Today is the first day of many law firms' summer associate programs. To summer associates who are starting work today: WELCOME!

Law school is great and all, and we're sure you had a fabulous experience last summer interning for the ACLU. But you haven't truly arrived in the legal profession until your first day of work as a summer associate. To those of you starting as summers today, congratulations! You are now Big Boys and Big Girls of Biglaw.

Several readers have asked us to give advice or tips to incoming summer associates. To be totally honest, we'd rather not. We seek to encourage summer associate scandals, like the many that we covered last summer -- e.g., the Bruised Booze Cruiser (at Kirkland & Ellis); Skadden Cristal Boy; Katten Kreep; O'Melveny Mystery Man -- not to nip them in the bud.

But because we're good people, we've collected below links to summer associate advice columns written by others. We also hereby declare this post to be an open thread, devoted to freewheeling discussion of do's and don'ts for summer associates. Summer associates, post your questions; experienced attorneys, post your answers.

Later this week, we'll offer advice for lawyers at firms who are hosting summers, concerning how to handle your young charges. In the weeks ahead, we'll be doing a slew of summer program-related surveys (e.g., a survey of summer lunch budgets at different firms). If you have suggestions for SA-related coverage, or salacious tales to tell, please email us (and include the words "summer associate" somewhere in the subject line).

Thanks in advance for all your tips. We're looking forward to a great summer, full of food, folks, and fun (plus a few good scandals). Please don't disappoint us!

First Day Advice for New Summers [ATL Community]
Tips for Summer Associates [Jeremy Blachman]
The Ten Commandments for Summer Associates [4LawSchool.com]

Earlier: The Incredible Shrinking Summer Program?

Oh is the author of the famous (and fabulous) PH Farewell Email -- aka The Email That Launched A Thousand Blog Comments -- and a heroine in the eyes of many Biglaw associates around the country. Here are a few highlights from the interview:

[T]he former associate, Shinyung Oh (University of Chicago ’93, Georgetown Law ’98), a commercial litigation lawyer.... says she sent the now-infamous email because she didn’t want other associates who may be laid off because of downsizing by the firm – but told it is because of their performance – to doubt their own abilities.

“I want them to feel like they’re not completely alone and not to worry about their own performance when it’s the firm doing something for economic reasons” and because of a “desire to increase partner profits,” she said.

Inducing crippling self-doubt among associates is one of the most pernicious things about "stealth layoffs," in which economically-driven dismissals are cast by firms as purely performance-based. We know this from having spoken to stealth-layoff victims, who have described how their self-confidence was shattered when their firms dismissed them, purportedly for poor performance.

While there may be a "six of one, half-dozen of another" quality to this debate -- as Dan Weiner of Hughes Hubbard & Reed just told the WSJ Law Blog, "is it economic or is it performance-related is a false dichotomy," since if you have to make cuts, "you’re not going to pick people randomly" -- we still think it's the better part of valor for firms to take the reputational hit, rather than stick it to their associates. At any rate, it's certainly fair for law students and lateral candidates to shun firms that get called out for being less-than-candid about their personnel decisions.

Back to the interview. Here's the $64,000 -- or three-months-severance -- question: What was Shinyung Oh thinking when she sent out that email?

[Oh said] she knew that the email, which was sent to associates firm-wide, litigation partners in her office and the top management of Paul Hastings, could ruin her chances of landing another big-firm job. She said she isn’t considering suing the firm, and said she doesn’t feel she was discriminated against because of her pregnancy.

Oh Shinyung, are you sure? After Aaron Charney settled with Sullivan & Cromwell, he got himself a nice new apartment. Then again, if you were planning to sue, you probably shouldn't have told the Wall Street Journal that you didn't feel discriminated against on account of your pregnancy.

As for what’s next, Oh, who immigrated from South Korea when she was eight and grew up in New York and Houston, said she’s not sure. But she said that since the email was posted online, she’s received an outpouring of support from lawyers in the Bay Area and across the country. Several are trying to help her find a new job.

