Interview Stories

Law firm recruiting season is winding down, but we remain interested in your job interview horror stories. To read prior stories, click here, then scroll down. (Note: The “horror” in “interview horror stories” is loosely defined. Stories that are somewhat embarrassing or mildly amusing will suffice.) Most of our interview horror stories involve interviewees saying […]

* Who is the hottest dean? Your nominations are needed. (At right: A portrait of Howard Dean as a young man. Seriously.) * Who is the Paris Hilton of the federal judiciary? * Are you a professor at a private law school? If so, how much money do you make? * Why are those Florida […]

Remember the not-so-little secret we let you in on the other day: that all big law firms are pretty much the same?* If you question that conventional wisdom, consider this interview tale: I walked into an on-campus interview with a prominent DC firm. The interview room had a big window, and the interviewer must have […]

Our series on Interview Horror Stories has released a wave of funny interview anecdotes throughout the blogosphere. In addition to yesterday’s amusingly awkward anecdote from David Bernstein, check out Eric Muller’s two contributions: a funny-but-evil law firm story, and a butt-clenchingly mortifying faculty job talk story (anecdote #2). And now, our latest funny/embarrassing interview story, […]

We recently heard about a 1L at a top law school who knew, since he was a wee lad, that he wanted to go into international commercial arbitration. We found this rather odd. No one in his family worked in the field. He had no other prior exposure to this area of law. And ICA […]

* DLA Piper’s Amy Schulman (at right): Leading litigatrix, or Dianne Feinstein doppelganger? [WSJ Law Blog] * “Eugene Volokh” on Boston Legal: the mystery revealed. Congrats on the shout-out, Professor Volokh! [Volokh Conspiracy] * We enjoyed this. Or, to do our best Instapundit impression: HEH. [Concurring Opinions] * Another funny interview story, courtesy of David […]

Since fall is job hunting season in the legal profession, both in terms of firm jobs and judicial clerkships, ATL offers you this “public service announcement”: our top ten interview tips. We’ve received requests for interview advice from readers. Rather than repeat ourselves in emails, we thought we’d just write our “wisdom” down in a […]

Those big law firms — they’re all the same, right? Yeah, pretty much. But let’s keep that as our little secret. Here’s our next amusing interview story.* A law school classmate had been on what seemed like a zillion second-year callbacks and was having trouble keeping all the interviews straight in his head. At a […]

Obviously we have no aversion around here to humor (or attempts at it). But lawyers and law students on job interviews should be very careful when cracking jokes. Engage in some amount of cost-benefit analysis: Does the good that this joke might do outweigh the risk that it will fall flat? Could the joke be […]

Tomorrow is the first day for clerkship interviews under the official Law Clerk Hiring Plan (which some judges follow, and some judges don’t). So it’s fitting and proper that our next interview anecdote relates to a clerkship interview with a federal judge: I clerked for a federal court of appeals judge. The judge’s chambers were […]

Our series of interview anecdotes, which we kicked off yesterday, continues. And today’s tale illustrates that sometimes the rudeness comes not from the interview candidate, but from her hosts: As a law student applying for summer associate jobs, I had a post-interview lunch at [a large New York law firm] with a young male associate. […]

The evening air is turning crisp. The kids are back in school. You’re starting to think about where to spend Thanksgiving. That’s right, everyone: Autumn is here. (Official start of fall this year: Saturday, September 23.) In the legal world, everyone knows what fall means: job interviews. Second- and third-year law students are interviewing for […]