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quote:You guys are taking this serious aren't you? The guy above me here dropping all these studies about lawyers fighting depression, fighting alcholism. Will you fall into any of these categories? If not, then stfu. The topic is dealing with lawyer's salaries as far as I am aware. There will always be ups and downs in every career. More importantly, you can enter the worst job market and choose the most competitive job and still succeed. Just worry about yourself. Canada's student unemployment rate is roughly 15% (?), the worse in a long time. Many would argue being a student right now and trying to find work -- i.e. a summer job, would be terrible. Well, I am a student and have a very good job. I don't follow under that category, so why discuss it, why try to make the case that "all" students are screwed? Don't let yourself go under that category. It's the same logic as law school (or any career for that matter). If you are worried about getting into a law school because it's too competitive, or you're worried because you're not going to make the salary you want, or if you're worried because you'll have to work 70 hours a week, then you shouldn't even be considering law school. Are we allowed to post funny stuff from other boards? Because I just read this, and had to share it somewhere that it'd be appreciated. I can't really decide which "law school is terrible/no jobs/you're not a special snowflake" picture to respond to him with, because there's just so many possibilities. My favourite part is him talking about how if you're not depressed/alcoholic now, you probably never will be. Pretty sure when he graduates and finds himself working 80 hours a week with no social life (even better if that job is in bumfuck nowhere Ontario), he might start to feel pretty depressed. The same board has a "long-term goals" poll thread as well, where the majority response is "become a biglaw partner earning 500k+ a year", and a lot of them really seem to believe they'll get there. bub spank fucked around with this message at 21:53 on Aug 5, 2011 |
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Aug 5, 2011 21:44
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I instantly recognized that post from lawstudents.ca. He did get mocked for it though, in a rare show of reason from that festering pit.
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Aug 5, 2011 22:47
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prussian advisor posted:Congratulations on getting your job back (sort of?)
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Aug 5, 2011 23:30
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Defleshed posted:Man that poo poo sounds loving terrible. Enjoy your money, I'll enjoy my life. I've literally never heard one single thing about life at huge law firms that makes me ever want to work in one.
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Aug 6, 2011 01:20
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Carooe posted:I "only" make 100k in midlaw but I get to do cool poo poo like go home sometimes. it owns nm posted:Haw, deputy public defender again on monday. Wooo.
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Aug 6, 2011 01:55
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joat mon posted:Congrats. Again. Maybe they're just testing you to see if you really, really want to be a PD.
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Aug 6, 2011 03:49
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nm posted:One would think the 9 months of working for free would have helped. And I thought I had PD cred by taking a 33% pay cut...
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Aug 6, 2011 04:08
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Carooe posted:My boss dictates. He also goes through like 2 secretaries a year because they hate him
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Aug 7, 2011 05:28
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Atlas, how's bootcamp going for you? Artsy fartsy bootcamp. Having done most of my firm research, I have to say: if I see one more picture of six white guys with an obligatory photoshopped black or Asian dude, I'm gonna lose my drat mind. On the other hand, I'm going to have one exam this semester. Thank god.
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Aug 7, 2011 06:17
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The Warszawa posted:Atlas, how's bootcamp going for you? Artsy fartsy bootcamp. It is funny, I'll bet that my PDs office of maybe 50 people probably has more minorities people than any major law firm in the bay area (local offices only).
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Aug 7, 2011 06:27
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nm posted:Wait, asians are rare in law firms? They're pretty drat common out west. As partners though? Usually for firm pictures I'm only seeing partners, unless it's Remedial's firm. Although, I usually can still only see Remedial, since your eye is pulled there by some weird gravitational field, which doesn't make sense since it's over the internet, and gravity shouldn't work that way, but it's probably some sort of quantum mechanics thing I don't understand.
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Aug 7, 2011 12:27
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Abugadu posted:As partners though? Usually for firm pictures I'm only seeing partners I think OCI brochures and career pages often include a lot of pictures of associates. If you're talking partners, you also have a token female in there talking about work life balance.
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Aug 7, 2011 13:53
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nm posted:Wait, asians are rare in law firms? They're pretty drat common out west. Yeah asians are pretty rare in law firms, even as associates. It's been changing recently, but there are still a shitload of white people for every asian.
