Hm, hiring experienced attorneys and clerks? That sounds like a ridiculously good idea. BigLaw should look into that.

How about eliminating the hiring of 1Ls from Michigan?

bring lat back

Is anyone seriously trying to split this summer? Most incoming SAs I know are crapping their pants about getting no-offered, and splitting a summer is just handing a firm a reason to deny an offer.

Lat speaks at Boalt in an hour.

Does anyone have a good question I should ask him?

Quick! Somebody find a typo in this and scream at Elie for it, so that 400 people can promptly yell "This isn't Elie you moron, it's Lat" at that guy!!

5, There are two different types of splits. One is a 2L who is splitting between two firms he/she has never worked for before, which I think can fairly be seen as a bad strategy (though probably was committed to this BEFORE all the late unpleasantness).

The other is a 2L who had a 1L summer position and is splitting to return to the prior firm for a few weeks at the end of the summer. Totally different situation. It would be senseless for that person to not return to the former firm.

All firms should stop hiring entry-level attorneys. Why should firms take on the responsibility of training their future partners.
Obviously there is an endless supply of clerkships and government jobs available to law students.

Better yet, law students should graduate from law school with at least 4 years of legal experience and training.

6 - Ask him why law firms continue to hide behind the tissue paper "arms length" curtain of using headhunters to hire from one another when they should be doing it internally the way the rest of the business world does.

"It's interesting to see how rarely law firm websites mention adverse developments (compared with, say, corporate websites)."

Really? And this guy was a lawyer? I mean, he couldn't come up with a good reason that corporate websites might disclose bad info while law firms might not?

FIRST to say I don't care about the NALP conference. Gimme more layoff news!

3 Do you have anything personal against Michigan? Are you from OSU?

has anyone heard about the lesbian partner at king and spalding that had sex with a client ? does anyone have photos ?

10,

You must not have ever worked outside of a law firm... every industry has recruiters that work outside the institution and, in fact, most industries think more highly of recruiters than attorneys.

9 is absolutely right in that firms are going to curtail summer hiring and focus more on lateral type recruiting. the top echelon firms will still hire top students out of the top 14 but it will be pared back and will fill in the blanks and needs at the lateral level. It will be similar to how every other business acquires people - or if you want to think about a professional sports organization. That is the wave of the future and the current economic climate has just pushed that development further along

15 - I think 9 was being sarcastic - i.e., firms SHOULD take on the responsibility of training future partners, and law students can't graduate with four years of legal experience.

Sorry you missed the joke.

-Not 9

10, because the law firm wants to hire the best lawyer for the job rather than retraining some TTT who happens to be working in another department. Sorry your firm laid you off and hired new (better) people, bro.

michigan is so TTT

Thanks for getting it 16.

I don't get where firms think they are going to get all of this trained legal talent.

- 9

NY to 100k!

"What are some things firms should keep in mind about the fall 2009 OCI process?

Student attitudes will vary; some are in denial about how bad things are. Be prepared for that."

2011 is the true lost generation

14 - When do your parents get home? And why isn't your babysitter monitoring your internet use more closely?

Any restaurant recommendations in Lexington, Ky.? I have doc review there next week.

Ain't no jobs out there.

5,

I'm splitting this summer. Do you actually think my chances of getting one offer are LOWER than if I were at a single firm the entire summer?

For that to be true, you would have to believe that both firms are half as likely to extend and offer simply because I'm splitting. I believe that on-the-job performance will be the larger factor.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diversification_(finance)

23 - Are you sure it's doc review? I think your firm is just abandoning you in Kentucky rather than offering you severance. It'll be fun though - think of your journey home as "Amazing Race: Appalachia". Elie and Lat will probably even let you post about it.

25,

The problem is that financial diversification does not take "appearances" into account. If neither firm thinks you're devoted enough to their firm, then so long. I predict offer chances LOWER than 50% for splits.

25 - it depends entirely on the quality of your firms and the size of your class. If they are looking for reasons not to give out offers, then you have given them one.

As for your on-the-job performance argument, that also relies heavily on your firms. Most BigLaw firms don't have work for their current attorneys, never mind SAs. If that is the case at your firms, then you won't have enough substantive work for them to make performance-related decisions, and offers will be based on different criteria. For example, it may be based on your perceived level of interest and commitment to the firm, which would be diminished if you split.

