd be on track to make partner at MBB right around when you turn 40. It's a convoluted route overall, to be sure, but seven figures at 40 is a pretty good outcome. You are interested in business which is the only pitch you need to make in interviews and you will have done the MBA so any fears about your quantitative skills would be addressed (actually, you're econ so no one will worry).

[BernieTrump]

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[zot1]

Anyone have any advice for an 0L who thought he'd like biglaw then read this and cried but has a t14 full ride so he wont graduate with debt? Is there decent pay, decent hour legal jobs out of law school or is it just grind and make money in big law or grind and be poor doing public interest stuff. Also government doesnt work, im foreign.

There are plenty of legal jobs that are actually fulfilling. They don't pay you as much, so have no debt will be helpful because you won't have loans to worry about.

Having no debt also means that you're in the awesome position to go try BigLaw and then leave in a year or two since you won't be chained to the work for the money.

I actually think you're in the best position to go to law school. That is, if the idea of being an attorney interests you.

[BernieTrump]

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[Brentwood]

Having no debt also means that you're in the awesome position to go try BigLaw and then leave in a year or two since you won't be chained to the work for the money.

I actually think you're in the best position to go to law school. That is, if the idea of being an attorney interests you.

What are exit ops like for someone who only dabbles in biglaw for 1-2 years? It's not intuitive to me that you could go join the peace corps or something if your only WE is pushing documents in corporate law

[7a1]

I've been an M&A lawyer for 15 years. There are pluses:

- you get to work with executives in some of the most important moments of their careers And they absolutely hate you when you have to work for them (they'll love you're off the clock and just small talking, but they hate having to deal with you. And they'll push down the work of "dealing with lawyers" to the most junior possible person, especially at places that are repeat players (i.e. private M&A players, as opposed to corporate M&A players)
- you get to work with smart people
- you get to work on challenging problems (or at a minimum, be challenged by arduous tasks) You correctly state that you can be challenged without it being a good thing. It's mindless, but only difficult because it is so extremely boring and everyone who matters care so little about what you're doing on the "legal points"
- the intensity of the work can give rise to strong relationships with clients and co-workers from having done battle together Agree on the corporate side. Again the repeat players tend to hate lawyers and will do everything they can to not talk to you or interact with you.
- the practice is increasingly global In yesteryear, that meant going to cool locations, meeting cool people, and getting a cool deal toy. Global deals in 2016 mean that I get up at 330AM for a conference call and 6AM for a conference call when I'm on a Europe deal
- there is less bureaucracy and time spent in meetings than I think in most corporate jobs This is a good point. The flip side is that you have 8 direct bosses (who don't care what you're doing for others and think only their stuff matters), as opposed to 1 anywhere else. But there is far less bureaucracy
- there is less travel than consulting or banking, meaning that after the junior associate years it's possible to eat healthy and exercise This is flatly wrong. Everyone gains the Seamless 17. Nobody works out, except people who can stomach the schedule and get up early (law starts late, so you can do things in the morning if you don't need sleep)
- given low overall economic growth, globalization and technological disruption, seems like there will be work to do for a while
- if you stick with it at the right firm, it's special to work alongside the same team of professional colleagues over the long-term

There are also many downsides, chief among them being the unpredictability of the work. It feels like working as an emergency first responder, prepared to drop everything at a moment's notice. That requires one's life to be re-configured around flexibility as the organizing principle a very euphemistic way of saying "my kid calls every male over 20 in the elevator dad and I'm not sure he could pick me out of a lineup" . It's easy to look back and see different alternatives as superior, but the ideal alternative occupation changes over time -- perhaps investment banking fifteen years ago, PE ten years ago, tech startups last year, maybe computer programming/AI today. But as I look at my colleagues from college and law school today, I see a lot of difficulties encountered in other professions too. I see people absolutely wanting to leave law at exponentially higher rates than anything else. Read the recent studies about lawyers having 5x the alcohol/depression issues as other professions, including much higher than the professions people think of like dentistry (triple point score if you read the footnotes where they note the highest rates of alcoholism and depression are for "firm lawyers" under 40). Take a look at how there are thriving consultancies in New York, paid by the lawyer by the hour, devoted to helping lawyers get out of law. Or just ask anyone 5 years out, who is or was at a big firm. Whereas many work-hard professions complain a lot, especially at the junior level, lawyers are the only ones who follow that with "and it wasn't worth it" as opposed to "but it was worth it go get where I am". ( Overall I'm satisfied with my career.

I respectfully disagree.

Fair enough. Just one person's experience. All of the downsides described on this board are real.

[Helioze]

Obviously ex ante if you want to be in consulting, business side F500, banking, etc. you should just hustle or go M7. But once you have significant experience managing junior lawyers on huge deals at an elite firm, there must be some way to spin that and a GMAT score into HBS (assuming you know you want out), right? Understandably it would suck to go back to square 1, incur debt and lose two years of earnings - but if it's that or beat your head against the wall seems like an obvious (albeit difficult) choice.

I've never seen HYS -> BIGLAW -> Top Business school happen, and I know a ton of lawyers. Some of that may have to do with (i) having just paid off loans for 5 years, most don't want to take out another 150k (or sink their life savings into it) and (ii) after 4-5 years, you're 30 years old (even if you were K-JD); after 2 years of school you're at least 32; you're too old to start at the entry-level of most places, even if you'd want to.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellen_Pao

just an anecdote.

[zot1]

Having no debt also means that you're in the awesome position to go try BigLaw and then leave in a year or two since you won't be chained to the work for the money.

I actually think you're in the best position to go to law school. That is, if the idea of being an attorney interests you.