Shinyung, if you're looking for headhunter recommendations, drop us a line -- we can hook you up. And if you ever get the urge to send out another barn-burning, firmwide email, definitely give us a heads up. Based on the way that your email resonated with readers, it's clear that you have writerly talent that deserves a wider audience.

In all seriousness, we wish Shinyung Oh the best of luck. We commend her for the courage it took to write that farewell email. We have every confidence that she will land on her feet -- recall our prior post, quoting a colleague who praised her as someone who "ran a huge class action and got excellent results" -- and we look forward to following her career in the years ahead.

Update: Jane Genova shares our optimism about Oh's future. She writes: Oh "has almost an infinite number of fresh career options, within and outside law.... [enumerates options].... Being the good solider, girl scout or boy scout has no payoff in the current career marketplace. Bold risks do.... Wild risk is the only secure path."

P.S. Congrats to Amir Efrati on the interview. Read the full post over here. Check out a copy of Shinyung Oh's 2006 performance review, also obtained by the WSJ, over here (PDF).

A screencap of her firm bio is saved for posterity, after the jump.

Fired Paul Hastings Associate Talks to Law Blog [WSJ Law Blog]
The New Risky Business - Shinyung Oh's E-Mail Strategy [Law and More]

Earlier: Breaking: A Dramatic Farewell Email (And proof of Paul Hastings layoffs.)
Miscarriage of Justice at Paul Hastings? The Blogosphere Reacts
Nationwide Layoff Watch: Paul Hastings

So rescission is no longer just an equitable remedy; it's a hot new trend in the world of employment. Over the weekend, this report appeared in the New York Times:

Thousands of people are losing their jobs on Wall Street — some before their first day of work.

They polished résumés; they sweated interviews; they landed dream jobs. But now a small group of college and business school students are discovering that their careers at Bear Stearns ended before they began. JPMorgan Chase, which bought the beleaguered investment bank last month, rescinded many of their job offers.

Yashoda Khandkar, a senior at the University of Pennsylvania, is among 250 Bear hires who now find themselves unemployed in one of the worst financial job markets in years.

“The worst part about the entire situation is that it’s a really hard market for us to look for other jobs,” Ms. Khandkar said. “We probably can’t get as good of jobs as we would have had.”

Compared to the rescinded offers on Wall Street, what we're seeing in law firm land looks like small potatoes. This makes sense. If finance offers richer rewards than Biglaw during good times, Biglaw should offer reduced risk during bad.

But could it be the case that we don't know the full extent of rescinded job offers in the legal world? From a tipster:

Why aren’t you doing anything about law firms rescinding offers to 2L summer associates?

[Firm X] apparently rescinded 15-20 offers in Chicago. [Firm Y] rescinded 15 offers in their DC office. Apparently Charlotte is getting hammered...

Please look into this, and if it's true, hammer these firms and protect the rest of us!

We are following up with the firms mentioned by our tipster, and if we can confirm the rumors, we will report them in these pages. In the meantime, if you have definite knowledge of a firm rescinding offers of summer or full-time employment -- e.g., your own offer was rescinded -- please email us (subject line: "Rescinded Job Offer"). We will investigate and report back. Thanks.

Update: A commenter points out this helpful article on the NALP website, Rescinded Offers: Mitigating the Effects of Rescinded Offers ("adapted from an article published in the August 2001 NALP Bulletin").

Bear Stearns’s New Hires Become Job Seekers [New York Times]
Law Firms Curtail Associate Programs As Economy Slows [Wall Street Journal]

And your life must be pretty bad if you're a former U.S. Attorney General who can't find a job, and some columnist in Austin is making lots of fun of you. John Kelso of the Austin American-Statesman wrote a column yesterday titled Maybe former A.G. Gonzales could get a job being paid by the hour to keep his mouth shut. AG AG's frequent "I don't recall" answers during Senate testimony provide inspiration for many of Kelso's jokes:

What holiday do you think of when you think of Alberto R. Gonzales? With me, it's always Mother's Day. Why? Simple. Because with Gonzales, mum's the word.

