I’m about to start my first firm job after a clerkship. Any tips/things you wish you knew before you started? I’ll be doing bankruptcy litigation. Mostly worried about time management/organization/billing properly.

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If your firm has email detainment requirements, start filing/saving your emails day 1

And use a timer for billing, either there one in your software or a desktop timer

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Bill as you go! You won’t remember that 0.2 email you sent in the morning if you wait until the end of the day to enter your time. Keep a tight diary system. Don’t let the amount of time someone has been practicing inflate your imposter syndrome - most of us are still making it up as we go. Good luck!

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Highly recommend the email folder system (have a diff folder for each matter). It makes your life so much easier when finding docs, making all the firmwide emails go automatically to a “firmwide” folder, or remembering where you are at on each matter If you haven’t seen anything there for a bit. If you are unsure about anything, over communicate it

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Contemporaneous billing is huge. Also, find a task management system that works for you.

For bankruptcy lit., get familiar with all of the preference and fraudulent transfer statutes. If you haven’t already, definitely brush up a little bit on the bankruptcy jurisdiction decisions. Fair warning, they are an absolute mess.

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