What are exit ops like for someone who only dabbles in biglaw for 1-2 years? It's not intuitive to me that you could go join the peace corps or something if your only WE is pushing documents in corporate law

Here's what I've seen so far (from BigLaw people in California):

BigLaw to

In-house (usually you need three years though)
BigFed (usually DOJ)
Judicial clerkship
Boutique firms
Small firms
State government
And there are always the few people who left law altogether (went to work on consulting or start-ups)

I can't speak to how hard it was to find these jobs. It was easier for some than for others. And it depends the kind of connections you've made through the years. For example, two of the people who I know went in-house got the gig because the company had been a client of their firm. They got a paycut, but they also got arguably better hours.

[Brentwood]

Having no debt also means that you're in the awesome position to go try BigLaw and then leave in a year or two since you won't be chained to the work for the money.

I actually think you're in the best position to go to law school. That is, if the idea of being an attorney interests you.

What are exit ops like for someone who only dabbles in biglaw for 1-2 years? It's not intuitive to me that you could go join the peace corps or something if your only WE is pushing documents in corporate law

Here's what I've seen so far (from BigLaw people in California):

BigLaw to

In-house (usually you need three years though)
BigFed (usually DOJ)
Judicial clerkship
Boutique firms
Small firms
State government
And there are always the few people who left law altogether (went to work on consulting or start-ups)

I can't speak to how hard it was to find these jobs. It was easier for some than for others. And it depends the kind of connections you've made through the years. For example, two of the people who I know went in-house got the gig because the company had been a client of their firm. They got a paycut, but they also got arguably better hours.

Thanks for sharing. I'd imagine all of those options entail some sort of pay cut. If anyone can expound upon the NY market and what they've seen, it'd be much appreciated

[PMan99]

Having no debt also means that you're in the awesome position to go try BigLaw and then leave in a year or two since you won't be chained to the work for the money.

I actually think you're in the best position to go to law school. That is, if the idea of being an attorney interests you.

What are exit ops like for someone who only dabbles in biglaw for 1-2 years? It's not intuitive to me that you could go join the peace corps or something if your only WE is pushing documents in corporate law

Here's what I've seen so far (from BigLaw people in California):

BigLaw to

In-house (usually you need three years though)
BigFed (usually DOJ)
Judicial clerkship
Boutique firms
Small firms
State government
And there are always the few people who left law altogether (went to work on consulting or start-ups)

I can't speak to how hard it was to find these jobs. It was easier for some than for others. And it depends the kind of connections you've made through the years. For example, two of the people who I know went in-house got the gig because the company had been a client of their firm. They got a paycut, but they also got arguably better hours.

I will agree with this and say the vast majority of people I know who left as a junior junior are still doing law at other firms, clerking, in a fellowship, or something similar. A tiny minority are doing business or startup stuff through some connection. I know no one who landed high end business stuff (eg mbb).

[DanteAlighieri]

Obviously ex ante if you want to be in consulting, business side F500, banking, etc. you should just hustle or go M7. But once you have significant experience managing junior lawyers on huge deals at an elite firm, there must be some way to spin that and a GMAT score into HBS (assuming you know you want out), right? Understandably it would suck to go back to square 1, incur debt and lose two years of earnings - but if it's that or beat your head against the wall seems like an obvious (albeit difficult) choice.

I've never seen HYS -> BIGLAW -> Top Business school happen, and I know a ton of lawyers. Some of that may have to do with (i) having just paid off loans for 5 years, most don't want to take out another 150k (or sink their life savings into it) and (ii) after 4-5 years, you're 30 years old (even if you were K-JD); after 2 years of school you're at least 32; you're too old to start at the entry-level of most places, even if you'd want to.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellen_Pao

just an anecdote.

Yes, 20 years ago HBS let in a highly decorated JD (an asian women with an engineering degree) into their MBA program. As a poor white dude from a fly over state who is "quitting" his legal career, let me tell you that HBS in 2016 will not have such open arms to my admission. I have seen, very recently, Top UG -> T14 -> M7 happen, I have also seen it fail more often then not. I have had the former director of admissions at Booth tell me they have a specific pile of applicants that are just disaffected lawyers looking to change careers. In saying this, I'm under 30 still and have 90k in savings so it looks like the GMAT is my next step.

[DanteAlighieri]

Thanks for sharing. I'd imagine all of those options entail some sort of pay cut. If anyone can expound upon the NY market and what they've seen, it'd be much appreciated

I have seen lawyers take all sorts of positions in NY as well. As you move from lawyers taking a "JD required" to a "JD advantage" job the more your background and connections matter (people reaching out to UG friends to swing them in, etc.). I have seen state school liberal arts majors spin a M7 MBA into MBB, BB Bank and mid-size PE...I have never seen a T14 lawyer do it. Thats not to say you or I won't but for any folks out there like me, I just want to say it is not easy.

[Tls2016]

Final point: the serious downside of being a person who defines their self worth by their job is that if you aren't good at the job, get criticized at the job or even lose your job, your mental state will crash. It isn't pretty and can be devastating. (My personal devastation as a status seeking workaholic forced to take fulltime disability leave from my firm was greatly tempered by my fear I could die. Lol. My priorities changed.)

Most workaholic people have been successful their entire lives using their brains, believe in their intelligence and some can't cope when they "fail."

So a characteristic that can help people be happy at biglaw (being a biglaw lawyer validates you) also opens you up to over reaction and loss of self esteem with criticism or failure. Crippling anxiety can happen when a first or second year gets heavy markups,resulting in fear of making mistakes, instead of just learning and moving on.

Try to get a healthier mental state before you start.