Biglaw, Job Searches, Reader Polls

What's Up With That Deer Valley Trip? Quinn Emanuel Partners Speak

By  
on

We’ve devoted an insane amount of coverage to Quinn Emanuel’s plan to take recruits to a resort in Deer Valley, Utah (in lieu of callbacks). Now The Recorder has this interesting article:

Instead of bringing students met during on-campus interviews back to the office for a series of sit-downs, the firm will take them on the road. Quinn Emanuel is arranging an all-expenses-paid October weekend of dining and drinks in Deer Valley, Utah, for about 40 students. They’ll stay at the Stein Eriksen Lodge, a Scandinavian-inspired chalet where a suite runs more than $2,000 a night in peak season.

“We stole the idea from an investment bank — I don’t think any law firm has tried it,” said firm leader William Urquhart.

Reporter Kellie Schmitt confronted Quinn Emanuel partners with some choice comments from ATL readers. Learn about their reactions, after the jump.


There are actually multiple shout-outs to ATL in Schmitt’s piece:

Reaction [to the Quinn Emanuel proposal] was swift, with some posters at the Above the Law blog panning it as a hellish three-day job interview, and others praising it as an opportunity to get to know a prospective firm’s key people a bit better….

In his signature lower-case style, Quinn sent a firmwide e-mail Sept. 13 explaining the plan to attorneys who might field inquiries: “please tell them that this is an experiment. if it is successful, we may decide to expand it next year to two events.”

Reactions posted at Above the Law were mixed, with some saying Quinn was trying too hard to be different, and others unsure of what to make of the event: “It’s either going to be a 72-hour interview (which sucks), or pretty much anyone invited has an offer for the summer, assuming they don’t do anything stupid.”

Other posters questioned the timing: “Going at the end of October, when it’s snowing and cold yet not quite ski season, is absurd.”

That’s just sour grapes, Urquhart said: “The ones who are invited love the idea, and the ones who weren’t have been posting all kinds of negative comments on messageboards.”

We’re glad that Bill Urquhart doesn’t take ATL comments personally. We certainly don’t.
Here are the results of the ATL reader poll, which is probably a better guide to reader sentiment than the comments (since more people voted in the poll then commented on the coverage, and the commenters tend to be disproportionately snarky). Despite the harsh comments from the peanut gallery, the poll shows that those who favor or are at least open to the idea narrowly outnumber those who don’t like it:

Quinn Emanuel to Try Out 72-Hour Interview [The Recorder]
Earlier: Prior ATL coverage of Quinn Emanuel (scroll down)

Sponsored

Topics