Seeking advice on Biglaw from lawyers: I'm below median at a T-30 school

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't want to make you feel discouraged, but I am on the Legal Honors hiring committee for a federal agency (and not one of the popular ones like DOJ or State). It has been years since we hired anyone with below median grades. We get such a high quality applicant pool that we are able to hire new attorneys from top schools with top grades, law review/moot court and usually some kind of relevant work experience. I don't think you're going to have the luxury of being picky in this legal market.

I am on a similar committee, and we have a top 20 percent cutoff, no exceptions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Let’s say your went to a DA’s office, they love you, and you’ve got a ton of trial experience. Perhaps if you stay a few more years you will be promoted to a senior or deputy position. Then maybe you can come into a firm as a senior associate or counsel, prove your worth, and make counsel.

When I graduated, which was admittedly 7 years ago, I could not get a job at a DA's office to save my life, though I did get offers from top 50 firms, and a federal clerkship after I worked at one of said firms for a year and hated it. It was truly disheartening since I went to law school with the aspiration of becoming a DA, and interned at the DA's office during school. No offices in the multiple cites I applied in were hiring. I'm not sure this is necessarily an easier path than a firm.

I did not mean to make it sound like getting a job at a DA was a piece of cake. I do think that in a lot of regions of the country it is less grade sensitive than are firms or federal judges (not because its easier, but because the office cares more about characteristics other than class rank). So it is plausible to me that with the right background, someone who has no shot at a large firm job could be a plausible candidate at a DA's office.

+1

I did a clerkship and got a great job after my clerkship, but I couldn't get a ADA/ASA to save my soul.

[Anonymous]

I don't think T30 is a thing, or at least not something to be proud of.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't want to make you feel discouraged, but I am on the Legal Honors hiring committee for a federal agency (and not one of the popular ones like DOJ or State). It has been years since we hired anyone with below median grades. We get such a high quality applicant pool that we are able to hire new attorneys from top schools with top grades, law review/moot court and usually some kind of relevant work experience. I don't think you're going to have the luxury of being picky in this legal market.

I am on a similar committee, and we have a top 20 percent cutoff, no exceptions.

Does that differ by school? Could someone in the top twenty at AU be hired but not someone who was top third at Georgetown?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not sure why big law is so attractive. It's really grueling and most new associates leave.

seriously. The only reason to go to big law is for the money.* If you have little or no debt, thank your lucky stars and find a better job.


*I guess for some people there is the "prestige" thing, but at this point that is pretty much a fiction the lawyers in "biglaw" tell themselves to keep themselves at work.

At one point, a lot of law school grads fell into law firm jobs because it was relatively easier to get a job at a law firm out of law school than anywhere else, and big law paid the best, so the better students fell into big law, but it's not anything to organize your life around, esp. these days.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't want to make you feel discouraged, but I am on the Legal Honors hiring committee for a federal agency (and not one of the popular ones like DOJ or State). It has been years since we hired anyone with below median grades. We get such a high quality applicant pool that we are able to hire new attorneys from top schools with top grades, law review/moot court and usually some kind of relevant work experience. I don't think you're going to have the luxury of being picky in this legal market.

I am on a similar committee, and we have a top 20 percent cutoff, no exceptions.

Does that differ by school? Could someone in the top twenty at AU be hired but not someone who was top third at Georgetown?

At our agency, the school doesn't count- the grades do. However, there is a degree of subjectivity to our scoring system and I admit, I can't help but be more impressed with an applicant from Harvard than some school I've never heard of. However, Georgetown vs. AU isn't going to make such a huge impression on me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't want to make you feel discouraged, but I am on the Legal Honors hiring committee for a federal agency (and not one of the popular ones like DOJ or State). It has been years since we hired anyone with below median grades. We get such a high quality applicant pool that we are able to hire new attorneys from top schools with top grades, law review/moot court and usually some kind of relevant work experience. I don't think you're going to have the luxury of being picky in this legal market.

I am on a similar committee, and we have a top 20 percent cutoff, no exceptions.

A lot of top schools don't rank, so your post is BS. Federal agencies are full of mediocre lawyers and affirmative action hires.

[Anonymous]

17:28 said it all. Great advice.
Your option #1 is a horrible idea.
My three short pieces for an immediate plan would be, (a) network the hell out of the senior person at your small firm (or whomever you've impresed the most there); (b) start looking for state government jobs; (c) if you think you're cut out for trial work, look for a DA job or public defender job. Trial experience is a big accelerator on the track (assuming you do well). Prosecuting opens many more doors than defending, but trial experience is trial experience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:17:28 said it all. Great advice.
Your option #1 is a horrible idea.
My three short pieces for an immediate plan would be, (a) network the hell out of the senior person at your small firm (or whomever you've impresed the most there); (b) start looking for state government jobs; (c) if you think you're cut out for trial work, look for a DA job or public defender job. Trial experience is a big accelerator on the track (assuming you do well). Prosecuting opens many more doors than defending, but trial experience is trial experience.

This makes sense. The legal profession is all about prestige and connections at the entry level, and all about experience and revenue generation at the more senior levels. If you can't compete on school and grades, cut to the chase and start getting real experience somewhere. Maybe you"ll end up a real lawyer who can actually help clients solve problems and not one of the thousands of BigLaw drones who make a lot of money for five years pushing paper and then get laid off with few clients or practical skills to market.