I feel sorry for anybody out there who can't find a job, even a guy like Gonzales who is still making a bunch of money from speaking engagements. As bad as Gonzales' memory is, he must use notes.

Maybe the problem is that when the job interviewers ask him what his last job was, he's telling them that he doesn't remember. Can't say as I blame him. If I were him, I'd tell them I used to work at Denny's.

It's pretty traditional for law firms to bring former partners back after they've served in government -- e.g., Mary Jo White and Debevoise, Michael Mukasey and Patterson Belknap -- but AG AG's former firm is apparently not biting, despite his having served as America's top lawyer. A tipster tells us:

Several months ago, I heard that even V&E [Vinson & Elkins] was not interested in having Gonzales back – looks like there are no takers. How long do you think he’ll be able to support himself on speakers’ gigs?

Locke Liddell took Harriet Miers back. Apparently, endorsing torture and getting caught in the U.S. Attorney firing scandal is worse than losing the Supreme Court popularity contest and having many bad hair days.

In Searching for New Job, Gonzales Sees No Takers [New York Times]
Maybe former A.G. Gonzales could get a job being paid by the hour to keep his mouth shut [The Austin American-Statesman]

Random, but interesting -- and topical, given current events. From a reader:

I ran across this article today. I know it has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with the law, but I figured that all of the Loyola 2Ls out there may appreciate this.

Another glamorous and high-paying job is, in fact, not what it appears. The price of admission is quite staggering, yet people continue to chase the "dream" (read: $$$).

But many of them don't end up with that prestigious, six-figure gig. Instead, they wind up six figures in debt -- many of them after abandoning secure and successful jobs in other fields. One financial planner, who works with many people in this profession, says that "you’re much better off going into plumbing, from a purely financial perspective."

The job in question? No, not lawyer -- airline pilot. Details here.

What can an aspiring pilot do to maximize their odds of landing a "Big Air" gig -- one of the lucrative but increasingly rare jobs flying for a major airline? It's not clear. Alas, U.S. News doesn't rank flight schools.

For Pilots, Dreams Run Into Reality [New York Times]

[Ed. note: Apologies for the radio silence for much of today. Alas, we've been experiencing some rather severe technical difficulties, in connection with the site redesign and relaunch. The next few days (and perhaps weeks) may be a little bumpy around here; please bear with us. Thanks for your patience.]

Here are two pieces of information that we've heard about Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman:

1. For incoming first-year associates, their start dates, originally set for early October 2008, are being pushed back. These new associates could start as late as January 2009. The delay is due to "a serious slowdown in business."

2. For 2008 summer associates, the summer program has been reduced from 12 weeks to 10 weeks. Summer associates will not be allowed to work more than 10 weeks, even if they want to.

With respect to the first tip, concerning incoming full-time associates, we've heard it with respect to the Los Angeles office specifically. With respect to the second tip, concerning summer associates, we believe it to be a firmwide policy.

We contacted PWSP for confirmation and comment, earlier this week and again today. A firm spokesperson confirmed receipt of our inquiries but had no comment (as of the time of this posting; if we hear from her, we'll update this post).

More details, plus reactions from some of our tipsters, after the jump.

Okay, so you already knew that. Last year, in a widely read, front-page story for the Wall Street Journal, Amir Efrati reported on the non-Biglaw blues: the challenging job market and not-so-hot financial prospects faced by many law school graduates (many of whom are saddled with heavy debt).

A month later, the Des Moines Register basically rewrote Efrati's story. But Efrati couldn't have been that offended, since his article was thematically similar to this piece by Leigh Jones, which appeared in the National Law Journal a few months earlier.