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Aug 7, 2011 15:41
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HooKars posted:I think OCI brochures and career pages often include a lot of pictures of associates. If you're talking partners, you also have a token female in there talking about work life balance.
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Aug 7, 2011 18:56
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gvibes posted:Kirkland and Ellis used to have an amazing work-life balance video on their recruiting web page. It was basically one guy saying he had an amazing work-life balance because he could put in 11 hours, come home and eat dinner with his family, and then, due to Kirkland's awesome remote-workspace software, get back to work until it was time to go to bed.
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Aug 7, 2011 19:01
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gvibes posted:Kirkland and Ellis used to have an amazing work-life balance video on their recruiting web page. It was basically one guy saying he had an amazing work-life balance because he could put in 11 hours, come home and eat dinner with his family, and then, due to Kirkland's awesome remote-workspace software, get back to work until it was time to go to bed. This is why I don't get people from wealthy families enrolling in law school. I mean why toil away like some peasant when you could just move money around and sit on a non-profit? Do they just work these jobs for a few years then get the hell out? I was too TTT to ever step foot in these places so I may not know how this part of the game is played.
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Aug 7, 2011 19:07
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Now might be a good time to bring up my all-time favorite associate quote from my Vault days:quote:Q: How is the work-life balance?
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Aug 7, 2011 19:28
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HiddenReplaced posted:Yeah asians are pretty rare in law firms, even as associates. It's been changing recently, but there are still a shitload of white people for every asian. I didn't feel like a special snowflake anymore when I found out there's another Asian female working defence in my city. Having clients find me in court used to be so easy!  But there's probably a reason as to why there are significantly less Asian partners than there are white partners. I'm guessing it's something about Asian education trend and the acceptance of Asians in corporate culture. Here's a question for you all: As a student/associate, do you stay until the partners leave? I do since I do whatever the other student/associate do but one of my friends said "Partners think you're stupid if you're staying just because they're staying. They might also think you're not doing your work fast enough." I think she's just generalizing and being bitter, but thoughts? Penguins Like Pies fucked around with this message at 20:10 on Aug 7, 2011 |
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Aug 7, 2011 20:03
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Asians are smart enough to get the hell out.
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Aug 7, 2011 20:06
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Linguica posted:http://www.guardian.co.uk/law/2011/aug/04/law-case-sleepless-lawyers On various related themes: We're expressly told not to show the kiddy-winks the Sleeping Pods when they're here on work experience or vac schemes (equivalent to Summer Associate programmes) in case they run screaming from the building. CC's London office seems to take the opposite approach and had a graduate recruitment video a couple of years ago that showed a trainee/junior associate going off to an empty office one night and quietly sobbing, which was perhaps a little extreme. I'm always slightly sniffy about attributing long hours to some sort of macho bollocks, particularly as a junior lawyer. You pull an all-nighter because you're terrified of getting behind, suspect that you're working far more slowly than everyone else and live in constant fear of being the weak link (or maybe that's just me). It's about as un-testosterone inspired as it gets. 2,200/2,400 as minimum billable hours is bloody tough, but I wouldn't assume it's largely achieved by padding. People tend to adapt their hours to the departments they find themselves in. If everyone else is out the door by 7 you feel a bit of an idiot still being around at 9, but if you're going home at midnight, saying goodbye to half your colleagues on the way out and then picking up emails by blackberry when you get back you just tend not to think of what you're doing as particularly unusual.
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Aug 7, 2011 20:19
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sigmachiev posted:I did the BigLaw SA thing in SoCal this summer so that's what I was talking about. As for clerking, that's still something I'm working on although more and more I think it's a futile effort given only decent grades last year and the fact that judges are trending towards hiring people with experience. My attitude at this point is that if it happens then tits, if not eh.
