What are the thoughts on taking some time off for vacation, etc. (like 3 months or so) after clerking for a year or two, but before returning to work for your firm long-term? I'm really wishing I'd taken time off between college and law school to do some major traveling, etc., and I don't think I'll ever have the chance to do more than a couple weeks at a time at least while I'm at a firm.

Sure man. Whatever.

Sounds like a great idea. As long as they're cool with it I'd support it.

Are you doing the clerkship right out of law school or are you a few years into practice? I would be hesitant to ask for that much time off before you ever even started at the firm as a full time associate. If you've already built up a few years of good will though, I think it would be fine.

I'd have worked at the firm, but for only one year before clerking.

Ah, I stand corrected. I would've thought that would come off as lazy; I didn't realize it was normal practice.

Haha that's what I thought too, but it seems fair in my opinion, especially if you're about to tie yourself down to a 3-4 year commitment where you can't really take off more than 1-2 weeks at a time (and only like 4 weeks a year).

And alternatively, I'd definitely send out an informal feeler before requesting to take an extra couple months off after a clerkship if you're doing the work->clerk->work thing. Some firms (not all) are going to get a little put off if you say you need some extra downtime before returning. To them, that's what the clerkship IS -- a year or two of downtime while you still get a (smaller) paycheck, partnership service credit, and a nice $50k bonus. They're going to think that you're just going through the motions and are only coming back for a year to collect the bonus and a (larger) paycheck while you try to secure that USAO or academic job that you really want.

Not saying don't ask. Just talk to someone (mentor, original hiring partner, whomever you can vaguely trust) and make sure no one is going to get upset if you do.

Wow, that is exactly my plan (Not OP).

Yeah, and it's not like biglaw partners aren't going to have suspicions. Remember, they were associates too once upon a time, and probably had the same idea themselves. Of all of the reasons that you'd want to do the work->clerk->work track, the vast majority -- transition to academia or USAO, transition to a new market, trade up firms -- mean a parting of ways with your pre-clerkship firm. Indeed, based on my conversations last summer with the clerks I was interviewing with, I can think of maybe one that was going back to his original firm and professed to wanting to do so. The rest would only go back if they struck out in their first choice career paths.

(It's a totally different story for right-out-of-law-school clerkships.)

I disagree with this. The big career concern about taking a clerkship break while at a firm is that the firm is going to get the vibe that you don't want to be there, and will just return/stay at the firm if you can't get your first choice job out of the clerkship. (This isn't a concern for straight-out-of-law-school clerkships.) You want to avoid doing anything that will exacerbate this suspicion. Asking to take an extended break (more than a month) after the clerkship before returning to the firm might do that. Again, it might not as well, so it probably makes sense to get the opinion of someone outside of the official chain-of-command. But this isn't a trivial concern.



Yes, but a work-clerk-work person has started. And if/when they come back, they will likely do so as a fourth or fifth or even sixth year associate (the last assumes someone who does a two-year clerkship after three years at a firm). This is an entirely different scenario than a more-or-less fungible entry-level hire. Partnership decisions will be in a few years for the returning clerks, and since firms tend to like weeding out associates before they are up for it, the unofficial preliminary decisions are going to be made in the fifth and sixth and seventh years. You see the problem there -- groups are going to have to figure out whether they want to elevate the associates returning from the clerkships almost as soon as they walk back in the door, and oftentimes even before that. You can see why they might give a little more thought to the associates on clerkship leave than they do the incoming newbie associates. (And this says nothing of the fact that unlike entry-level hires, the work-clerk-work people have spent multiple years working with the groups, and that the groups are going to have to figure out how to replace that person's capacity while out.)