So, yes, it is possible that splitting reduces the chances of getting hired.

This would never happen in Texas.

-A double-wide, a pre-owned Chevy and Big-haired wife in acid washed jeans in Texas.

With the hundreds of associates deferred or laid off this year, firms appear to be banking that the risk is minimal, since the associate market will have plenty of pickings for the next couple of years.

"I think there will be, for the next year to two years, more first-years than law firms will be looking for," said Keith Wetmore, chairman of Morrison & Foerster.

"I hope that by the fall of 2010, firms will be close to being aligned again through smaller summer classes this year," he said.

Many of California's biggest firms have cut the number of associates in their programs compared to last year, some by 30 percent to 50 percent, according to data collected from the National Association of Law Placement. See The Recorder's table of how top CalLaw 25 firms are (mostly) shrinking their summer classes (pdf). For further data, see The Recorder's law school blog, The Shark.

The 10 largest firms nationwide also have cut their programs by similar amounts.

http://www.zimbio.com/pilot?ID=aMZg3wLjpfD&ZURL=%2FLaw%2BSchools%2Fnews&URL=http%3A%2F 2Fus.rd.yahoo.com%2Fdailynews%2Frss%2Fsearch%2F%2522berkeley%2Blaw%2522%2BOR%2B%2522best%2Blaw%2Bschools%2522%2BOR%2B%2522law%2Bprograms%2522%2BOR%2B%2522law%2Breview%2522%2BOR%2B%2522law%2Bschools%2522%2BOR%2B%2522law%2Bstudent%2522%2FSIG%3D1242b9klt%2F*http%253A%2F%2Fwww.law.com%2Fjsp%2Farticle.jsp%3Fid%3D1202429711985%26rss%3Dnewswire

15--How would you respond to the proposition pasted below? Pretty interesting article.

you cannot introduce a gap into that supply chain. You need to be in the business of continually recruiting new talent, in order to feed the continually moving production line of senior to mid-level to junior staff needed to manage cases and transactions. You cannot, in other words, inflict on your own firm the equivalent of a "lost generation."

http://www.bmacewen.com/blog/archives/2008/12/whats_your_attrition_rate.html

15 - Actually, I have worked outside of a law firm. Precisely why I made the suggestion that I did. Law firms spend millions in search fees so they can pretend they didn't recruit someone directly from one another. Yes, companies use external recruiters, but most companies have good internal recruiters as well. Not everything is about being a lawyer you know..well, clearly you don't know.

17 - Still employed "Bro". Why do you have your shorts twisted - because I recommended a little better transparancy in hiring? Not to mention better fiscal management. Oh, wait, I know - because you're a headhunter and you're scared to death that the easy road is getting bumpy.

15--How would you respond to the proposition pasted below? Pretty interesting article.

you cannot introduce a gap into that supply chain. You need to be in the business of continually recruiting new talent, in order to feed the continually moving production line of senior to mid-level to junior staff needed to manage cases and transactions. You cannot, in other words, inflict on your own firm the equivalent of a "lost generation."

http://www.bmacewen.com/blog/archives/2008/12/whats_your_attrition_rate.html

9 and 16,

and all those recently canned attorneys demonstrate what exactly? i.e. that there is/was an overabundance of lawyers and that firms don't have the work for them currently and given the prospects of the financial industry are never coming back to the same level if at all, see securitizations or companies are keeping more of their work in-house the need for lawyers will diminish.

Firms don't need 1st year associates and only a warped person would think otherwise. Firms can get contract/staff attorneys to do the grunt work and use that like a baseball team's minor league and then fill in via free agency (the lateral market). The legal profession is changing and it would be better to have your eyes and ears open to take full advantage.

Ask a buggy whip makers how they are doing right now.

15

I've seen Kimball live. Funny guy, smart too. Was a hiring partner before S&S fell off the edge.

26, funny, but do you have any restaurant recommendations?
--23

15 - Actually, I have worked outside of law firms. More of you should try it. Having been outside of law firms is precisely why I point out the fallacy and farce of using headhunters (almost exclusively) to hire lawyers. Most corporations, while they do use headhunters from time to time, have internal recruiting teams. The model works well. It is also more fiscally responsible and could have saved some of these sacred law jobs.

