Hey, sorry but what is a staff-attorney position, when you’re a 5th year? Just don’t understand why people keep talking about this status when it comes to being put (or not) in the partner-track.

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I imagine you’re still doing limited substantive work but have more responsibility. So a lot of staff attorneys at my firm handle things like contract review, signature pages, etc. I imagine a fifth year staff attorney is like a senior paralegal in that they review the work of their juniors and can probably do things like schedules but not more than that (in other words, not marking up purchase agreements, etc.).

On the litigation side the most common task for staff attorneys is large document review projects. Their work is more "project based" and often does not require them to be thinking about big picture case issues.

It is also viewed as a career position with not much progression so titles like "5th year" don't mean as much in staff attorney context. There is little investment in staff attorney skill development and it is a dead end job

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Based on everything I’ve seen here and in practice, staff attorney roles should be avoided unless you’re literally out of options. It’s low skill legal work with minimal professional advancement/career growth and most likely no path to partner.

Understood, thanks all!

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