Big Law Discussions
Billable Hours

Some of you really only bill 17/1800 hours? Are you just busy doing non-billable work or you just don’t have enough work coming to you? If it’s because you don’t have enough work does that mean you have your evenings and weekends to yourself too? Could you maybe help the rest of us out who never get either?

Has anyone worked on a outsourced GC model. Where for a monthly payment you do effectively unlimited work for them? I hate billable hours and prefer fixed monthly retainers.

PLEASE HELP! I’m a first year commercial litigation associate at a boutique firm. I am deciding between two offers. One is to go in-house paying roughly the same as I make now. The second offer is from big law as a commercial real estate associate, paying double.

I would love to go in-house and never worry about billable hours again but the big law money is super tempting. Advice?? Is the money really worth it?

I have an interview with Korn Ferry for an associate principal role and am curious about others’ experiences have been with work-life balance here. Also, I have an idea of what I should be compensated in this type of role, but any insights on how they pay compared to others would be helpful. Are you traveling during the pandemic or have client interactions been virtual? Lastly, if you are a consultant here, are you on billable hours? My current consulting role is not - so this would be new.

I have an interview with Korn Ferry for an associate principal role and am curious about others’ experiences have been with work-life balance here. Also, I have an idea of what I should be compensated in this type of role, but any insights on how they pay compared to others would be helpful. Are you traveling during the pandemic or have client interactions been virtual? Lastly, if you are a consultant here, are you on billable hours? My current consulting role is not - so this would be new.

I hate how billable hours are inextricably tied to your sense of worth/achievement in this job

Is it harder to meet billables in certain practice areas? I’m in T&E and in busy times I’ll be working on 15 different clients in a single day. I feel like I lose so much time task-switching and my billable hours also don’t reflect the mental load I carry around thinking about all the moving parts for so many different clients. Has anyone else had a similar experience? Have you found any time entry or organizational tools that have helped you?

I joined a very prominent midsized firm back in fall which gave me almost no billable work for the first 2 months. I still am barely getting any billable work and am lucky if I can bill 20- 25 hours a week. Should I be looking for a new job right now? I am afraid they are going to load me up for tax season, look at my overall numbers and just decide that I’m an “under-performer”

I'm a non-equity partner at a mid-size firm that typically does billable work. I've got a valuable plaintiff's case that's on a contingency fee and will likely be resolving pre-suit. I'm negotiating with my firm as to profit splitting and looking for input on what I should propose. For additional background, this case came in through an EP, but I'm the only partner with experience in this type of law, and the firm would have had to refer it out if I had not taken it. Thanks!

Position at Lewis Brisbois (1200+) or small firm (45) same billable hours, pay, and area of law. Thoughts?

Is there any area of law that allows you to help people (not companies), doesn’t require billable hours but still pays >$100k in Florida? I’ve been doing insurance defense work for about five years now and either I’m severely depressed or hate my job 😅 going with the latter for now.

Struggling with billing, it takes me like 5 hours to do 3 billable hours worth of work and then I’m exhausted afterwards, what am I doing wrong?

Is it possible to be a good parent and spouse while billing 2100 billable hours per year? If so, at what point does maintaining a healthy personal life become impossible?

To keep things simple, Staff one’s billable rate is $200/hr and Senior 1 is $250/hr. If you budget projects for 10 hours and the staff takes 15 hours ($3,000) and the senior takes 8 hours ($2,000). Is that the actual amount that gets billed?

Name all legal jobs that do not use billable hours.

What firms allow fully remote, including for paralegals? I see lots of remote opportunities for attorneys, but then they require all paralegals in person?!? We bill too so it seems we are just as trackable with productivity. I've been remote since March 2020 (maintaining and even exceeding billable requirements), but my firm wouldn't let me stay remote since I'm moving to a state where we do not have a physical office.

Today marks two weeks from Milbank. DPW, you had two full weeks, which generally translates to roughly at the least 100 billable hours of any given associate’s time. I’m sure you are charging out your midlevels at at the least 1k an hour, so that’s easily 100k * whatever realization percentage you have. That’s more than enough to make up for whatever flimsy 5-10k raise we are asking for, no? I just went to bed at 2am and woke up at 6 for 4 fire drills. Let this misery end, Sir DPW, esquire!

Looking for Help

Second Career - First Year Associate with a Tech Background and experience in Businesses Development and Sales.

