• Home
  • News
  • Summer Associates Report Fear, Anxiety and Lots of Food

Law Firms

Summer Associates Report Fear, Anxiety and Lots of Food

Posted Sep 29, 2009 9:16 AM CST
By Debra Cassens Weiss

Stress and anxiety are on the rise among law students employed this summer at large law firms, according to a new survey. But the summer associates could assuage their worries with food and drink offered at social outings that still were on the agenda.

American Lawyer’s survey of 2009 summer associates found that almost half of the respondents weren’t sure whether they would get full-time offers, compared to only 17 percent last year and 12 percent in 2007. Some associates sounded downright panicked in their open-ended answers to some of the questions, according to the American Lawyer story on the survey.

“It is a scary time to be a law student,” one wrote. “For the love of God,” another wrote, “please be more transparent about the offer process and outlook.”

The top-ranked law firm in the associate survey, Cozen O’Connor, told its 18 summer associates up front that all would get job offers as long as they did a good job. The firm didn’t reduce the length of its 10-week program. "A great place to work,” gushed one summer associate who worked there. “One of the rare things in life that are as good or better than expected.”

The law firm said yesterday that it has made offers to three-quarters of its summer associate class, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports.

Despite the anxiety expressed in some comments, summer associates appeared to be satisfied on the whole, according to the American Lawyer story. The average grade was 4.518 (on a 1-5 scale, with 5 being the highest), a score that was close to last year’s average.

Law firms tried to keep summers happy with social activities, although the outings and meals were less lavish than in the past. Activities included “river-rafting, race-car driving, mechanical bull-riding, moonlight kayaking, target-shooting, bowling, and even polka-dancing,” the story says. A few summers even complained that meals were too rich and the portions too generous.

One guilty associate wondered about the need for so many perks, according to the story. “We really don’t need BlackBerrys, free lunches every day, or an event every week,” she wrote. “If cutting back on these perks would help one more associate get hired or decrease the need for [deferrals], I would rather have our class start bringing peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.”

Summer associates ranked these five law firms as best:

1) Cozen O’Connor

2) Nutter McClennen & Fish

3) Fox Rothschild

4) Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman

5) Bingham McCutchen

The results were based on a survey of more than 4,800 law students working at 124 firms. They were asked about nine subject areas, including the amount of interesting work, training and guidance, and interactions with other lawyers at their firms.

Comments

1.

B. McLeod
Sep 29, 2009 12:08 PM CST

The “guilty associate” with doubts about the perks perhaps does not realize what she has strayed into.  That kind of thinking will never fit in a large firm environment.

Flag this comment

2.

Esq.
Sep 29, 2009 12:40 PM CST

Oh, the naivety of youth.  The firms will cut back on associates LONG before they’d touch their perks.

Flag this comment

3.

B. McLeod
Sep 30, 2009 12:12 AM CST

What about “loathing”?  Do any report “fear & loathing?”

Flag this comment

4.

tng
Sep 30, 2009 8:12 AM CST

Yawn, another lame ABA article.  Those 4800 law students should count themselves lucky that they had a summer associate position and the potential for a job offer (not to forget the 2k a week in compensation)... because there were another approximately 30,000 law students who did not win the “summer associate lottery” and work for a firm and get paid.  Those some odd 30,000 other law students had to scrambled, beg, and plea for whatever unpaid internship they could find and take on another…say 20k in debt so they could live this past summer.  Practically all of those 30,000 law students never had a the hopeful chance that they would get some offer of employment for a job that actually will enable them to pay off those student loans and no live in debt slavery.  No, those other 30,000 law students now get to start their 3rd year heavily in debt with practically zero job prospects when they graduate.  Time for law students to look for non-legal jobs…they better cruise those undergraduate job fairs.

Flag this comment

5.

JN
Sep 30, 2009 3:28 PM CST

Once again, I hope the clients of these biglaw firms realize what their legal bills are paying for. Is it ridiculous to encourage people making 2000 per week to be able to afford their own lunch? C’mon.

The fact that this business model didn’t die long ago amazes me.

Flag this comment

6.

annie
Oct 2, 2009 5:29 AM CST

I would take my summer associate job where I worked with seven seasoned attorneys for the summer with little perks - didn’t expect them - and lots of work over these cushy summer internships. I learned a lot that summer and the next fall, they continued to send me work at law school at a pretty decent hourly wage. Anyway, my apparent lack of entitlement made it possible for me to find my own clients and open a little office when I was laid off my first law job. I now work for a small firm. And I enjoyed a nice peanut butter & jelly sandwich yesterday at my desk. Wish I would have had a glass of milk to go along with it.

Flag this comment

7.

