"Everyone who deserved an offer received one"

Wow. 4 bad apples out of 38? Maybe Wiley needs to take a second look at its initial screening and callback process. That's almost 10% of their class that were duds.

If by "almost" you mean "more than."

From the lawyers need to use math correctly dept: it's 10 and a half percent of their class.

"almost 10%"

math was never your thing, was it?

That's an incredibly slap in the face to the four who didn't get offers. That will certainly be uncomfortable for them when interviewing with other firms.

Interviewer: "I see you didn't get an offer from Wiley Rein, who said they made offers to everyone who deserved one."

Response: "Yes, that's largely a function of the fact I indicated an interest in pro bono work. I really can do legal work...no, seriously, I can!"

Does school prestige affect the likelihood of an offer? Are firms more likely to no-offer a Tier-II student over a Yalie?

Law firms bend over backwords to get Yalies. Much lower tolerance for Tier-II students. Law firms worry about their reputation on campuses. If they do not seriously recruit a Tier-II school, the the no offer to the Tier-II does not affect that much. The Tier II students will still interview and try to go to the firm. However, if the law firm is trying to recruit at a Tier I school, then it faces much stiffer competition.

In this job market though, it's a buyer's market.

It's almost 10%. But only if you're counting down.

Elie, stick with these posts. It's called a Legal Tabloid for a reason, Johnny Livejournal.

Gotta disagree with 8 - a lot of law firms are beginning to dump on Yale - with its emphasis on the philosophy and the policy of the law as opposed to practice of the law. But what 8 says is true with respect to other tops schools such as Harvard and Stanford.

This is the lamest post I've seen in a *long* time. 4 summers get no-offered and that deserves its own post? You've got to be kidding me.

And no...I'm not from this firm. My firm gave 100% offers and I still think this is ridiculous as a story.

Who cares about this TTT? This blog is going downhill fast.

If you want to excite us, how some pics of white guys with asian girls? Who doesn't love their pretty, flat, round faces and cute, tiny tits?

- King of WGWAG

10: what about CCN? Are firms less likely to no-offer a CLS or Chicago student over a Tier-II one? Does it matter?

Of course, this all depends on the law firm. In smaller markets, law firms that are staffed with mainly Tier II associates will jump at the chance to add a Harvard or Stanford graduate. It helps with their marketing and promotional literature. Also allows them to maybe up the billable rate on that associate.

Of course, that begs the question on why that Harvard or Stanford graduate is willing to go to that smaller market law firm...

Wow. Way to pour salt into the wound of the four no offers. No attempt to soften the blow while actually making their chances of landing on their feet worse. Real classy Kay Nash. Perfect example of kicking people when they are down.

It Wiley Reining men, hallelujah!

No offering at a highly ranked Tier I school can damage a law firm's recruiting for years. The better the school, the less chance of that student getting no offered. Short term loss by taking a lousy Tier I graduate, the law firm takes a bad associate. Long term loss by no offering a lousy Tier 1 graduate, potential bad reputation which may cause the law firm to not be able to recruit at that school for years.

Law students are a risk averse bunch. Since a student at a highly regarded Tier I school is usually going to get multiple offers, why take a risk at a law firm that no offered someone at that school?

Wiley Rein,
some get jobs and others feel the pain,
(I move away from the mic when I'm crying)

Agree wholeheartedly with 17 and I wonder how the other 34 were able to demonstrate as *summers* that they were so much more useful than the 4 who got dumped

17: what qualifies as "highly ranked"? Top ten?

Kay Nash is a wonderful person. We were sad to see her go.

-Former Akin Gump Associate

7 - I worked in Wilmington a few summers ago. Plenty of kids from Temple and Widener as well as a few from Harvard, NYU, Columbia, Duke, Penn and Yale. Put it this way, as a member of the latter group, all I had to do was show up to get an offer. The 3rd and 4th tier students were constantly evaluated on every subject - work product, social skills, ability to tie their shoes, etc.

Then only half of them got offers and subsequently got in everyone's face about how they could have gone to Harvard but didn't want the debt. That's why they work at some terrible firm in Wilmington and I work in a V100.