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Aug 7, 2011 20:36
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Haha working past 7 is hella gay and only for people without a book
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Aug 7, 2011 21:13
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Yes I'm posting from my office what's your point
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Aug 7, 2011 21:15
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I have to get back to my 2000 page doc review due Tuesday morning, ttyl
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Aug 7, 2011 21:20
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blar posted:This is why I don't get people from wealthy families enrolling in law school. I mean why toil away like some peasant when you could just move money around and sit on a non-profit? Do they just work these jobs for a few years then get the hell out? I was too TTT to ever step foot in these places so I may not know how this part of the game is played. It's not just people from wealthy families. Realize as well, there are plenty of partners who have made more than enough money to retire forever at the age of 45-50, yet they still put in another 20 years of miserable partner hours. Not miserable in comparison with some associates, but that's like saying hitting yourself in the hand over and over with a hammer isn't miserable compared with hitting yourself in the crotch. My 10+ years have led me to realize that there is something in some people (perhaps most people) that makes them keep doing this poo poo. Most of the people I work with really don't seem to question it. And I don't say that in the "they do, but they just don't whine about it," sense. You really get the feeling that they are insensate creatures. I talked with one guy recently about being there until two in the morning a fifth night in a row (and we don't do that New York thing where you work until midnight but then show up at 10:00 the next morning; this guy is in before 7:00 every day). He just kind of shrugs and gives a "Huh, work's gotta get done," response. I swear, sometimes I want to just start punching them in the head to see if they just mutter, "Yup, I guess someone's gotta get punched in the head, might as well be me," and then shuffle back into their offices. It is really hard to describe. There is some quality that these people have that just seems to keep them soldiering on without questioning the grand scheme of things. Whether it's a need to keep score using whatever stats you can have as an adult (hours worked and pay) or something else, I don't know. Of course, the fact that they are in the vast majority makes me presume that I am the one with something wrong with me, something missing. I just don't fundamentally understand it. I have no idea why any person on this planet, who is making $500,000 and could easily live on $300,000 if they scaled back their hours accordingly, would prefer to spend their free time reviewing yet another 80 page M&A agreement instead of reading a book of their choice, learning to paint, etc. Of course, the idea of scaling back your hours doesn't really work in the end. Because that's the other part of large law firms. There's some type of odd cult, even in the partnership ranks, that says that anyone who wants to work 40-50 hour weeks and take the concomitant pay cut is complete dead weight who needs to be cut loose. Even if you're willing to take the financial hit, it's like your nonconformist choice pisses them off.
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Aug 7, 2011 21:48
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Abugadu, can you tell me if Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood is accepting clerkship applications and if so what should I do?
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Aug 7, 2011 22:56
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Headed to the first day in a small (15-20) firm doing largely ID litigation tomorrow. Might not be exciting to everyone, but to me, it's a paycheck that I haven't gotten in over three years. And half again as much money as I ever made as a cop. I feel like the poster child for lowered expectations.
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Aug 8, 2011 00:13
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billion dollar bitch posted:Abugadu, can you tell me if Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood is accepting clerkship applications and if so what should I do? Possibly, I'll ask around. I know she has one 'permanent' clerk that she brought over who was working for her before, but I think she gets at least one more, as I vaguely remember being introduced to one a few years ago. I'd probably treat it like any other clerkship application, to be honest. I think it's perhaps the leanest docket of any federal court, the local US atty office charges what seems like 1 criminal case every two months, usually drug importation cases that plead out immediately, and most of the civil stuff is status updates on how the receiverships are handling local gov. fuckups. Edit: The judge herself is very cool and would be great to work with. Abugadu fucked around with this message at 00:17 on Aug 8, 2011 |
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Aug 8, 2011 00:15
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Penguins Like Pies posted:Here's a question for you all: As a student/associate, do you stay until the partners leave? I do since I do whatever the other student/associate do but one of my friends said "Partners think you're stupid if you're staying just because they're staying. They might also think you're not doing your work fast enough." I think she's just generalizing and being bitter, but thoughts? I think it depends on the partner and the firm culture, but we were generally advised to stay until the partner we were working with left and get in before them, unless they essentially said we could leave. I wouldn't stay until all the partners in the group left just to stay if I wasn't working on their deal or case or whatever. But if you hand something over to a partner, and they are hanging around, there is at least a chance that they will hand it back for revisions and that they want those revisions done asap.
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Aug 8, 2011 00:41
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Abugadu posted:I think it's perhaps the leanest docket of any federal court, the local US atty office charges what seems like 1 criminal case every two months, usually drug importation cases that plead out immediately, and most of the civil stuff is status updates on how the receiverships are handling local gov. fuckups. That's an awesome docket.