Wake Up
Oct 2, 2009 7:27 AM CST

JN, what you need to realize is that many of the in house counsel for these clients used to work for those big law firms with their failed business models and are not only well aware of the situation but they are also loyal to their former firms, which helps continue the cycle.

Flag this comment

8.

LuvMyFirm
Oct 2, 2009 8:43 AM CST

The other part of the tragic story is that these lavishly pampered Summers are going to get a HARSH wake up call the first day they report to work IF they are lucky enough to make the cut.  I will never be thankful enough that I went with the down-to-earth, real-life-experience firm that offered me a great salary for the local cost of living and an environment where—as a NEW associate—I rarely work more than 45-50 hours a week and work out EVERY DAY at lunch.  I may not have had gourmet meals every night during my summer experience, but I sure am glad I was given a realistic idea of what working for MY firm was going to be like before I accepted the offer.  They did not sugarcoat anything—granted, they didn’t really need to because I saw how happy everyone was with what their lives (personal and professional) looked like.  I dare say that it’s not the amount of money they spend on you BEFORE you work there that’s going to make you happy once you’re there.

Flag this comment

9.

Kalifornia Arnold
Oct 2, 2009 9:08 AM CST

Lunch? People get to eat lunch?

Flag this comment

10.

kasey
Oct 2, 2009 9:10 AM CST

I clerked for (and eventually went to work for) a"big law” firm that feted it’s summer associates endlessly.  Turns out that it was usually the associates and partners that were the ones pushing for all of the activities and breakfast/lunches/dinners with summers. I think the summers would have welcomed a break from all of that.  I know I certainly felt that way when I was a summer.

Flag this comment

11.

formersummer
Oct 2, 2009 10:17 AM CST

At my BigLaw summer job, the lower level associates wanted to take the summers to lunch because that meant they could go to fancier places on the firm’s dime and could spend 2 or 3 hours for lunch and get credit for the hours.  For the summers, I did not like spending all that time meeting the lunch partner earlier in the day, going to lunch for some multi-course extravaganza, and then walking or driving back to the office because that could take 3 or 4 hours out of the work day.  Those who received offers got offers based on the number of billable hours they reported over the summer.  I would have preferred a simple lunch (even if I had to bring it from home or dine out at my own expense) that didn’t eat into my work time so that I could have worked reasonable hours.  Each hour spent at lunch is another hour you have to stay later at the office.  Just give the kids a real-life view and save the time and money on the other garbage.  In this economy, you don’t have to worry about the student not liking your firm or choosing to go somewhere else because they got better perks.  Now, the students should know they are lucky to have an opportunity, and they will accept the job even if they have to work in a cubicle and pack a Hot Pocket.  The summers are smart people.  They should be worried that each dollar spent on the harbor cruise or casino trip makes it that much more likely the firm will not hire another associate because of budget woes.  Summers used to feel secure about a firm that had all that extra cash. Now, they should worry about where that cash is going.

Flag this comment

12.

KJ
Oct 2, 2009 11:01 AM CST

I just don’t understand why the ABA keeps referring to biglaw students as if they are the only law students in the country, when they are in the minority.  Is it just because they make more money? Who cares?  Id like to read an article that I can actually relate to, once in a while.

Flag this comment

13.

Q
Oct 2, 2009 11:25 AM CST

You know how many times ABA Journal is going to run articles about all that’s wrong with summer programs?  UNTIL SOMEONE IN RECRUITING READS THEM.  Even when Big Law was in the pink, the #1 complaint I had as a spoiled summer and the #1 complaint I heard from summers after I became an associate was “too many parties, not enough real work.”  Summers get cast as these greedy undeserving students, when all 80% of them genuinely want is to find out what it would be like to work in Big Law, whether the money is worth it and whether they would be any good at it.  Big Law could cut their entertainment budgets, pay half salaries and still attract the same quality and number of applicants and no one would complain.

Flag this comment

14.

Dan Burnham
Oct 2, 2009 3:25 PM CST

TNG basically hit it on the head. No crying for these summer associates, how about the other students who don’t have any job, and are running up the debt (I’m not a law student, by the way).

Flag this comment

15.

elmo
Oct 2, 2009 4:06 PM CST

2nd year law students with no experience and no skills “gushing” about all the perks at biglaw. I’m going to be sick.

Flag this comment

16.

KJ
Oct 2, 2009 4:51 PM CST

They are only perks if you are into that sort of thing.  I’d rather use my own (so I don’t owe anyone anything)  to go on vacation several times a year with my personal friends or family, than have lunch and dinner and moonlight kayaks with a bunch of lawyers or students I work with.

Flag this comment

17.

KJ
Oct 2, 2009 4:52 PM CST

oops, I meant use my own money.

Flag this comment

Add a Comment

We welcome your comments, but please adhere to our comment policy.

Commenting has expired on this post.