Its Wiley Reining LeBeef.

wat? is this a firm?

Highly ranked would definitely include any school in the top ten according to U.S. News and World Report. But geography is also important. For example, Chicago law firms will probably give more weight to Northwestern or University of Chicago students or Houston law firms to University of Texas at Austin students. Remember, a lot of law school graduates stay in the area. Thus, the connections and network of that local school are that much stronger and accordingly, will have that much greater impact on that law firm's reputation.

As in college football, you have to be able to recruit your best local talent first.

17: T14 or TTT. There is no such thing as a "highly ranked tier 1" unless you are refering to T14 (or better).

HTH.

How do you know they are undeserving?

You suck as an editor, Elie Mystal.

Ummm... "Rein" in WIley Rein isn't pronounced like "rain." Except maybe in Bratislava.

This has been said, but making a public statement to an industry media outlet that "[e]veryone who deserved an offer received one" is incredibly harsh for the non-offerees. No doubt, in re-interviewing, the students in question have been trying to put as positive a face on it as possible, certainly mentioning the economy as a factor in not receiving an offer, as well as the firm's over-subscription. There can be little question that those were at least factors, if not dispositive ones. But now, that whole explanation falls apart. This is Wiley Rein cutting off four law students' noses to spite its own face, and is just plain unprofessional.

22--A V100? Wow, you really showed them!

30 - I bet you work at V10 and you went to Yale and your penis is huge. Seriously, that must be the truth.

Word is that some some of those no-offered had no negative feedback during the summer and were a little surprised when they were no-offered. Kay Adams makes it seem like those no-offered were slouches who didn't do work. From what I've heard, that was not the case. But hey, at least PPP can survive without having to pay 4 potential associates a salary of $160k. I'm sure that $640,000 will make a huge difference at Wiley.

30 -- that is priceless. I love it.

32: that's an underestimate. You're also paying for their benefits, the associate overhead (paper, printer, office, gym membership), and the discretionary bonus in December.

32,

$640,000 will pay for what -- one fourth of a Wiley partner's salary? That's not small change.

Unfortunately, by this post, inadvertently abovethelaw is hurting those four students chances of getting another job. If not for the publicity, they could argue (perhaps even convincingly:-)) that Wiley overhired in their EIW interviews. Now that Wiley has issued a public statement in response to this post, it is less likely that those sa's can make their case that they were just victims of a firm hiring beyond its needs.

Any law student using PPP as a guide to choosing his/her summer employment is a moron. Talk about putting the cart before the horse. Here are the things to be concentrating on as a soon-to-be associate

1) Can I get into my preferred area of practice at this firm and how well regarded is this practice area? If you don't know what you want to do, better do some soul searching and decide.

2) What kind of training will I get in my chosen practice area? This refers to the quality of both the work and the informal mentoring. Formal mentoring is bullshit.

3) What are my potential colleagues like? You'll be spending lots of time with these people so they better be people you think you will like.

That's pretty much all you need to be considering as a junior. Sure, pay matters too. But getting solid, hands on training in your area is the key to becoming a good lawyer and pays huge dividends down the line.

At my v10 office, there were less than 5% no offers. All came from t6 schools.

37:

I would add:

4) When I am ready to leave (and in biglaw most people leave) what options will be available to me, and will the available options be different than if I were to do be in the same practice area at a different firm?

37: the word "dividends" connotates that you're a shareholder. You're using it incorrectly.

38: I doubt it. They don't no-offer prestigious school associates.

i was one of the 4, and i agree with comment 32. i'm glad i wasn't the only one who didn't see it coming.

in response to comment 37, i don't think many, if any, of the summers chose the firm based on the blackberry profits. i didn't know about the lawsuit (or the over-hiring...) until i had already accepted there, and everyone i talked to about it said the same.

40: Look up "dividends". Use by 37 was correct.

Not37

6, 29, 36, etc.:

You're all assuming that the four who were no-offered will actually be asked about it in future interviews, which isn't always the case.

