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Are you sure they’re just not overwhelmed and having trouble balancing things? Even when people ask juniors if they have capacity , unfortunately sometimes they don’t really understand that they don’t.
Sometimes they’re blowing you off, but sometimes there really is a reason for the underperformance. As a manager, try to figure out what it is instead of assuming the worst, and I can promise you they will appreciate it and work harder for you. It’s hard being a first year! Have some empathy.
Yeah, I think the real problem I’m having is that I have been trying to communicate with him and understand his workload and I am still being given the run around. No matter what, it’s just not acceptable to sit on an assignment for almost a week. Trust me, I don’t give bullshit work and don’t let anyone working with me pull all nighters like people forced me to do. I don’t believe in that but I do believe that you still have to do your job.
I think work from home (or live from work) is the culprit for many of the issues discussed in this thread. There is far less daily communication between everyone and far more time that one must be "on," particularly as a lower-level member of a firm, than there was previously. The result is increased burnout and more miscommunications even if billable hours are not demonstrably higher. In my experience, and those of many others I have talked to, off-hours (night, weekend) work has increased even as on-hours work decreased, but people still have to stay glued to their computers for the normal working day. The result is plummeting billable efficiency while total hours worked increases. I pulled more than my fair share of all nighters and weekends as a first year working for some very demanding partners early in the decade, but I don't think the situations are entirely comparable. I also noticed that, at least in my practice, the amount of "easy" hours (meetings, calls, etc.) went way down during WFH, meaning that the actual billables were more draining than before. What used to be a 45 minute talk about a project and general firm life in a partners office where you get to develop some semblance of a relationship turned into one cold e-mail.
I think there are ways to avoid this, and my understanding is that some firms have tried to institute policies to restore some of the boundaries that have been broken down during the pandemic, but ultimately I suspect most such efforts will be futile. Given the generally lackluster managerial skills of most big firm attorneys and the down nature of the legal economy as a whole, it's simply easier to sit behind a keyboard fuming and then conduct stealth layoffs than actually care about employees.
A9 - I forget the specifics at this point, but it was something like implementing a policy where all weekend emails are deemed acceptable to handle Monday morning unless explicitly marked urgent. This reverses the usual assumption in big law where everything is urgent unless you negotiate a longer deadline. This was in response to the increasingly common habit that supervising attorneys had to just sit down and fire off 5 assignments on Saturday and Sunday morning without thinking now that the “office” is 20 steps away from their bedroom.
I feel the same way. As a first year, I worked hard and (so did others in my class) and communicated to partners and senior associates regularly. Lately first years and even summers seem more entitled. And I don’t buy the whole “oh maybe they’re overwhelmed” because everyone is and they should at least communicate if they cannot meet a deadline.
Honestly when I have fears that I’m a bad first year, I feel much better about myself when I hear about people acting like this.
Is this a trend or have first years always been like this? Because I had some minor issues with a first year not being responsive at the beginning of the summer, but two other mid-level friends of mine (both at different firms) have been having huge issues with first years skipping deadlines, ignoring emails, turning around work product that’s poor even for a first year...
For the record, I asked if he had capacity before staffing him, he said yes. We checked in over the weekend because he was swamped with work on another deal Wednesday/Thursday. Here we are Tuesday morning with nothing done.
Obviously you noticed. Others will notice too. This can only go on for so long.
Snitch
My bad lol I have actually had the same issue with more junior consultants on my end. Must be something in the air. I hate to say they are lazy, but I think they believe work life balance means they work 9-5s and in client service that is not a reality. Especially when clients pay our rates.
First year here. I had two back to back 270+ billable months this summer and had some serious bandwidth issues. I always immediately communicated a deadline that would be feasible to the senior person requesting the project (I.e., I’m swamped on X until Thursday and can start on this Thursday night and aim to get it to you Friday EOD). I think asking that of a first year (no matter how swamped they are) is fair.
You need to talk to someone about getting those hours to a more reasonable place, too. You will burn out fast at that pace in this career. Do you have a mentor or someone who handles workload that you could discuss with?
Wondering if you gave them a deadline or sense of timing? Maybe he had capacity, just not capacity to do it right now.
Coach
Like I said in other comments we were in communication about it since I gave him the assignment. I also staffed him a while back on this and again have been in communication about when the deal is starting and reconfirmed he was available. Of course deadlines were given if I’m saying they were blowing through them. Hell he blew through the extension.
If it’s a pattern you need to sit the person down and set expectations. If it continues, ask for new staffing or, if not possible, cut them out of everything you can and just try to avoid them in the future. I think it’s fair game to give honest feedback on their review if you’ve already *spoken* to them and the behavior continues.