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Big law is great training for big law. In house is a totally different world and only so many skills and lessons actually transfer. There's definitely a tendency for those in big law to inflate the usefulness of it. I'm at a F100 tech company and some of my best attorneys came from smaller firms.
What are some of the skills that are hardest to transfer to in house?
I think it’s undeniable you get the most formal trainings. You also get the most amount of reps in just by sheer hours of work. You’re also, consequently, working alongside people who have the most amount of experience. So yeah, I think it’s the best. You get unlimited resources, formal training, and projects. It’s like you’re learning how to swim, you get all the YT videos and manuals, Phelps is in the pool already, there to save you if you’re about to drown, and you’re just thrown in the pool and forced to stay there.
So I would say yes. I think (and this is all from my limited experience), government can be a good training ground, but people just care less. There’s also a lot of bureaucracy. In-house, people care, but too many people care. Want to get anything done? Well, have fun discussing with Accounting and Marketing why you’re right about this piece of law! You spend way more time managing people than you actually practice law in-house. Again, in my limited experience.
It’s several that we’ve had issues with, won’t name names here. I’ve of course seen some great work product as well from a couple firms, so we try to stick with those when we need big law. I’ve found it’s mostly only worth using big law for niche work that midlaw may not have a practice group for or a deal that just needs input from several niche groups. Midlaw’s work has been consistently better overall for cheaper, so I definitely disagree with the point that biglaw gives the best training.
On the second paragraph, it’s less about the internal management than about client management. A lawyer can have all the substantive knowledge in the world but it’s useless if it can’t be translated to business impact or if the partner can’t interface with someone who isn’t a nonlawyer. Again, lawyers almost entirely offer services to nonlawyers, so so being able to communicate with the business is key.
I’m going to be honest, I think it’s absolute nonsense. I say this as someone who started my career at a competitive trial public defender’s office and has also spent time in Big Law - the public defender’s office has substantially better training and supervision, and I learned a LOT more. Transitioning to Big Law was wild because although I had to learn some things (mainly ins and outs of civil discovery and managing partner relationships), I was stunned at how much better the training was at the PD’s office. In BL I’ve basically taught myself on the fly, and it’s been fine.
Public interest can certainly have problematic attitudes as well, but I think everyone in Big Law tells themselves that it’s “the best training” as a way to justify the ridiculous (and frankly unnecessary) hours and expectations. Sure, it provides some training, but at a lot of BL firms you can literally make partner without ever trying a case. Most of the best litigators at my firm all spent time at the USAO, SEC, or a public defender’s office, where they actually got to be in court. The ones who spent their entire career in Big Law are noticeably weaker litigators who have trouble adapting when crazy things happen.
OP, totally agree with your sentiment.
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