Indeed, I didn't get an offer from Wiley and ended up at a much better biglaw without ever being asked about it.

i was one of the 4, and i agree with comment 32. i'm glad i wasn't the only one who didn't see it coming.

in response to comment 37, i don't think many, if any, of the summers chose the firm based on the blackberry profits. i didn't know about the lawsuit (or the over-hiring...) until i had already accepted there, and everyone i talked to about it said the same.

43: You are correct. I would assert (and thereby cut off any question from future interviewers) that I "did not accept an offer from Wiley...".

This is a factual statement and great lawyering. It implies that you had an offer, but does not expressly state so, thus it is not a lie.

i was one of the 4, and i agree with comment 32. i'm glad i wasn't the only one who didn't see it coming.

in response to comment 37, i don't think many, if any, of the summers chose the firm based on the blackberry profits. i didn't know about the lawsuit (or the over-hiring...) until i had already accepted there, and everyone i talked to about it said the same.

18 -- an oldie but a goodie. excellent work.

If Mega Man can't stop Wiley, four summers have no chance.

Firms differ with respect to no-offering Tier I versus Tier II schools. At my old (V30) firm, obviously they gave preference to top schools in choosing who to hire as a summer associate. The goal at the end of the summer was always 100% offers. However, in deciding whether someone deserved an offer, the firm didn't care about T5 prestige or allegiances -- they no-offered anyone who sucked, regardless of where that person went to school. It usually worked out to one person a summer who was told not to come back or to come back next summer for a second try. The person's work product was usually so abysmal you had to wonder if they were on drugs or mentally retarded.

People are focusing on the second of the two Third Tier/low-class elements in the Wiley Rein statement (that the four no-offers are implicitly "undeserving") - what about the first half of the statement - that their original plan was only to keep around 25 (of 38) summers!

In other words, it seems their original plan was to no-offer more than a third of the class. I assume they did not announce that during OCI.

Terrible topic that is not news and does nothing for the summers and generates piss-poor comments about math and school prestige.

51 = Bitter non-T14 grad.

50: The other possibility is that, like other firms mentioned this summer, their yield was much higher than expected. They wanted 25 and got 38.

Pointing out that they offered 34 when they normally shoot for 25 is probably an effort to say "Don't ding us for 4 no-offers when we managed to give out 33% more offers than we planned for."

I work at Wiley and have spoken to Kay Nash about this on several ocassions and 53 has it right in terms of the firm's attitude.

That said, I'm disappointed that Kay would make the type of statement she did to ATL about "those deserving got offers" and basically hang the other 4 out to dry. I knew all 4 of the no offers and they were good people who deserved better.

52: Doesn't realize that after about 2 months on the job, the topic of law school will rarely, if ever, be mentioned again, except by those within the firm that nobody likes.

Besides, when the PT LSATs are added in to the rankings, you're not going to be able to claim T14 status anymore.

55: I'm HYS. And, yes, it matters for the rest of your career if you are at a V10 firm like me, otherwise perhaps not. Now go back to your TTT firm in your TTT city.

56 - You're a law student, or more than likely, pre-law. Go back to studying. Or if you are a lawyer, back to working for your partner - who is a Fordham (PT) grad.

I'm shocked by #54 -- Anyone who knows Kay Nash should know better than to ever attribute malice or ill intent to anything she says. Kay works tirelessly to HELP WIley's associates and summer associates in any way she can.

I'm shocked by #54 -- Anyone who knows Kay Nash should know better than to ever attribute malice or ill intent to anything she says. Kay works tirelessly to HELP WIley's associates and summer associates in any way she can.

59-
Except that time she told the world that they didn't get an offer of employment because they didn't deserve it, right?

51/57 = Regional law firm grad currently practicing in flyerover state and hates life.

59: everybody in this world, no matter who they are, has friends who will vouch that they are a wonderful person. I know a guy who says Dick Cheney is as good a man as it gets.

Like 99% of the people here, I don't know Kay Nash, but I do know she just did something pretty bad to those four people. Maybe 1 or 2 of them were jackasses who did something to deserve that, but I doubt all four of them were, especially given comment #54

59 - (54 here) I don't think she didn't with malice, but that doesn't mean it's not going to have a very negative impact on the 4 people. It doesn't need to be malicious or delivered with ill-intent to have that effect.

