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Additional Posts in Big Law
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What’s common PTO wise in big law?
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My views are informed by the people sent on secondment at my firm. Usually well liked, good but not star associates are sent on secondments. Not everyone wants to be a partner and secondment is prob the best way to go in-house.
Coach
Must be a firm specific thing. We only send our all stars on secondment. The idea is for them to eventually be a relationship partner with the client.
The prime question is whether the associate wants to leave Big Law or not. And if he does want to leave, the type of role he wants outside of big law.
Some do secondments and then go back and make partner. I think that’s a rarer situation than the “secondment as an exit”. But that happens too. If you want to see how your client operates and strengthen your relationship with them, and then go back to your firm, a secondment is an option, but I think it’s rarer.
If you want to exit, a secondment is probably the best way to get a good, usually pretty high ranking opportunity at least compared to cold applying for corporate counsel roles.
More generally:
You could be the most stellar, amazing big law associate in existence. But if you don’t want to be a Big Law partner, you can (and should) do something else.
The grass can be greener but it’s in the eye of the beholder. What do you want to do?
The point I’m making is, you need to tell yourself what you want out of your career first. When you answer that, then you can figure out whether a secondment is the right approach to exiting.
For more context, the firm knows I want to stay and want to become a partner.
From what I’ve seen, the biggest thing to evaluate is the lifestyle of the people at the place you would do a secondment. I’ve known people who said it was an incredible experience in part because you get billable hour credit for working full time biglaw hours without necessarily actually working full time biglaw hours at the client. On the other hand, I’ve know people to go on secondment and come back traumatized because they worked even harder than at their biglaw job (and didn’t get hours credit for that). I haven’t seen any major flags as to whether someone doing a secondment means they’ll make partner—my experience is that it’s people who are well liked and basically just seen as a plus for the firm whether they stay after or go in house.
By the way, one of the things that I find a little odd on this bowl is that many associates think that the highest levels of success come from making big law partner. Anything else is seen as either settling or not as successful or a backup plan.
But that’s just not true. Some of the most successful people I know were big law associates who left to start their own businesses or went in house then raised up through the corporate ranks to lead operating and investment companies.
Someone from my firm left as a fifth year and over the next 8 years raised the ranks on the PE sponsor side and now owns his own private equity sponsor. He makes at least as much if not more than a big law partner. And seems to be having a hell of a lot more fun doing it.
Secondment is a great way to go in-house or get experience on how to be an effective partner since you're now the client evaluating service provided by law firms. Usually the very solid but not superstar (think workhorse) associates go on secondment
What are your views on using the letter "e"?
Horrific. Always avoid that glyph—it has brought nothing but pain and sorrow from that first day a sad man thought to scrawl it down.