When you first transition from a private practice to in-house roll, is it important to start at a name brand company everybody recognizes, or is it more important to put your first foot in the door wherever?

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Go where you will be happy.

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What is a name brand company? You make the more money at well positioned smaller or medium sized companies that move up.

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This has been my experience. Private, medium size companies have given me (and my colleagues at other places) great experience plus there’s room to move up without having to go elsewhere every 3-5 years.

It depends on your taste. There are many different flavors of rolls.

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You will greatly limit your job prospects if you limit your options to only “name brand companies” (whatever that even means). Getting a first in house role can be very difficult, focus on the role itself and whether you think it’ll let you build on the skills you’ve already acquired. Most in house groups are trying to find a person with the right skill set for an open role, they won’t care if you worked at a certain company.

Keep in mind that gigantic companies with very large legal departments are often very bureaucratic, and won’t allow you to work outside your specific role (because that’s someone else’s job). Smaller or private companies with smaller legal departments may give you a more diverse experience, and that experience will be more valuable to a future employer. I’ve interviewed (and passed on) several lawyers from big company legal departments because they just didn’t have a decent breadth of experience - yeah, they worked at a well recognized company for the right amount of years, but they also reviewed same kind of contract for those years and rarely stepped outside their box to deal with other issues or novel agreements.

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Curious to see other thoughts on this.

Guess it’s important to get foot in door if it’s your first job out of law school. For those with experience, not so sure…

No. I think your question is really about the next career move after your first in-house position. My company is large but does not sell directly to the public and, consequently, is not a “brand” name. I have had plenty of opportunities to move to another company and what has proven key are my experiences. You may have better experiences that you can leverage for a future role at another company that is not a “brand” name. Of course, if your subject matter is focused on “brands” this advice is inapplicable.

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