Ugh ugh ugh. Why kick the no-offers while they're down? What you want to say here, Classypants, is some variant of "no comment".

Check w. your employment lawyers and find out if you've now given the departed a privacy type suit against you.

What is the issue here? 90% acceptance rate seems fine. Are people assuming that the 4 people were arbitrarily rejected? The idea that Wiley would hire 38 SAs when they always intended to hire 34 or 25 makes no sense. The salary for each SA is approximately $24,600.

People are kicking the recruiting director for the firm's comment, but do people really think that she wrote it? Sounds too lawyerly to me.

32:

What you need to do now is start working on your spin. When you reinterview, you need to be able to tell your story calmly in a way that makes you look as good as possible but not whiny or unwilling to accept responsibility. As part of that, you need to think long and hard about what may have gone wrong. Its OK to tell firms that you were surprised by the no-offer. Go ahead and say that your reviews were good throughout the summer. Any chance that you expressed interest in a practice area that is now tanking? Did you not get a chance to work with the group you wanted to get into? Anything that you and the other no-offers have in common? Get your spiel together, and practice it until you can do it without tearing up or getting angry. Recite the statistics calmly: interviewers will know that 25 usual class size plus 38 this year equals massive oversubscription.

Find out if you can get a reference either from someone there or someone wherever you worked last summer. Professors or pre-law job if you have to. Look into clerking: coming off a clerkship will erase this stain from your resume, and no judge is going to ask you if you got an offer. Get a writing sample together. Do anything and everything you can to polish up your resume: apply to be a TA, try to get something published, see if any professors need research assistants, etc. Hoof it over to career services and get them to see what they can do.

You might also see if any of your friends can put in a good word for you at their firms. Or even a "hey, keep an eye out for the Wiley Rein castoffs: they were good people who didn't deserve it" word.

RESIST the urge to trash Wiley up and down the avenue. Dwelling on it does you no good, makes you look unprofessional, and inspires the firm to do crap like the quote above. You can't win against the firm; don't even try. Your mission in life now should be to prove that they were wrong about you.

Good luck.

66: totally agree. She's clearly the mouthpiece.

I was also one of the four not to receive an offer from wiley and didn't see it coming. I've called several people on the recruiting committee to find out what went wrong and no one will return my call. Of course, the people in the recruiting department who have returned my calls don't have answers and say I should talk to someone who was involved in the decision-making.

To commenter 41, we should talk about how to deal with this. Maybe there's not much we can do at this point, but sometimes talking to someone in the same boat is helpful.

I was also one of the four not to receive an offer from wiley and didn't see it coming. I've called several people on the recruiting committee to find out what went wrong and no one will return my call. Of course, the people in the recruiting department who have returned my calls don't have answers and say I should talk to someone who was involved in the decision-making.

To commenter 41, we should talk about how to deal with this. Maybe there's not much we can do at this point, but sometimes talking to someone in the same boat is helpful.

I was also one of the four not to receive an offer from wiley and didn't see it coming. I've called several people on the recruiting committee to find out what went wrong and no one will return my call. Of course, the people in the recruiting department who have returned my calls don't have answers and say I should talk to someone who was involved in the decision-making.

To commenter 41, we should talk about how to deal with this. Maybe there's not much we can do at this point, but sometimes talking to someone in the same boat is helpful.

WOW!

First of all, ATL should be classier and take this post down ASAP. Second, Kay Nash is an absolute hypocrite, and incredibly classless.

I work at Wiley and I too knew the 4 SAs that were no-offered. They are all hard working students, two from T14 schools (yes, T14!). I also know that Kay told the SAs that she will help get them letters from Partners and others to attest to their hard work. Now she goes and pulls this, very very shameful.

I am ashamed of the firm, I am ashamed of how they treated these 4 SAs who were incredible workers. I hope the 4 SAs go on to do great things, as I am sure they all will. I also hope they contact representation to see how they can counter this negative attack campaign.

Furthermore, the SAs were each told a different number of how many no-offers were made. Surely this was to calm them down on the phone, either that or reconsideration of other no-offers took place.

