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Mentor
Are you tired of the agency life?
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Any news from DPW? 🤔🤔
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Enthusiast
+70 billables for 2 consecutive weeks with no end in sight. That would put you on track for ~300 for the month, which is not sustainable.
Don’t say “you’re drowning.” Say you “have so much to do that you don’t think you have time to devote sufficient attention to the client work and you are afraid the quality of the work product might be jeopardized.”
Enthusiast
If you’re on track to bill over 400 that month
Don’t listen to this in case you were unsure if this was a joke or not OP. No one should ever bill anywhere close to 400 and those who claim that they have done so or that you should do so are liars, full stop.
If you think you are outpacing other people in your group by a wide margin, are feeling the signs of burnout, or have billed something super aggressive like 60 hours week after week.
Everyone has their own limits and the trick is finding yours. As a litigator, I start speaking up when I’m projected to bill over 200 hours outside of major court deadlines (MTD, MSJ, trial, etc.). I know other associates who don’t do anything until they’re over 250. But I start seeing a serious decline in my quality of life when I’m over 200 so that’s my personal limit. Sometimes it can’t be helped though and there’s nothing I can do.
Also, note that not all billable work is the same. 100 hours of doc review and travel time (to a client/court) is not as mentally taxing as research and drafting memos or motions.
When your drowning and impacting your ability to produce quality work product and/or affecting your wellbeing.
Subject Expert
Never. Swallow that water and take another breath!
Jk
Am I?
It’s easier to decline new deals than to get off of existing ones. But agreed if you’re looking at more than a couple more weeks of a crazy schedule, it’s probably good to reach out to the senior associates on your deal to see if someone else can be added. Usually the answer is yes.
Subject Expert
When your quality of work starts slipping
Subject Expert
As others have mentioned, it’s not any magic #. If you’re crying everyday from exhaustion, not getting enough sleep, etc, that’s a good sign you have too much. If you’re frequently getting competing deadlines that all “have” to be met today, that’s a good sign you’re on too many matters. If you’re frequently turning in crappy work product at 5 am, that’s a good sign you have too much. If you feel like you have too much, say so.
If you want a rough estimate, I’d probably say 10+ hours a day before you can say you have too much (but depends, e.g., competing deadlines that can’t both be met).
Coach
I think if you are really worried and don't want to do it, the chances you are exaggerating and actually doing too little are very slim. Raise your hand and ask for help, the worse they can say is no.
Mentor
How much are you sleeping? That’s the magic question for me. Very (and I mean VERY) few people can function well for long periods of time below a minimum number of hours of sleep (for most people that’s about 6). If you’re getting less than that because of work for extended periods of time and don’t see things changing in the near future, raise your hand for help.
To be clear, if you hit this point, you’re WAY beyond what I think is an appropriate workload. But once you’re at that point, you’re well into drowning territory.
Also depends on what kinds of work you’re expected to do. When I had back to back weeks of LOTS of doc review, there was not really a decline in my quality of work despite needing to do 60+ hours of that in one week and I can sustain that for a few weeks. But when I’m expected to draft complex briefs and do really complicated legal research and analysis, I can’t really do for more than ~50 hours/week for more than two weeks.
My practice group and partners are very plugged into each other and look out for the associates in the group, though, so I rarely have to advocate for myself because usually a senior associate or partner will speak on my behalf to help me out.
100%. Also depends on what other obligations you have (like kids, aging parents) who need and deserve your time and energy such that you simply don’t have as much to give as someone single (not saying one should work more than the other but that you only have so much emotional energy and that has to be rationally taken into account). 180 hour months with a death in the family could be far worse than 250 hour months when not much else is going on.
At my firm you can never bill enough…. So I’m leaving.