17 - Hate to ruin your rant, "Bro", but I am still employed. I bet you're a headhunter and you're soiling your Scooby-Do underoos because the simple fee ride is grinding to a halt.

Hey, 15/34. Where are all those laterals going to come from? The government can't employ them all - I bet a bunch of them will have been first-year associates somewhere.

You seem to have mistaken shrinking associate classes for the elimination of associate classes. They're not the same thing. But given that you're a stupid jackass that can't spell or use grammar, I guess you missed that.

23/36 - sorry, no. I'm only good for smart-ass remarks, I have nothing of substance. Glad you liked the joke though.

-26

Splitting the summer isn't that crazy this year especially since firms have cut their programs down to 8-10 weeks. I'm doing the full 8 weeks at one firm that cut down from 12-14, and then going to another firm where I already have a job offer for 4-6 weeks. Surely this won't impact my job offer decision from firm 1 since I will have done the entire program?

Biglaw should stop hiring new grads. When new ballplayers come out of HS or college, teams don't pay the whole lot of em the MLB minimum to sit on the bench; they leave em in the minors for a few years, to weed out the weaklings and develop stars.

Likewise, let young attorneys get better hands-on training at lower-tiered firms, then poach the capable and willing after a few years. Biglaw scut-work can be handled by contract attorneys.

Added bonus for Biglaw, there's no draft or guaranteed contracts like in MLB.

Hey, look 40 - the consultant guy told 1000 BigLaw HR reps not to let their summers split. You tell me if it's a good idea to split your summer.

As some of you have been anticipating the lawwave LPO training start dates, they are as follows:

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Previous particpants have commented:

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Much of this was easily foreseen (check the message here mocking the stupidity of the "top firms" for having summer classes of say 150+ when these firms have only three to four hundred total lawyers.

A certain blogger defended one of the worse overhirers with some lame ass "but they did a lot of mergers two years before the summer program will start so it makes sense...."

assuming arguendo that there is a future of recruiting, the secret will be to get the photos referred to by #14 and send them with a copy of your resume to the aforementioned partner with a cover letter consisting only of the words "a fortiori."

2L here. Splitting isn't stupid; it's the only survival strategy left. When a national firm recruited me last fall, they advertised a 12 to 14-week program. I told them they had to let me put in a couple weeks at the regional firm I worked at 1L summer. The national firm eventually agreed.

Of course, you know the rest of the story. The national firm cut its summer program to 8 weeks maximum. It's improbable that the offer percentage will be that great. I'm beginning to wonder if the move is even worth it.

If I'd told the regional firm to take a hike, I'd be screwed right now. I'd be unemployed for a month this summer, I'd probably have lost the regional firm's interest (even though they love me), and everything would ride on whether the national firm felt like hiring anyone this year.

If a firm is only going to employ you for 6-8 weeks, it's insane for the firm not to let you work somewhere else the rest of the summer. There's dumb loyalty to a firm that hasn't offered you anything real and there's showing initiative to get work; I want to work for a firm that rewards the latter.

46 - That's really poor reasoning. Law students used to be the belle of the ball, and the firms were the suitors. The opposite is now true. Why should you show "dumb loyalty" to my firm, when all we have offered to do for you is pay you thousands of dollars a week that you are not worth? Because you need to if you want a job here.

No firm is going to begrudge you trying to fill your time before or after their program (nor will you get "showing initiative" points for doing so). But that is not splitting. Splitting is telling me you can't show up for all of my program so that you can work at another firm, and that increases your risk of a no-offer.

Although it won't matter if you are a star (although that seems unlikely with your attitude and reasoning), if you are one of the people possibly getting no-offered, it makes it a lot easier to cut you and take someone else who 1) was around longer and presumably has developed stronger relationships; and 2) really wants to work here (i.e., does not still have his/her foot in the door of another firm). Plus it is less difficult to cut someone who probably has another job.

Being "screwed" by being out of work for a month of one summer (please. . .) is a lot better than being screwed by being no-offered.

-V10 partner