I also know that the firm was particularly pitiful with returning calls to the no-offers, and have no given much guidance as to why this took place.

I am ashamed of how this has all unfolded, especially publicly like this. The firm has reached a low, and I personally think once all is said and done for the 4 SAs, they will be better off not having worked here.

32:

What you need to do now is start working on your spin. When you reinterview, you need to be able to tell your story calmly in a way that makes you look as good as possible but not whiny or unwilling to accept responsibility. As part of that, you need to think long and hard about what may have gone wrong. Its OK to tell firms that you were surprised by the no-offer. Go ahead and say that your reviews were good throughout the summer. Any chance that you expressed interest in a practice area that is now tanking? Did you not get a chance to work with the group you wanted to get into? Anything that you and the other no-offers have in common? Get your spiel together, and practice it until you can do it without tearing up or getting angry. Recite the statistics calmly: interviewers will know that 25 usual class size plus 38 this year equals massive oversubscription.

Find out if you can get a reference either from someone there or someone wherever you worked last summer. Professors or pre-law job if you have to. Look into clerking: coming off a clerkship will erase this stain from your resume, and no judge is going to ask you if you got an offer. Get a writing sample together. Do anything and everything you can to polish up your resume: apply to be a TA, try to get something published, see if any professors need research assistants, etc. Hoof it over to career services and get them to see what they can do.

You might also see if any of your friends can put in a good word for you at their firms. Or even a "hey, keep an eye out for the Wiley Rein castoffs: they were good people who didn't deserve it" word.

RESIST the urge to trash Wiley up and down the avenue. Dwelling on it does you no good, makes you look unprofessional, and inspires the firm to do crap like the quote above. You can't win against the firm; don't even try. Your mission in life now should be to prove that they were wrong about you.

Good luck.

WOW!

First of all, ATL should be classier and take this post down ASAP. Second, Kay Nash is an absolute hypocrite, and incredibly classless.

I work at Wiley and I too knew the 4 SAs that were no-offered. They are all hard working students, two from T14 schools (yes, T14!). I also know that Kay told the SAs that she will help get them letters from Partners and others to attest to their hard work. Now she goes and pulls this, very very shameful.

I am ashamed of the firm, I am ashamed of how they treated these 4 SAs who were incredible workers. I hope the 4 SAs go on to do great things, as I am sure they all will. I also hope they contact representation to see how they can counter this negative attack campaign.

Furthermore, the SAs were each told a different number of how many no-offers were made. Surely this was to calm them down on the phone, either that or reconsideration of other no-offers took place.

I also know that the firm was particularly pitiful with returning calls to the no-offers, and have no given much guidance as to why this took place.

I am ashamed of how this has all unfolded, especially publicly like this. The firm has reached a low, and I personally think once all is said and done for the 4 SAs, they will be better off not having worked here.

69-71, if the hiring committee is collectively not returning phone calls of of the no-offers, that is fucking garbage behavior. At least have the guts to stand behind your decision.

69: STOP looking to get an explanation from the firm. You are BETTER OFF not knowing. Then, when asked, you can truthfully say "Unfortunately, the firm didn't give me an explanation for their decision. I can tell you that at my mid-summer review I was told X, Y and Z good things. Partner S has offered to provide a reference for me and attest to the quality of my work (you'll find his information on the reference sheet included in my packet), and here's a writing sample (which, of course, has been redacted to preserve client confidences and OKed by the firm) if you'd like to judge for yourself. "

And from what it sounds like, the honest real answer probably comes down to something like "nobody had anything bad to say about you, but when it came right down to it we had X number of slots and you didn't have quite enough people advocating strongly enough for you to stay."

This is absurd...I just had an OCI with Wiley and really liked the firm. Obviously I'm interested in the DC market, and Communications Law, so Wiley was a perfect fit, but not after this.

I go to a T14 school, I though the interview went well, but now I will clearly not accept an offer if given one. The fact that a firm no-offers 4 people might not be the "biggest deal" but the fact that it turns around and kicks them when down, well that is unacceptable.

This is especially true when these people probably had other choices of firms before picking Wiley. Not only do I not want to work at a firm that is going to no-offer 4 people to "compensate" but I definitely do not want to work somewhere that openly bashes people who worked hard for them over the summer.

