Legal jobs -- anyone hiring seventh year associates? Looking for gov agency position

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had much more real world courtroom experience than the BigLaw types, though I'm sure they'd write a better law review article than mine.

the really important thing here, and what makes biglaw attys such attractive candidates, is that their briefs have ZERO TYPOS. and they really adhere to that bluebook style.

PP here... sorry to disappoint you, but I learned that in law school (T20 if you care) and my first year or 2 of practice, and didn't need BigLaw to teach me that aspect of being a professional.

I do. I really do care to know that you went to GW. (Thank goodness for you this was before the economic meltdown. GW grads are probably populating the doc review mills and trip and fall shitshops. This is how bad the legal job market is.) Anyway, thanks for bragging that you went to a fairly decent law school.

Sorry, wrong again... not GW but I'm sure I, and the GW grads here, appreciate your snark and superior attitude... it's kind of funny in a pathological sort of way. I wasn't bragging, just pre-emptively stifling what I figured would be carping about my inferior background and education (since I see that so often here, as well as in BigLaw settings, aimed at anyone & everyone).

BTW, I detected and hope that was a bit of humor in your original snark, other than the zero typos, which is something that always annoys me in others' work when I see it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had much more real world courtroom experience than the BigLaw types, though I'm sure they'd write a better law review article than mine.

the really important thing here, and what makes biglaw attys such attractive candidates, is that their briefs have ZERO TYPOS. and they really adhere to that bluebook style.

PP here... sorry to disappoint you, but I learned that in law school (T20 if you care) and my first year or 2 of practice, and didn't need BigLaw to teach me that aspect of being a professional.

I don't know. Obviously experience varies, but I have found at my agency that many, many lawyers do not seem to care about typos, bluebooking, etc even in briefs that are submitted to court. Ditto for opposing counsel and for the lawyers who practice before us. I care intensely, which I assume is my clerkship/biglaw training; I would've gotten reamed out for the mistakes that routinely are submitted in my colleagues' briefs. My supervisor also cares and my colleagues label him a micromanaging freak because of it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I don't know. Obviously experience varies, but I have found at my agency that many, many lawyers do not seem to care about typos, bluebooking, etc even in briefs that are submitted to court. Ditto for opposing counsel and for the lawyers who practice before us. I care intensely, which I assume is my clerkship/biglaw training; I would've gotten reamed out for the mistakes that routinely are submitted in my colleagues' briefs. My supervisor also cares and my colleagues label him a micromanaging freak because of it.

Interesting, this is my experience too (including the resentment of people who care). Many are very careful, meticulous lawyers in other respects but it just doesn't carry through to their writing. I see a correlation between people who care and people who attended "top" schools; not sure if there is a biglaw correlation as there are few of us with that background.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I don't know. Obviously experience varies, but I have found at my agency that many, many lawyers do not seem to care about typos, bluebooking, etc even in briefs that are submitted to court. Ditto for opposing counsel and for the lawyers who practice before us. I care intensely, which I assume is my clerkship/biglaw training; I would've gotten reamed out for the mistakes that routinely are submitted in my colleagues' briefs. My supervisor also cares and my colleagues label him a micromanaging freak because of it.

Interesting, this is my experience too (including the resentment of people who care). Many are very careful, meticulous lawyers in other respects but it just doesn't carry through to their writing. I see a correlation between people who care and people who attended "top" schools; not sure if there is a biglaw correlation as there are few of us with that background.

For me, it has to do with resources. As a government attorney, I've frequently worked in offices that are understaffed. Some attorneys want to spend all their time writing a few briefs. The case log gets jammed up, and the rest of the office picks up the work. I've said to a few of my subordinates that they don't need to be turning out law review quality work. They need to write briefs that advocate our position. A typo isn't going to change the outcome of a case. Some attorneys need to check their egos and learn to turn out more work, even if the work product isn't perfect.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I don't know. Obviously experience varies, but I have found at my agency that many, many lawyers do not seem to care about typos, bluebooking, etc even in briefs that are submitted to court. Ditto for opposing counsel and for the lawyers who practice before us. I care intensely, which I assume is my clerkship/biglaw training; I would've gotten reamed out for the mistakes that routinely are submitted in my colleagues' briefs. My supervisor also cares and my colleagues label him a micromanaging freak because of it.

Interesting, this is my experience too (including the resentment of people who care). Many are very careful, meticulous lawyers in other respects but it just doesn't carry through to their writing. I see a correlation between people who care and people who attended "top" schools; not sure if there is a biglaw correlation as there are few of us with that background.