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Aug 8, 2011 01:22
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Just got back from a family reunion. Cousin's boyfriend is a real nice guy. Went to an elite LAC, was a track star, went into law at a T1, got good grades. Took the bar last week but has no job prospects in sight. He's currently hanging on to - and almost pathetically grateful for - his current job as a part time adjudicator of parking ticket disputes at boston city hall. To those few remaining prelaw students who can find this thread in BFC: don't go, no jobs, die alone.
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Aug 8, 2011 02:24
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SlyFrog posted:I just don't fundamentally understand it. I have no idea why any person on this planet, who is making $500,000 and could easily live on $300,000 if they scaled back their hours accordingly, would prefer to spend their free time reviewing yet another 80 page M&A agreement instead of reading a book of their choice, learning to paint, etc. All it takes is coming to your office once, and having NOTHING TO DO. It has happened to me twice. Come in, look at the files that you looked at yesterday, and nothing new has happened, and the phone is not ringing. Water your (dead) plant, clean your office, wonder who you will send bills to at the end of the month, and how you will make rent and payroll. It is terrifying. So when you are so buried you can't see straight, and a new client calls you with a $25,000 retainer and a sparkly, succulent lawsuit, you say "yes." Because if you say no, you may find yourself with NOTHING TO DO in six months, and as a result, nothing to bill. The next thing you know, you are one of those people.
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Aug 8, 2011 02:49
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Solomon Grundy posted:All it takes is coming to your office once, and having NOTHING TO DO. It has happened to me twice. Come in, look at the files that you looked at yesterday, and nothing new has happened, and the phone is not ringing. Water your (dead) plant, clean your office, wonder who you will send bills to at the end of the month, and how you will make rent and payroll. It is terrifying. Sure. But by that logic, you should bill 24 hours per day (presuming that you are successful enough to get the business, and many of these people are). At some point, business owner or no, you have to make a determination of how much is enough. By the way, I have nothing to do right now, and haven't had a hell of a lot to do for a few months. Thanks for terrifying the hell out of me. SlyFrog fucked around with this message at 03:12 on Aug 8, 2011 |
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Aug 8, 2011 03:09
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I had a moment Friday where I realized just how rural my rural PD job is: We had a discussion in court, on the record, between the judge, the probation officer and I, about when the harvest would come in so that my client could check himself in to finish his sentence after that time. At least I got a job!
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Aug 8, 2011 03:36
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SlyFrog posted:I just don't fundamentally understand it. I have no idea why any person on this planet, who is making $500,000 and could easily live on $300,000 if they scaled back their hours accordingly, would prefer to spend their free time reviewing yet another 80 page M&A agreement instead of reading a book of their choice, learning to paint, etc. LOL as if they have hobbies outside of work.
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Aug 8, 2011 03:51
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Penguins Like Pies posted:Here's a question for you all: As a student/associate, do you stay until the partners leave? I do since I do whatever the other student/associate do but one of my friends said "Partners think you're stupid if you're staying just because they're staying. They might also think you're not doing your work fast enough." I think she's just generalizing and being bitter, but thoughts? I rarely stayed past 6:00 or got in before 8:30 and I was commended for my efficiency during both my reviews. As for associates, from what I saw it depended on what was going on. For instance, if a big brief was due and the partner was staying until 3:00am, associates working on the brief stayed too. If the partner is there doing whatever until late but it's not pressing, associates bounced well before the partner would. Everyone, partners included, told me it was stupid to stay longer than need be. I also think HooKars is absolutely right in that it depends (as do many things I'm growing to think) a great deal on firm culture. I got away with a lot more than peers in NY or DC when it came to face time requirements, but I also think I was under a closer microscope with work product and to not be socially meh since offices out here are smaller and you work with a much higher percentage of the crew.
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Aug 8, 2011 08:47
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Vander posted:I had a moment Friday where I realized just how rural my rural PD job is: We had a discussion in court, on the record, between the judge, the probation officer and I, about when the harvest would come in so that my client could check himself in to finish his sentence after that time. That's pretty good though?
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Aug 8, 2011 14:34
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I just want to interject my bimonthly reminder that all upcoming 2Ls really, really should consider MidLaw.
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Aug 8, 2011 15:42
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How can I research MidLaw firms? I literally can't name a single one.
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Aug 8, 2011 15:43
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gret posted:LOL as if they have hobbies outside of work.
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Aug 8, 2011 15:49
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