Featured Job Survey Results: Got Work?
Last month we asked you which holidays you worked on, or expected to work on, during 2007. About 10% of you reported that you expected to work on Christmas, and roughly 22% expected to work on New Year's.
You were wrong.
We received about 1,300 responses to last Tuesday's ATL / Lateral Link survey about whether you did, indeed, work over the holidays. Overall, a little over 36% of you worked at least one of those days. About a quarter of you worked on Christmas, and almost a third of you worked over New Year's. Broken down by day, 22% of you worked on Christmas Eve, 10% on Christmas Day, 28% on New Year's Eve, and 15% of you nursed your hangovers in the office on New Year's Day.
Find out how it broke down by city, after the jump.
We would have expected associates in New York to spend much more time in the office over the holidays to justify their giant bonuses, but it turns out we underestimated the utter godlessness of California. Almost a third of respondents in Los Angeles -- and nearly two fifths of associates in San Francisco -- spent Christmas Eve performing pagan rituals like diligence and document production, and about half as many associates in each city kept sacrificing hours on Christmas Day. San Francisco and Atlanta kept the midnight oil burning on New Year's Eve, and San Francisco and L.A. didn't rest much on New Year's Day, either.
Meanwhile, associates in New York were actually a bit more likely than their peers in other cities to take the holidays off.
Breakdown By Location: Did You Work On Christmas or New Year's?
What drove all of this effort? Three percent of you are complete tools wanted to impress somebody. About half of you are just tools responded "Nobody asked me, but I had stuff I needed to get done." About a quarter said a partner asked you to. About a quarter also blamed client requests. About ten percent of you needed the hours. And, for a sorry, sorry fifth of you, the office was open, and you were simply unable to resist its lures.
Was it worth it? Half of you said yes, and the offer half said no, regardless of which holiday(s) you were blowing off or why you were doing it.
There was, however, one glaring exception to that fifty/fifty breakdown: of those of you who worked over the holidays because a partner scrooged you, roughly two thirds said the work wasn't worth it.
(19) Comments
this is why I plan to get out before this job comes to define me. Life is too short.
FIRST (one to say that this is a useless post).
WTF San Francisco?
Must have been a big deal going down in SF that week.
1:13: or a disproportionate sample causing a skew...
Note too that, as usual, NY people talk a big game about how they work more, but the facts don't back it up.
NY average billables are lower.
NY holidays worked are lower.
NY Pay to $145!
12:39, why is this a worthless post?
You don't think it matters that associates in San Francisco is full of "utter godlessness" and are performing "pagan rituals like diligence and document production" and "sacrificing hours"?
There's finally a place where I can dance around in my goat skin pants!
Pity everybody else there will be busy working.
1:47
That is ridiculous. Have you ever lived in New York? Don't you know that the cost of living is a lot higher? For that matter, I say New York to 210K. And guess what, I don't even live in New York to have the right sense.
1:47 That is ridiculous. Have you ever lived in New York? Don't you know that the cost of living is a lot higher? For that matter, I say New York to 210K. And guess what, I don't even live in New York to have the right sense.
New York to 210K!!
The problem is, this survey was self-selecting and thus, people who worked probably felt more compelled than those who did not to answer the survey.
New York to STFU!
Big law junior associates, get over yourselves. you are in the falling down profession. should have gone to HBS.
7:34, there were 1,300 respondents and they left the survey open for a week.
And the self-selection problem would apply to all cities equally.
Just face it, the associates in San Francisco are a bunch of pagan tools.
Ahh yes, the denial begins: "SF couldn't ACTUALLY work more than NY, because ... because ... "
Because?
8:34 - HBS? Please....the starting salary coming out of HBS is significantly lower than BigLaw. Business school is for chumps...
8:34 - stop hijacking material from the Times.
If I am ever required to work on Christmas day, I will quit. You can't pay me enough money to work a job that requires me to work on Christmas. I can only hope that the people working that day did themselves in by putting shit off or something. Otherwise, you need to find a new job. What good is $1 million a year if you are working 7 days a week plus holidays. Sad, sad, sad. I would rather be a poor.
"That is ridiculous. Have you ever lived in New York? Don't you know that the cost of living is a lot higher? For that matter, I say New York to 210K. And guess what, I don't even live in New York to have the right sense."
Because private practice pay should be like the government, and based on cost of living rather than productivity and profitability...
Non-New York attorneys to get the chip off your shoulder!
As someone who has lived in both NY and CA, this result does not surprise me. NY associates are more likely to take their vacation during cold weather seasons, and the holidays allow you to structure longer vacations without having to miss as many days when the office is open. In contrast, living in CA is like being on vacation, so you're not as likely to take a long vacation over the Holidays.