69-71: stop looking back. No point asking "but why?!??" Pick yourself up, shake it off, and get moving. If any of those people call you back, don't say "why me?", instead ask who you can use as a reference. Consider letting your phone go to voicemail and not returning calls till after you regroup over the weekend.

Onward and upward!

Hey 71, I'm the other no-offer summer from above. I don't know who you are, and I don't want to post my name on here, but I created an email account and you can email me there and we can commiserate: WileyWannabe@gmail.com. I have no desire to badmouth the firm or scheme up anything, but it would be nice to talk to someone else who understands.

Thanks to everyone who posted positive comments about us. I'm glad people didn't think we were idiots or slackers. Just about all the attorneys I worked with and hung out with this summer were totally awesome and I would have really liked to come back next year.

If I had known it would end up this way, maybe I would have gotten drunk and jumped in the pool at a dinner party. At least then I'd have a reason for the no-offer and a good story!

Wiley's name is now garbage to my T10 ears. It's understandable to not give offers if the class was over subscribed but don't drag the no-offered through the mud. If the 4 truly did poor work (which seems like too high a percentage to be true) still don't ruin their chances publicly.

Why is it so harsh to say that those who deserved an offer got one? If another firm interviews a 3L without an offer from the last summer, the obvious inference is that the student was not deserving for some reason. Would you rather the firm says "everyone deserved an offer, but we cut 4 people anyway"?

I have worked with Kay Nash, and she is a great person. Stop trying to turn her into a monster.

Its harsh to sabotage the careers of four SAs who, by all accounts here, were good SAs, had good reviews, and then got blindsided by the firm trying to cover its own ass. The firm should have admitted that economics was the reason for the no-offers instead of throwing those 4 no-offered summers under the bus.

Kay Nash, I'm sure you're not this horrible monster some are making you out to be, but you gave the statement that indirectly denigrates those 4 no-offered SAs. You're the paid professional spokesperson on this and like it or not, you're name is now the one out there.

Please put together a "no offer firms of shame" list, and put Wiley at the TOP of the list.
I'm not a Wiley summer or associate, but this kind of behavior firm's part makes me sick.

Please put together a "no offer firms of shame" list, and put Wiley at the TOP of the list.
I'm not a Wiley summer or associate, but this kind of behavior on the firm's part makes me sick.

1. Kay Nash is terrific. She's great to all the associates, stars and non-stars alike. I'm sure she was put in a rough position here and did what she was told to do. I'm also sure that ATL's inquiry sent the Recruiting and Management Committee leaders scrambling for something to say, and this was what came out. More time might have yielded a better response, but I expect that the powers-that-be were trying to avoid getting dinged for not responding.

2. Wiley's got an odd history with summer offers. Used to be that there was always that one summer that didn't get an offer, leaving a lot of people scratching their heads "why?" A few years back, they no-offered a terrific associate who really liked the place, but who still wound up at a higher-prestige firm with a recommendation from none other than Fred Fielding himself. Strange. Some of us who've been here for a while think that the firm always liked to no-offer one summer a year just so that each summer's class wouldn't take their being here for granted.

3. Then for 3 summers running, every single SA got an offer. More that any other factor, that's what my circle thinks led to this summer's overacceptance. (The notion that it was the BlackBerry $$ is crazy, since all associates together saw less than 1% of that cash). In a down economy, I think more 2Ls than expected decided to go for the sure thing, which is what no-offering one poor SA each summer was trying to prevent.

4. My bet is the four no-offers was one part economic reality and one part "message" to future classes. (Everyone I know who worked with them thinks their work was O.K. and no worse than many of their classmates who got offers). The firm really doesn't care if it lowers the yield. Indeed, that's the point. Wiley has a full pipeline of graduates and clerks for the next two or three years. Fewer associates are leaving because of the general economy. And some of the works that's been keeping people busy, like the Sirius-XM merger and Verizon FIOS licenses, is going to drop off. If next summer's class is 15 or less, that will be just fine. Oh, and I bet that there will be at least one no-offer a year from here on out.