Preemption is a bitch. In this media-saturated age, it's difficult to be truly original.

Nevertheless, even if these articles all sort of sound alike, they generate buzz and traffic -- which may explain why they keep getting written, over and over again. The latest is a rather lengthy cover story from the Chicago Tribune's Sunday magazine, by Greg Burns.

From one of the many tipsters who emailed us about it: "Nothing earth shattering revealed, but this article discusses the 'haves and have nots' of the legal profession." Another reader noted:

I assume you’ve seen the Chicago Trib article on low lawyer salaries, for those not in BigLaw. Not that this discrepancy is a shocker to you, but your fans seem to enjoy lording their big, uh, paychecks over their less fortunate brethren, while taking perverse pleasure in working 20-hour days for the free dinner and ride home. As such, this seems like a perfect comment clusterf**k topic.

A third quipped: "Not sure if news, but enjoy!" We concur. Even if the piece's thesis is nothing new, at least it's well-reported, chock full of interesting anecdotes and data.

More discussion, after the jump.

Over at Greedy South, various rumors are circulating about Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal. One poster claimed that the firm rescinded offers of summer employment to several incoming summer associates in the Charlotte office. Later on in the thread, others chimed in to claim that the firm is rescinding offers to full-time associates who were set to arrive in the fall (possibly beyond Charlotte as well).

An ATL tipster wrote us:

I know things are really, really, slow at most firms in Charlotte (as has been noted by the firings at Cadwalader and Dechert), but is there any way that you could find out whether this is actually true? It seems like the elephant in the room is everyone's hope that securitization will magically pick up again, but everyone seems to forget that it's difficult for a market segment to "rebound" that wasn't even in existence 10 years ago.

Is this a sign of Sonnenschein closing its Charlotte office (after only 1 year)? Have you heard anything about other offices having the same types of problems? Just trying to find out what's going on.

We reached out to the firm for comment earlier this week but they never got back to us. If you have any info to share, please email us. Thanks.

Sonnenschein Firings? [Greedy South / Infirmation]

In these pages, we alternate between sensationalistically fanning the flames of greed (NY to 190!) and despair (Nationwide Layoff Watch!).

Today, despair. From the ATL mailbag:

You should do a thread on worried 2Ls. I am one of them. I have a summer associate job at a Vault 100 firm, and so do lots of my friends. But we hear through the grapevine that new-ish associates at many firms don't have tons of work and will not meet their billables targets.

Are we 2Ls seriously in danger of getting major no offers at the end of the summer? What was it like for 2L summers in other legal market downturn times (I guess around 2001 was the last one)? What should we expect?

At last month's APALSA conference, we attended a very interesting panel on law firm partnership. One of the panelists mentioned that she was a summer associate during a prior downturn. Out of her summer class of thirteen (13), only one (1) received an offer of full-time employment. As soon as she mentioned the grim 1-out-of-13 statistic, one could feel the chill of fear in the audience. [FN1]

One out of 13 may be a bit extreme. But are the days of 100 percent offer rates over? Quite possibly. Last fall, there was anecdotal evidence of firms being more stingy with offers than in the past. Since then, of course, the economy has worsened significantly, with several firms announcing layoffs of full-time associates. So perhaps the trend of no-offering SAs will continue.

Some unsolicited advice for 2008 summer associates: work your tails off; keep your heads down; and don't threaten to knife anyone, get slugged by a local lass at a bar, or steal firm-provided Swiss Miss.

Good luck and Godspeed.

[FN1] The panelist was the one summer associate who got an offer. Now she's a partner -- at an even bigger and more profitable firm than the one she summered at. Some people were just born to be Biglaw badasses.

Earlier: Fall Recruiting Open Thread: No-Offer Factories

From a student at Duke Law School:

I had to laugh out loud at Kramer Levin's use of the daylight savings time maxim, "spring ahead/spring forward," to suggest that we could do the same for our careers by coming to their firm. See the flyer below, which they seem to have sent to the entire 1L class.

