Early recruiting, or precruiting, is trending when it comes to the entry-level recruiting scene for Biglaw firms, with 66% of the largest of law firms and 34% of law firms overall attempting to fill their summer associate classes before formal OCI programs have even started. Many firms are finding great success with precruiting, with 23.3% of all offers to second-year students (3,145 offers, to be exact) coming as a result of early recruiting as firms try to beat the competition to the punch.
But what happens when Biglaw firms step away from the formal rules that go hand in hand with the OCI process?
Exploding offers are apparently the name of the game, and law schools are not happy about the added stress this may add to their students’ lives.
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(For what it’s worth, if you’re wondering who to blame for exploding offers, it would be fair to point a finger at NALP. The organization approved of exploding offers back in 2018 with its new set of “rules” — if they can really be called that — for entry-level recruiting.)
The American Lawyer has additional details:
The stress early recruiting can cause students as they near the end of their first year can be exacerbated by “exploding offers,” when firms tell students they have to make a decision before the OCI process begins or else their offer will “explode.” Gray said it’s a phenomenon she’s hears about from members “quite frequently.”
“It’s a very unfortunate situation,” [NALP executive director Nikia] Gray said. “It’s a pressure tactic. [The students] don’t know if they’ll receive another better offer.”
To that end, some law schools have openly commented on their disapproval of the precruiting movement. For example, Dean Erwin Chemerinsky of Berkeley Law told Am Law that the school “doesn’t support precruiting.” Here’s more:
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The law school’s online policy called recruiting that takes place before the school’s Early Interview Week (EIW) an “unfair process that disadvantages qualified candidates who happen to be less obviously credentialed or as well-networked as their peers.” But in response to “market realities,” the law school is no longer prohibiting employers registered for EIW from interviewing rising second-year law students before EIW.
So, how can law student better manage what may become the new normal when it comes to Biglaw’s entry-level recruiting? For what it’s worth, Gray says students “have more power in the process than they realize.”
“They are the commodity that law firms are trying to get and they have power in this process,” Gray said. “They have the ability to negotiate an exploding offer and say, ‘I appreciate the offer, but I want to do OCI and see what my options are.’ They may even decide they want to go with another firm that doesn’t put pressure on them.”
Career services offices are more than willing to assist with any questions that students may have when it comes to the job hunt (including how to deal with an exploding offer). Best of luck out there, law students, because it seems like you may need it this year.
With ‘Exploding Offers’ and ‘Elite’ Advantages, Early Campus Recruiting Gets Mixed Reception [American Lawyer]
Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter and Threads or connect with her on LinkedIn.