For me, it has to do with resources. As a government attorney, I've frequently worked in offices that are understaffed. Some attorneys want to spend all their time writing a few briefs. The case log gets jammed up, and the rest of the office picks up the work. I've said to a few of my subordinates that they don't need to be turning out law review quality work. They need to write briefs that advocate our position. A typo isn't going to change the outcome of a case. Some attorneys need to check their egos and learn to turn out more work, even if the work product isn't perfect.

21:24 here. Of course I understand there is a resource issue; we don't have paralegals to check the document 15 times like I did at the firm. In my office, however, we all do the same work. In fact my workload is about 30% heavier than most of my colleagues because I work very fast and request more work on a frequent basis. Again, the ingrained Biglaw mentality, I guess -- churn it out, work as fast as you can in the hours you have, etc. I am not saying I don't have typos sometimes -- of course I do. Everyone does. But the thing is, I care about them. My colleagues don't. It's not primarily a resource issue where I am, or else it would impact me the way it does others. It's an attitude issue. It is probably the only thing that really annoys me in government practice, which I otherwise love. And, of course, it may well be that my colleagues' briefs are substantively far better than mine. Though having reviewed a bunch -- we have a peer review system -- I would say we are all pretty consistent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had much more real world courtroom experience than the BigLaw types, though I'm sure they'd write a better law review article than mine.

the really important thing here, and what makes biglaw attys such attractive candidates, is that their briefs have ZERO TYPOS. and they really adhere to that bluebook style.

PP here... sorry to disappoint you, but I learned that in law school (T20 if you care) and my first year or 2 of practice, and didn't need BigLaw to teach me that aspect of being a professional.

I don't know. Obviously experience varies, but I have found at my agency that many, many lawyers do not seem to care about typos, bluebooking, etc even in briefs that are submitted to court. Ditto for opposing counsel and for the lawyers who practice before us. I care intensely, which I assume is my clerkship/biglaw training; I would've gotten reamed out for the mistakes that routinely are submitted in my colleagues' briefs. My supervisor also cares and my colleagues label him a micromanaging freak because of it.

PP here ... I agree with you... your colleagues are wrong, that is not micromanaging, that is professional standards in action... learn it, live it, every day.

But then I'm on the older side of the DCUM snark spectrum, I just retired at 58. But the way I was brought up & taught, zero typos is not just a goal, it's an absolute must-do. Your credibility rides on every filing and if you can't proofread and get it right, that reflects on your competence and professionalism. May be old school, but that's the way it is, IMO.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I don't know. Obviously experience varies, but I have found at my agency that many, many lawyers do not seem to care about typos, bluebooking, etc even in briefs that are submitted to court. Ditto for opposing counsel and for the lawyers who practice before us. I care intensely, which I assume is my clerkship/biglaw training; I would've gotten reamed out for the mistakes that routinely are submitted in my colleagues' briefs. My supervisor also cares and my colleagues label him a micromanaging freak because of it.

Interesting, this is my experience too (including the resentment of people who care). Many are very careful, meticulous lawyers in other respects but it just doesn't carry through to their writing. I see a correlation between people who care and people who attended "top" schools; not sure if there is a biglaw correlation as there are few of us with that background.

For me, it has to do with resources. As a government attorney, I've frequently worked in offices that are understaffed. Some attorneys want to spend all their time writing a few briefs. The case log gets jammed up, and the rest of the office picks up the work. I've said to a few of my subordinates that they don't need to be turning out law review quality work. They need to write briefs that advocate our position. A typo isn't going to change the outcome of a case. Some attorneys need to check their egos and learn to turn out more work, even if the work product isn't perfect.

PP here... I completely disagree with you.

If you do not care enough about your work product to proofread and avoid typos in this day & age of computers and word processing software, that tells me (as an attorney with 33 yrs. experience, as well as a judge, mediator, and arbitrator), that your professional standards are lax. And that reflects on your credibility.

Slackers of the world, get your shit together!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I don't know. Obviously experience varies, but I have found at my agency that many, many lawyers do not seem to care about typos, bluebooking, etc even in briefs that are submitted to court. Ditto for opposing counsel and for the lawyers who practice before us. I care intensely, which I assume is my clerkship/biglaw training; I would've gotten reamed out for the mistakes that routinely are submitted in my colleagues' briefs. My supervisor also cares and my colleagues label him a micromanaging freak because of it.