I work in Tax Law with a significant billable hour requirement, which I have no problem meeting (1160 Billable Hours achieved just in Q4 last year).

I am looking to speak to a recruiter or anyone with an opportunity in remote work speficially, preferably transactional in nature

Message or Comment!

Thanks!

Looking for Help

Second Career - First Year Associate with a Tech Background and experience in Businesses Development and Sales.

I work in Tax Law with a significant billable hour requirement, which I have no problem meeting (1160 Billable Hours achieved just in Q4 last year).

I am looking to speak to a recruiter or anyone with an opportunity in remote work speficially, preferably transactional in nature

Message or Comment!

Thanks!

Do lower COLarea big law/non-big laws have lower billable hours requirements? I mean "real” expectations, not just what they put in their advertisement.
Will l still be expected to reply to emails after9:00pm? And always quickly respond after 8:00 am, at least?
Corporate transactions. I like to practice law, need more sleep, though.

What firms have lower billable requirements and actually bill those hours. Not like a 2000 requirement but people actually billing like 2200

What are good development goals for a junior associate (other than billable requirements)? My feedback convo is next week and the partner would like to discuss my goals for my second year.

Any info regarding Zuckerman Spaeder? For example, salary, work-life, billable requirements. Would greatly appreciate any insight!

What’s the best way to turn down a 2nd interview? During the 1st interview, I learned that the compensation for the role is not within the range that I am looking for and requires 400 more billable hours a year than what I bill now. I’d basically be laterally for my current salary just to bill 400 more hours. I also wasn’t aware that the local office was strictly ID. Firm website advertises lots of practice areas. Any advice? TIA!

I have a recruiter showing me a general overview of FTI Consulting saying that compensation would consist of base salary + monthly qualified billables + 10% to 20% annual bonus. Is this similar to A&M (% of billable hours)? I'm currently in TS but am looking for a boost in compensation, more than a public accounting firm can offer. What kind of $ are FTI seniors making in this market?

Trinity fish: Does anyone know if LT is scrutinizing internal hours in Q1?
For context, I heard in Q4 all non-billable hours were being sent to LT and they viewed it as 'open' hours indicating people could take on more project work

Would you rather: (1) stay in big law (V100), collect your checks, keep billing 1900+ annually, knowing you’ll likely only progress to non-equity partner but stable pipelines for work; or (2) transition to boutique firm with no billable requirements, no minimum salary, on a pure revenue split (half of collections), option for equity partner in 16 months?

In what cases I can be asked to resign or can be fired in PwC AC based on billable hours and performance?

How much job security is there in PwC AC if I'm on bench for long period. After how many months of being on bench, do they fire? Please respond.

Thanks in advance.

What do you do at the end of the month in ID when you have some days needing 3-4 more billable hours. The clients are so strict with billing…

To all advisory brothers and sisters, what do you do when there's no project available and you are really looking for billable hours?

Out of curiosity: how much time do you spend actually logging and tracking your billable hours every day?

Does your firm make allowances to billable hours for PTO/sick leave? Every firm I’ve been to has been “billing 9-12 hours a day until you make up the deficit.” That shit ain’t right, but curious if others have a different experience.

Currently at 60 billable hrs so far in corporate 🙌🏼 how’s your New Years starting?

My firm has a collections budget (80% of your billable rate x 1850 hours) and an hourly budget that must be met in order to be eligible for a bonus. The firm cares very little about originations and will reward someone for making their collections over someone who brings in new work. I missed my collection budget due to some odd timing with a client, but originated more than all my peers so no bonus for me. I’ve been at this same mid level firm for 9 years and it’s all I know. Is this normal??

I know these scenarios are posted all the time but… Iateralled last month/ super slow/ need support that l’m ok lol. Was super busy the first 2 real weeks of work but have been slow since the holidays (25-30 billable hours per week). Any support/ recommendations to ease the anxiety greatly appreciated :) My last firm was quite toxic and basically shamed me for ever having a slow day

Thoughts on Kilpatrick Townsend Atlanta office? WFH options, office culture, sophistication of clients, billable requirements, etc. mid level, IP

Hi everyone, my firm (V100) is hiring a midlevel L&E associate for its SF office. Pay is market and billable hours requirement 2000. Please dm me if you’re interested.

Does industry have billable hours? At the big 4, we are required to work a certain number of hours each week and if we spend too much time on anything we are questioned on why it took so long. Is that a thing when you go in industry?