[Anonymous]

get any job you can. you can possibly lateral into BigLaw later on. I did that - after an LL.M. too, paid off for me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
your advice is excellent; however the OP just doesn't seem to be anything special.

NP here- Is it just me or is the DCUM holiday spirit particularly nasty? What necessitated this statement? You just wanted to put down a complete stranger?

it was harsh but true. OP is one of MANY MANY MANY and probably doesn't bring anything to the table.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't want to make you feel discouraged, but I am on the Legal Honors hiring committee for a federal agency (and not one of the popular ones like DOJ or State). It has been years since we hired anyone with below median grades. We get such a high quality applicant pool that we are able to hire new attorneys from top schools with top grades, law review/moot court and usually some kind of relevant work experience. I don't think you're going to have the luxury of being picky in this legal market.

I am on a similar committee, and we have a top 20 percent cutoff, no exceptions.

A lot of top schools don't rank, so your post is BS. Federal agencies are full of mediocre lawyers and affirmative action hires.

You would actually be surprised. That might have been true for folks hired 15 years ago. But with the last few years and this legal market, the agencies are getting to choose from some high charged applicants. Every lawyer is my particualr unit either came from Big Law or the legal department of companies that the agency regulates. Last job opening - we got over 1500 applicants - most from law firms.

I am also on the Honors Attorney screening panel and we got almost 1000 applications for 2 spots. Yes, grades and academic record ARE taken into account.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't want to make you feel discouraged, but I am on the Legal Honors hiring committee for a federal agency (and not one of the popular ones like DOJ or State). It has been years since we hired anyone with below median grades. We get such a high quality applicant pool that we are able to hire new attorneys from top schools with top grades, law review/moot court and usually some kind of relevant work experience. I don't think you're going to have the luxury of being picky in this legal market.

I am on a similar committee, and we have a top 20 percent cutoff, no exceptions.

Does that differ by school? Could someone in the top twenty at AU be hired but not someone who was top third at Georgetown?

At our agency, the school doesn't count- the grades do. However, there is a degree of subjectivity to our scoring system and I admit, I can't help but be more impressed with an applicant from Harvard than some school I've never heard of. However, Georgetown vs. AU isn't going to make such a huge impression on me.

Wow, that sucks. LSAT scores (which are indicative of test taking abilities) are about a dozen points higher at Georgetown that AU, so it is much easier to place in the top twenty percent at AU than at Georgetown.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

1) Spend the next few months (i.e. all of spring semester) showing up at firms personally with my application materials, in a suit, and requesting to talk to the hiring partner. They will likely either put me off, or tell me flat out no. I should ignore that and continue to show up personally once a week and reiterate my interest face-to-face. I should follow that weekly stalking visit up with phone calls/emails every week, basically harassing them but politely

This is an insane plan. A better idea would be to look for people who graduated from your law school, are at a firm, and are relatively junior. Reach out and ask them if they would be willing to meet for coffee to talk about how they found their position and any advice they may have.

I am in charge of hiring at a place where lots of young lawyers want to work. This is less crazy than the stalking idea, but I have to say that, if I met with everyone who asked me for an "informational" interview, I would never get any work done. I love helping young people find jobs, and used to do this with pretty much anyone who asked, but, as the job market has gotten worse, the number of requests is just out of hand. OP needs to understand that even this may be annoying to those he/she will ask. The bottom line is that there are lots of highly qualified lawyers with experience who are looking for work. I really can't tell someone who is fresh out of school how to compete with those people, because they can't. My advice is the same that I give to those who call me -- take any job/internship you can get that is remotely close to the field you want to be in, and do the very best job you can, and hope you impress someone.

+1. To add, if you are going to do the informational interview, please follow up with a thank you email and whatever you said you would do. I met with a law student from my alma mater who wanted me to connect him with the GC of a large organization near the law school. I asked him to send me his materials and I would be happy to make the intro. I didn't hear back from him for a month. Needless to say, I did not make the intro.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't want to make you feel discouraged, but I am on the Legal Honors hiring committee for a federal agency (and not one of the popular ones like DOJ or State). It has been years since we hired anyone with below median grades. We get such a high quality applicant pool that we are able to hire new attorneys from top schools with top grades, law review/moot court and usually some kind of relevant work experience. I don't think you're going to have the luxury of being picky in this legal market.

I am on a similar committee, and we have a top 20 percent cutoff, no exceptions.

Does that differ by school? Could someone in the top twenty at AU be hired but not someone who was top third at Georgetown?

At our agency, the school doesn't count- the grades do. However, there is a degree of subjectivity to our scoring system and I admit, I can't help but be more impressed with an applicant from Harvard than some school I've never heard of. However, Georgetown vs. AU isn't going to make such a huge impression on me.

This is the same at my agency. We hire a ton of attorneys, but not many without any experience. The school doesn't matter, and usually the grades don't either. We are looking for direct experience in the areas we practice. Our office has attorneys from an assortment of schools. The common thread is most of us knew someone in the agency before we were hired.

For a current law student, I would recommend trying to lateral from an internship. This is how I was hired for my first position.