Recently noticed that Paul Weiss and Fried Frank are Band 1 for fund formation. Are they generally considered significantly better than Ropes, Clearly, etc. (Band 2 firms)?

Also, other than STB, K&E and Debevoise (and FF/PW), which firms are considered very solid/great reputation for fund formation work?

On vacation and hallucinating the Slack ping sound anytime it gets quiet.

Anyone working at Foresite Capital? Would be keen to learn about the company a bit more!

What's the word on spark foundry (chicago office). Seeing lots of wins and reading interesting things.

I don’t understand why our clients don’t just fire the underperforming resources that are requiring us to be there. Instead they just debate our fees. The real waste is paying salaries to those people

Top 10 books to read about consulting life ?

Advice on taking the SHRM-SCP exam? I’m taking the exam tomorrow and not feeling as prepared as I should. Who has taken the SCP exam? How difficult did you find it?

Recruiter refuses to tell HR to have my resumes printed ahead of time as I will be coming from work...says it’s unprofessional. What to do?

TFW you want to just work so you don't have to think about the girl you were interested in rejecting you & getting engaged.

Former consultants who moved to PE, how and when did you decide you wanted to make the transition vs continuing to do DDs/PE work from the consulting side?

How many of us desis work at MBB? There are a ton in tech consulting in various firms but want to see how many are doing pure strategic gigs at MBB.

Those who tuned into KPMG town hall, thoughts?

Seasoned ad composer and producer, doing
more sonic branding. Anyone have a pulse
on what the market is bearing for original
music/sound logo budgets? Thx!

Best business-oriented, but novel-style books with good writing, style, & interesting characters? Not really self-help/advise focused, more of actual literature with business themes/plots. Any recs?

Smart to look for a new job with a “recession” looming? Wanted to leave by end of the year, but nervous I’d be the first laid off at a new spot

What impact have you made in your organization outside of your day to day responsibilities? How did you find the opportunity and how did you go about accomplishing it?

Anywhere in Jersey City to play/practice indoor soccer (futsal)?

Waiting for God of War and for Bungie to grab Halo back from 343 Industries since Destiny has always been trash.
. . .S/O to Horizon Zero Dawn though.

How do I know Big-Law is not for me?

I am a first year who just started a couple of months ago and I am literally confused all the time. I did some small work for two partners and they loved it, so put me on new deals but the mid levels I am staffed with absolutely hate the work I do. One said the work I did was laughable. I felt bed because I spent over 25 hours on this. I wouldn’t be very bothered but the other Associates in my class are killing it. So I just feel dumb all the time.

Would love to hear thoughts on this one. Asking your firm to make sure the hotels at retreats stock quality 0.0 beer or other sober-curious-friendly options. Super progressive or super needy?

For anyone who is burnt out and looking to leave big law and go to a midsize, do your research. I was one of those people and I can tell you the grass is NOT greener on the other side. It’s a myth. In retrospect, I should’ve stayed and set better boundaries and not have taken this 35% pay cut.

What’s next on your expensive wishlist to make this job a little more comforting?

Putting aside wachtell, what do we think are the best M&A shops for high value deals?

Lol a client just emailed saying they want to sign a $1.5bn deal (we are sell side) not at some point before or by, but rather ON CHRISTMAS DAY.

What the hell is wrong with people?

In big law going on 6 years and I’ve always met my hours, but lately, cannot get enough work to keep busy. It’s been slow for some time, but I didn’t notice because I was working on matters in other offices. Is it time to move on? Are people really going to be laid off for not hitting hrs?

Good bad and ugly of the Kirkland tech trans group? Do they allow remote work? Any feedback much appreciated.

Senior attorneys at v100, how common is it for attorneys who start at small firms to lateral to biglaw? Have you worked with any? Conventional wisdom is always that if you don’t start there it’s hard to “trade up”. My coworker and I just did it to two different great v30 firms, and I’m wondering if it’s really that uncommon? Just out of curiosity. We’re not special counsel with special niche skills or anything, just associates. Pitfalls to beware? Positives?

What’s big law like in San Francisco? Anyone have any insights to firm cultures or billable targets?

How often do you drink? To what extent?

What was the hardest class year for you? I used to think first year was by far the hardest but now I’m a third year and I’m really feeling the pressure to step up. I work in finance and at this point I’m expected to handle closing documents, manage first years, draft some portions of major docs, etc. I feel like I’m always frazzled, constantly second guessing if I handled something correctly and anxious to answer calls from clients/OC. The worst part is I think people can tell I’m a mess....

Curious — do people consider billing 200ish hours a month a lot still or is that almost standard now?

If you do billable work on a given PTO/vacation day, do you still count that day as vacation? Or do you get that vacation day "back"? Or do you only get the part that you billed "back"? (Or some other option.)

I’m a junior in big law and in the short time I’ve been here, I’ve noticed that counsels produce perfect drafts and yet aren’t partners but partners can’t write two sentences without numerous typos. Shouldn’t counsels be partners and partners counsels instead?

Any insight on Brewer (either office, generally curious about the firm). I assume comp after year 1 is discretionary, rather than lock-step, given the size of the firm. Would appreciate happiness, horror stories, of whatever “firm culture” falls between the two. DM me if you don’t want to share publicly.

How did you give notice you were lateraling to people you like? Particularly if you haven't been there that long?

I'm lateraling to another firm because frankly I think the management of this one is terrible, but the people (and individual partners) I actually work with are awesome. I've only been here for about 18 months, so I imagine that short time frame will make it extra awkward 😬

When I’m in the office, the partner likes to talk. These talks usually last almost an hour. We should be allowed to bill this time to the partners.

Thoughts on Ogletree as an associate? Salary/day to day life