Law Firms to Stay Away From Forum

[nealric]

Norton Rose Fullbright. They are super shaky financially, and have no offered a good chunk of their class in recent years. If I was going into OCI, I'd only go here if I had no other option.

NY office had 20 Summers after the merger and offered 100% this year...Yes I'm defending my firm but its not "super shaky financially."

I haven't felt compelled to log into my account in a long time, but this is a flat out, dangerous LIE. I know a few summers who were no offered from this office, and it's awful because it had nothing to do with their performance. I'm assuming you're a recruiter, a clueless asssociate, or PR for the firm, because it doesn't make sense why you'd mislead people on this.

Edit: Actually, realized this post was made last Augusst, not this one. Whoops! But FWIW, Norton Rose was atrocious this year.

It’s certainly true that we almost always no-offer people, but keep in mind that for many of the V50-100 firms that aren’t as profitable, it’s just harder to recruit talent. Our reputation sort of becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, as we end up attracting lower caliber students of which at least a couple a year we just simply cannot hire, either because they turn out to be functionally illiterate or worse. In what other industry does one walk into a summer internship expecting to get a job with 100% certainty? In that case what’s even the point of doing a summer internship in the first place?

Fact is that the 100% offer thing may work for the top of the top firms, but really has no place for the rest of the firms. Many firms that force themselves to it just end up with incompetent people they struggle to fire later.

what does it mean to be "functionally illiterate?" where do you find these people and why do you hire them in the first place?

It means “spin bought by a dumbass associate who will be blindsided by The Talk”

Name one other industry where 100% of an intern class get $190K starting jobs or else their employers get excoriated on the internet? Delusional K-JDs man... Last I checked tons of firms have <100% offer rates. Nobody is forcing you to go to those firms. I heard Cravath offers 100%, good luck at 3L OCI.

What other industries do is irrelevant. Law firms are competing for talent in the legal industry. Other industries commonly hire new graduates who have not interned with their company. In biglaw, that is relatively rare. An SA offer is more like a full-time permanent offer with a trial period than a true internship- which really isn't that rare.

You have to understand that low offer rates can lead to a downward spiral. If firm A gives 100% offers and firm B gives 75% offers, a student with an offer at both will usually choose firm A (pay and other factors being equal). Given the preference for firm A, the students going to firm B are going to be ones who could not get an offer at firm A. So you are starting with a lower caliber of student to begin with as a result of the no-offers.

People generally forgive a few no-offers or no-offers in a very bad year. But a consistent pattern of no-offers can lead the firm to be one of last resort. Difficulty recruiting is something that may not have any immediate impact, but over a period of many years can lead to significant decline in firm quality. Not everyone can win the war for laterals- a firm has to develop talent in-house if it wants to grow economically.

[Anonymous User]

People generally forgive a few no-offers or no-offers in a very bad year. But a consistent pattern of no-offers can lead the firm to be one of last resort. Difficulty recruiting is something that may not have any immediate impact, but over a period of many years can lead to significant decline in firm quality. Not everyone can win the war for laterals- a firm has to develop talent in-house if it wants to grow economically.

This is true if we are talking about the supply of freshly minted PhDs in nuclear physics, but law students (with few exceptions) are fungible. The fact that firms have to dig deeper into the medians at a T14 or (God forbid) the top 10% at a T50 for 1st year "talent" will not doom them to failure. On the contrary, what will doom them is their inability to retain rainmakers and clients from the likes of K&E & co. The sooner law students realize the painful fact of their fungibility and increasing lack of leverage in the labor market, the better prepared they will be to hustle. Not sure why this is even being discussed -- all the moaning and griping will not change the economic reality that many of the lesser V100s that make up the bulk of SA openings do and will continue to no-offer people.