Actually, we think it's kinda cute! Check out those otherworldly tulips:

And it's a helpful reminder for overworked law firm associates. If you have a conference call scheduled for, say, this Sunday morning at 10, you don't want to miss it.

A suggestion for a discussion topic, from the ATL mailbag:

I searched through the archives for a thread on this, but couldn't find anything. As a second year law student headed to NYC Biglaw after graduation, I'm already assuming that I will work for the firm I start with for no more than three or four years. The idea of being a Biglaw partner does not sound like the life for me.

What really interests me is the possibility of moving to the business world to work for a big bank or a Fortune 500 company. Yet the qualifications and legal experience that an associate needs to get to make that sort of move are still very vague to me. It is a topic that I would be afraid to talk about at my firm as well.

So I was hoping you could start an open thread where people talk about their experience in moving from Big Law to Big Business, and how young associates should go about making the move. I hope this topic can be discussed on abovethelaw soon. Thanks.

We're happy to oblige; here's the requested open thread. Our general advice -- which is, we admit, pretty obvious -- would be: get your clients to like you as much as possible. Many of the lawyers we've known who have made the transition from law to business jumped over to a client who loved working with them. Some went to work for the client in a legal capacity, then moved over to the business side later; others went over directly to the business side.

In addition, to the (very persistent) commenter(s) seeking a place to talk about MBA degrees in Biglaw -- special bonuses for business degree holders, enhanced job prospects, seniority credit, etc. -- feel free to chime in as well.

(We previously posted an open thread on MBAs and Biglaw. But that was back in August 2007, so we figure it's okay to revisit the subject now.)

Earlier: In Biglaw, Does It Pay To Have An MBA?

Don't believe everything you read in these pages. If a gossip site isn't flat-out wrong a sizable percentage of the time, it's not sufficiently gossipy.

But we were right about something being afoot at Dechert LLP. This morning we wrote:

We've been hearing vague rumblings of something about to go down over at Dechert LLP. Said rumblings are reminiscent of what we heard in the days and hours leading up to Cadwalader's Thursday Morning Massacre....

We hear that certain groups at Dechert are super-slow, and morale in some quarters is super-low. These are, of course, often harbingers of lawyer layoffs.

Now we learn this, from Gina Passarella in the Legal Intelligencer:

The slowing economy has hit home at Dechert which has just let go 13 associates strictly in its finance and real estate practice, according to a source inside the firm....

Dechert has given the 13 associates, who have worked in Dechert offices throughout the United States, until the close of business Tuesday to leave. No one was asked to leave Friday, the source said....

There were no additional layoffs prior to today, but some attorneys were shifted into other practice areas, the firm source said. The layoffs comprise less than 10 percent of the 167 attorneys listed in Dechert's finance and real estate practice, which includes mortgage finance, structured finance and securitization, investment, and mergers and acquisitions.

The attorneys who are leaving were offered three months severance, six months of paid medical benefits and transition placement support, the source said.

Three months seems to be "market" in terms of severance. There was some fear that laid-off Dechert associates were going to get less.

ATL gets a shout-out in the piece:

Legal blog Above The Law has reported extensively on associate and staff layoffs across the country. The reports included associate layoffs at Thacher Proffitt, Cadwalader Wickersham & Taft and Clifford Chance, mainly in the structured finance, real estate and capital markets practices of those firms.

Today, Above The Law posted a blog on rumors of low morale at Dechert, questioning whether layoffs were imminent.

The article closes with a helpful overview of the layoff landscape:

Dechert's news puts the U.S. legal scene over the 100-attorney mark in terms of attorney layoffs and offered buyouts this economic cycle. According to data collected by The American Lawyer, 35 attorneys were laid off at Cadwalader Wickersham; 24 Thacher Proffitt mid-levels were offered buyouts plus an additional five first-years took optional buyouts; six Clifford Chance associates were laid off and 23 associates at McKee Nelson took buyouts.