86 - Then why doesn't Wiley just extend fewer offers instead of playing this game with summer offers? If Wiley doesn't care about getting fewer associates each year, then they should just give out fewer offers. Those no-offered summers likely had other offers during 2L recruiting, but now their chances as 3Ls are bleak because of that no-offer hanging around their necks.

Would giving 4 additional offers to summers cause that much of a problem to the firm's finances? And In this year's 2L recruiting, they could give out fewer offers knowing that they'll get a higher yield due to the previous summers' 100% offers.

Its one thing to no-offer some summers that don't meet expectations or do something stupid, but its despicable to play this "find someone to no-offer to send a message" game. 4 people's careers just got unjustly annihilated for the sake of a firm's game. I hope Wiley ends up with slumming it with Reed Smith in this year's 2L recruiting season.

Caveat: I won't feel sorry for the no-offered summer at Wiley next year. He/she has advance warning to stay away at all costs.

87-

I don't think there was game playing. Historically, the firm has given out enough offers to yield about 25 summers. Three years of 100% offers mixed with a down economy that didn't really start to show up until after offers were out combined to yield an extra-large class.

-86

bottomline here is that the response to ATL by Wiley Rein was unnecessary and I think they at least need to contact their no-offer SAs and apologize for the bad press.

86 / 88 - I possibly see a connection between the "down economy" aspect and how that might have created an extra large summer class. However, the only way that works is (1) if the 2Ls either chose Wiley because of its previous 100% full-time offers in previous summers (possible) or (2) other firms foresaw a downturn and gave out fewer offers (unlikely as most firms did not seem to see this down economy coming). I'll give some credit to (1).

And I can also understand how Wiley could decide to no-offer some SAs for salary purposes, but how much overall financial strain could 4 extra associates cause to a large law firm, especially if Wiley gives fewer 2L offers the following year as a result? Many firms would have absorbed the cost.

The main problems with Wiley's approach are (A) characterizing the no-offered SAs as "not deserving" and thus greatly harming those SAs career prospects, and (B) unexpectedly deciding to no-offer those 4 SAs to send a message to future classes in an effort to lower the yield.

If those 4 SAs had their careers severely impaired so that the firm could save itself from having to admit to declining economic conditions and to send a message to future classes (when it could have just decided to give out fewer offers in the future), that is something worthy of contempt.

A final word, for those that go on and on harping about how all businesses have the right to no-offer at will, consider that the stigma of a no-offer in the legal profession is so great because of the 95-100% offer expectations that everyone knows to exist in the field. To no-offer a SA in the legal profession is to give that person a pretty harsh condemnation because others will, rightly or wrongly, view that SA very poorly.

Contrast that with investment banking analysts (not summers). After two years, most of them don't get promoted to associate and so, are forced to leave their companies. But because everyone knows this and understands that those fired analysts are the norm (just not superstars), those analysts usually have little trouble finding another good job.

If Kay Nash doesn't deserve this, she shouldn't act like human scum who does.

Who knows what happened. Maybe Wiley torpedoed the summers to cover themselves. Maybe the summers did really well on some projects and poorly on others. And maybe just doing "nothing wrong" wasn't enough this year.

If the no-offers were for economic reasons, then Wiley really blew it with this statement. But if there really were performance reasons, then I suppose the statement is harsh but not out of left field.

92-
My answer is I don't have the first damn clue. Maybe they were an early hirer and they liked to give no-offers. And maybe they don't have any friends. I'm an educated man, but I'm afraid I can't speak intelligently about the hiring habits of Wiley Rein.

-N.R. Jessep

81: Umm, YES!!! If you're cutting people for economic reasons who in other years WOULD have gotten offers, man up and say so! They've just announced to the world that these people are scrubs when it seems pretty clear from what we're hearing that that was NOT true.

Bravo, 73. A rare dose of good-naturedness on ATL...thanks

And major kudos to you, 79, for handling the situation with a much cooler and reasonable head than a lot of us would. Good luck--after that I post I bet that you'll come off stronger for all this

has king & spalding started their layoffs yet ?

i hear they are coming

then many associates will be converted to staff attorneys

great place to work though if you are a sociopath