Interesting, this is my experience too (including the resentment of people who care). Many are very careful, meticulous lawyers in other respects but it just doesn't carry through to their writing. I see a correlation between people who care and people who attended "top" schools; not sure if there is a biglaw correlation as there are few of us with that background.

For me, it has to do with resources. As a government attorney, I've frequently worked in offices that are understaffed. Some attorneys want to spend all their time writing a few briefs. The case log gets jammed up, and the rest of the office picks up the work. I've said to a few of my subordinates that they don't need to be turning out law review quality work. They need to write briefs that advocate our position. A typo isn't going to change the outcome of a case. Some attorneys need to check their egos and learn to turn out more work, even if the work product isn't perfect.

21:24 here. Of course I understand there is a resource issue; we don't have paralegals to check the document 15 times like I did at the firm. In my office, however, we all do the same work. In fact my workload is about 30% heavier than most of my colleagues because I work very fast and request more work on a frequent basis. Again, the ingrained Biglaw mentality, I guess -- churn it out, work as fast as you can in the hours you have, etc. I am not saying I don't have typos sometimes -- of course I do. Everyone does. But the thing is, I care about them. My colleagues don't. It's not primarily a resource issue where I am, or else it would impact me the way it does others. It's an attitude issue. It is probably the only thing that really annoys me in government practice, which I otherwise love. And, of course, it may well be that my colleagues' briefs are substantively far better than mine. Though having reviewed a bunch -- we have a peer review system -- I would say we are all pretty consistent.

PP again ... I'm with you. In the agency I worked in for 26 yrs., typos in briefs and official documents were not accepted and were frowned upon and reflected poorly on the drafter/signer of the document.

"Good enough for government work" is a bullshit stereotype IMO. Your professional standards should not vaporize. You put your reputation on the line with each filing or document, there's no excuse IMO to let sloppy work go out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
For me, it has to do with resources. As a government attorney, I've frequently worked in offices that are understaffed. Some attorneys want to spend all their time writing a few briefs. The case log gets jammed up, and the rest of the office picks up the work. I've said to a few of my subordinates that they don't need to be turning out law review quality work. They need to write briefs that advocate our position. A typo isn't going to change the outcome of a case. Some attorneys need to check their egos and learn to turn out more work, even if the work product isn't perfect.

22:20 here. We're always understaffed. And I agree with you that perfect can become the enemy of good, whether it's crafting the perfect sentence or spending hours confirming your initial, probably-correct analysis. But we're talking -- or at least I am talking -- about things that should be ingrained: correct comma usage, basic citation format, correct use of homonyms and possessives, etc. We all make errors in haste, but a single proofread would catch most of those.

Also, apologies to OP for where this thread has gone.

[Anonymous]

I don't know why people should apologize. It's good for the OP to know it may be a different milieu - maybe more collegial, but also perhaps not up to the same professional standards.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't know why people should apologize. It's good for the OP to know it may be a different milieu - maybe more collegial, but also perhaps not up to the same professional standards.

haha

Okay, how much professional interaction have you had with government lawyers? Because "not up to the same professional standards" is not it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't know why people should apologize. It's good for the OP to know it may be a different milieu - maybe more collegial, but also perhaps not up to the same professional standards.

With emphasis on the "perhaps." There are government agencies with shoddy lawyers, I'm sure, but the average work product produced by the one I worked at before returning to private practice was consistently better than all but a tiny handful of law firms. And when I was clerking, I would estimate than in at least 90% of cases involving the United States, the United States' brief was better than the opposition's. The notion that working for the government, particularly in DC, is for people who are too burnt out or sloppy for law firms is remarkably silly (particularly when something like half of law firm parters in DC have previous government experience).

The biggest quality advantage of law firms over government that I've observed since returning to private practice is that law firm attorneys tend to be better at management tasks and at being time efficient.

[Anonymous]

I am the poster who made the "zero typos" post. I was making light of the fact that biglaw lawyers (of whom I am one) obsess about every last typo. I think one should strive to avoid any and all typos and other minor mistakes. However, I really do not think that scouring a brief repeatedly, looking for misplaced commas or split infinitives (at several hundred dollars per hour) is a good use of a client's money. And my post was really a commentary on the fact that your average biglaw mid-level (or in plenty of cases, senior) associate doesn't really bring much more to the table than a keen ability to write a typo-less brief that conforms ever so well to Bluebook style. Obviously, this caused a guy who went to a top 20 law school to get really pissed off and tell everyone he went to a good school (then blame me for his doing that), which does not surprise me because, well, lawyers.

[Anonymous]

haha