Check out the full article, which also discusses Dechert's record-setting year in 2007 -- $836 million in gross revenue, and more than $2.3 million in profits per equity partner -- by clicking here.

Update (5:15 PM): Okay, we're confused. We just received this email, sent out by firm chairman Barton Winokur, and forwarded to us by a Dechert source. Our source had heard that the 13 were being laid off. But this email implies otherwise:

From: Winokur, Barton
Sent: Friday, February 29, 2008 4:37 PM
To: ALL Dechert Users
Subject:

Due to the major shift in market conditions affecting client demands in our Finance and Real Estate practice area, we currently do not have sufficient work for all the associates in FRE. As a consequence, we have told 13 associates in the U.S. FRE group that we see no demand for them in that group in the foreseeable future. However, due to increased and substantial demand in other practice areas, we will be offering those lawyers the opportunity to work in those other groups.

Barton J. Winokur
Dechert LLP

Update (5:40 PM): We have reached out to Barton Winokur for clarification. We will let you know if and when he gets back to us.

Update (6:20 PM): The Legal Intelligencer has revised its piece somewhat, in light of the Winokur email:

The slowing economy has hit home at Dechert which just issued layoff notices to 13 associates strictly in its finance and real estate practice, according to a source inside the firm.

Shortly after the firm confirmed the planned layoffs, the source said Chairman Barton J. Winokur issued a statement that the firm would then offer the 13 associates positions in other practice groups. [Reprints the email.]

There was no word as to whether those associates, who had been given severance packages, accepted the revised offer to switch practices.

Update (6:35 PM): We're hearing conflicting things about whether these 13 lawyers really are being given the opportunity to switch practice groups, or whether they're being laid off outright, with additional lawyers getting moved internally.

We will continue to monitor and report about what's going down at Dechert. If you can clarify this somewhat murky situation for us, please email us. Thanks.

Layoffs Hit Dechert Following Record Financial Year [Legal Intelligencer]

From an anxious first-year law student:

I saw this piece on Tax Prof Blog and thought your readers might have some interesting thoughts. NALP has decided next fall the 2Ls only get 45 days to hold an offer for a summer position. See here.

I have a job at a firm this summer that is part of NALP that I am happy about as a 1L but I definitely want to go through OCI. If I leave my job this year at the end of July, the firm will likely notify me by August 15th that I have an offer for the next summer. It would then expire by September 30th!

It seems possible that I could be in the middle of call-backs with other firms and have to decide whether to take a chance on getting a better offer or not. Yikes!

And what about firms that don't do OCI at my school? I doubt that they will go through submitted resumes, conduct interviews and make offers by then.

So, ATL readers -- any advice for our nervous 1L? Or any views on whether this rule change is a good or bad idea?

Update / Correction: According to the analysis of this commenter, the scenario outlined above would not come to pass. We've reviewed the NALP rules, which can be accessed in full over here, and we agree with the commenter. See Part V, Section C: "Employers offering positions for the following summer to candidates previously employed by them should leave those offers open until at least November 15."

2Ls Now Must Respond to Summer Job Offers Within 45 Days [TaxProf Blog]
Full Text of NALP Principles & Standards [NALP]

In light of the explosive economic growth of China and the Far East, many top U.S. and global law firms are trying to figure out how to enter Asia. And Above the Law is, too.

We're looking for someone to write a weekly column for us about practicing law in Asia. It would be similar to ATL's other columns -- e.g., Legal Eagle Wedding Watch, Sports and the Law -- but centered on what it's like to be a lawyer in Asia.

The ideal candidate would be someone currently practicing in Asia. But former and future Asia practitioners would also be considered, as long as they can write knowledgeably about working in Asia, have a network of sources on the ground, etc.

