Associate Advice, Biglaw, Bonuses, Job Searches, pls hndle thx

Pls Hndle Thx: Gather Ye Rosebuds

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Ed. note: Have a question for next week? Send it in to advice@abovethelaw.com

Dear ATL,

The recruiter calls are picking up, and I want out. However, it’s August, and that bonus payout is getting very close. I have an option to get out of here just after Labor Day, but the position might not be open in February.

Should I leave now, or should I hang on, get my bonus, and restart my search in the new year?

— It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

Dear It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas,

A few months ago, I would have said some Chicken Soup for the Soul crap, like “your bonus cannot buy you happiness.” That was before my associate friend bought an amazing NYC apartment, and I spent three weeks in a jealous rage…

Who am I kidding? Money can buy you happiness — or at least its first cousin, NYC real estate. With granite backsplashes. And California Closets. DIE.

What does this mean for you? It means that unless you interview at a firm and you walk away thinking it’s your soulmate, there will always be other firms. This won’t be the firm that got away and employed some tanned, better-looking associate to do your job even though you two had a better connection and a ton of history.

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Right now, it’s more important to cool your heels, load up on cash, and collect your bonus, so you can pay off your student loans and buy crap that makes you genuinely happy, like pets or electronics. If you hate your job, a $20,000 bonus may not seem like it’s worth sticking around for, but try to put things in perspective by putting another zero on the end there and then deleting three zeros and then you’ll get my blogging salary. Gather ye rosebuds dollars while ye may.

Also, if we ever go out, you’re paying.

Your friend,

Marin

It depends. Are you trying to break out of the golden handcuffs, or are you trying to find a new pimp who will keep you in the manner to which you’ve become accustomed? If the latter, then yes, follow Marin’s advice. Changing masters now will just screw you out of cash. And your new lords (whoever they turn out to be) will appreciate that a sniveling, gold-digging wretch such as yourself had to make sure that your wealth maximization strategy didn’t get in the way of your hopes and dreams.

But what if you are looking to actually get out of the “I’ll suck your stuff for $160K” lifestyle? If you are trying to break out of the golden handcuffs that have trapped you in a job you long since stopped enjoying, well then, you should go now. Think about it: how does getting just a little more gold help you get out of the golden handcuffs? That’s the kind of thinking that got you into this situation in the first place.

I haven’t learned much in the thirty-plus years I’ve been blustering and drinking my way through existence, but I know this: people vastly overestimate their ability to feel the same way tomorrow as they do today. You act like all that will happen between August and sometime in February will be that you get a fat bonus. But you don’t know what’s going to happen in the next five months or so, and you don’t know what that will do to you, or how that will change you or your circumstances. A one-night tryst could develop into a bastard embryo. A full-scale economic panic could break out (panics always happen in the fall). A night out with friends could result in jail time. You just never know what will happen tomorrow.

What you do know is that right now, you want out. And you can get out. So do it. Go, before you change your mind. Because in the grand scheme of things, a heavily taxed, low five-figure payout isn’t worth staying at a place you hate for an indefinite amount of time.

— A Guy Who Makes Plans with a Pencil

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Ed. note: Have a question for next week? Send it in to advice@abovethelaw.com.

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