The columnist can write under a pseudonym if desired. The gig comes with pay (a modest stipend). It's an excellent opportunity for anyone looking to do some fun, non-legal writing, or to share their expat experience with ATL's large and growing readership.

If you might be interested, please email us (subject line: "Asia column"). Please include a brief bio and a discussion of your vision for the column, including possible topics to write about if you have some in mind.

Thanks! We look forward to reviewing your applications.

There have been some rumblings on this blog of a slowdown in judicial clerk hiring, even as firms raise clerkship bonuses to $50K.

Today's ATL / Lateral Link survey digs a little deeper into who is (or isn't) hiring judicial clerks, and what their bonuses look like.

We received 1,062 responses to our ATL / Lateral Link survey on in-house aspirations.

As shown in the charts below, over half of associates are satisfied or even "very satisfied" with their current positions, but about half would still like to go in-house.

Associate Responses: Are You Satisfied With Your Current Job?

Associate Responses: Would You Like To Go In-House?

Find out why and where associates want to move, and what in-house counsel are thinking themselves, after the jump.

This morning we've been hearing rumors of associate layoffs at Thacher Proffitt & Wood. As you may recall from ATL's prior coverage (scroll down), TPW has reduced its ranks over the past few months, through voluntary departures. But those departures took place after the firm warned that it might have to resort to layoffs.

Apparently something went down at the firm yesterday afternoon. Some sources characterized what happened as layoffs, with affected associates given until May to leave. But we contacted the firm, which denied the rumors and issued this statement:

Thacher Proffitt has not done layoffs. We have increased our efforts to provide associates with outplacement in practice areas that have been most affected by current market conditions.

We take the firm at its word; they've been pretty candid in the past about their personnel decisions and how they've been affected by the credit crunch. If you have the inside scoop on what took place yesterday, please email us. Thanks.

An excerpt from an ad in the "legal jobs" section of the Denver craigslist:

The ideal candidate would be admitted to practice Colorado State Bar, and have at least 4 to 7 years experience. Experienced professional demeanor in client contact both in person and on the telephone is a must. Ability to work and adapt in a fast-paced environment is crucial. The candidate should have a very high level of proficiency with MS Word, Outlook, and Excel. Experience with TABS billing software is a plus. Must be able to lift up to 25 lbs. Compensation is commensurate with experience.

Are we witnessing the start of a trend, as the market for legal talent shifts from a sellers' market to a buyers' market? This isn't the first law firm advertisement we've seen requiring the ability to engage in heavy lifting (quite literally). See also this ad (applicants must have the ability to "carry[] loads of up to 35 pounds").

Associate for Litigation Group [Denver craigslist]

Earlier: Definitely Not the Job of the Week

Earlier this week, we told you about client contact, and asked you about your firm's leave policies (that survey's still live, by the way). In today's ATL / Lateral Link survey, we explore whether you'd like to leave your firm to become a client:

Congratulations to our good friends over at Lateral Link, ATL's career partner. They just got a great write-up in the Wall Street Journal, which identifies them as a Web 3.0 recruiting trendsetter. Reporter Sarah Needleman writes:

What's so different: Lateral Link generally limits access to its job postings to graduates of top-tier law schools with a minimum of two years of work experience. About 5,000 applicants have been approved to date. Unlike most job sites, Lateral Link's recruiters get in direct contact with members who apply for the positions it lists. Another distinction: Lateral Link pays a $10,000 bonus to members who land positions at law firms, though not corporations.

"Through our Web-based platform, we're able to operate much more efficiently than a traditional recruiting firm, and therefore are able to pass along our cost savings to the job hunter," says T.J. Duane, a principal at Lateral Link, which was founded by three Harvard Law School graduates. The reward is also consistent with the referral bonus that many law firms pay associates, he adds.

You can read the rest of the piece, which also includes testimonials from happy lawyers who landed jobs (and multiple job offers) after working with Lateral Link, by clicking here.

Members Only: LateralLink.com [Wall Street Journal]