[Anonymous User]

People generally forgive a few no-offers or no-offers in a very bad year. But a consistent pattern of no-offers can lead the firm to be one of last resort. Difficulty recruiting is something that may not have any immediate impact, but over a period of many years can lead to significant decline in firm quality. Not everyone can win the war for laterals- a firm has to develop talent in-house if it wants to grow economically.

This is true if we are talking about the supply of freshly minted PhDs in nuclear physics, but law students (with few exceptions) are fungible. The fact that firms have to dig deeper into the medians at a T14 or (God forbid) the top 10% at a T50 for 1st year "talent" will not doom them to failure. On the contrary, what will doom them is their inability to retain rainmakers and clients from the likes of K&E & co. The sooner law students realize the painful fact of their fungibility and increasing lack of leverage in the labor market, the better prepared they will be to hustle. Not sure why this is even being discussed -- all the moaning and griping will not change the economic reality that many of the lesser V100s that make up the bulk of SA openings do and will continue to no-offer people.

Odd to hear this coming from a firm that tried so hard but still struggled to half-way match the new Milbank scale. If law students are so fungible, why not just do what Greenberg Traurig did? Why try so hard?

[Anonymous User]

Norton Rose Fullbright. They are super shaky financially, and have no offered a good chunk of their class in recent years. If I was going into OCI, I'd only go here if I had no other option.

NY office had 20 Summers after the merger and offered 100% this year...Yes I'm defending my firm but its not "super shaky financially."

I haven't felt compelled to log into my account in a long time, but this is a flat out, dangerous LIE. I know a few summers who were no offered from this office, and it's awful because it had nothing to do with their performance. I'm assuming you're a recruiter, a clueless asssociate, or PR for the firm, because it doesn't make sense why you'd mislead people on this.

Edit: Actually, realized this post was made last Augusst, not this one. Whoops! But FWIW, Norton Rose was atrocious this year.

It’s certainly true that we almost always no-offer people, but keep in mind that for many of the V50-100 firms that aren’t as profitable, it’s just harder to recruit talent. Our reputation sort of becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, as we end up attracting lower caliber students of which at least a couple a year we just simply cannot hire, either because they turn out to be functionally illiterate or worse. In what other industry does one walk into a summer internship expecting to get a job with 100% certainty? In that case what’s even the point of doing a summer internship in the first place?

Fact is that the 100% offer thing may work for the top of the top firms, but really has no place for the rest of the firms. Many firms that force themselves to it just end up with incompetent people they struggle to fire later.

How bad was NRF in NY after going 100% in 2017?

Norton Rose no offered 3 2Ls in NYC alone. One was pregnant. They also had no offers in their big Texas offices.

It's true that some lower V100 occasionally no offer people. Norton Rose is in a league of its own. 2017 was an anomaly. Before 2017, they usually had below-80% rates. If you're considering them, proceed with caution.

[Anonymous User]

Norton Rose Fullbright. They are super shaky financially, and have no offered a good chunk of their class in recent years. If I was going into OCI, I'd only go here if I had no other option.

NY office had 20 Summers after the merger and offered 100% this year...Yes I'm defending my firm but its not "super shaky financially."

I haven't felt compelled to log into my account in a long time, but this is a flat out, dangerous LIE. I know a few summers who were no offered from this office, and it's awful because it had nothing to do with their performance. I'm assuming you're a recruiter, a clueless asssociate, or PR for the firm, because it doesn't make sense why you'd mislead people on this.

Edit: Actually, realized this post was made last Augusst, not this one. Whoops! But FWIW, Norton Rose was atrocious this year.

It’s certainly true that we almost always no-offer people, but keep in mind that for many of the V50-100 firms that aren’t as profitable, it’s just harder to recruit talent. Our reputation sort of becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, as we end up attracting lower caliber students of which at least a couple a year we just simply cannot hire, either because they turn out to be functionally illiterate or worse. In what other industry does one walk into a summer internship expecting to get a job with 100% certainty? In that case what’s even the point of doing a summer internship in the first place?

Fact is that the 100% offer thing may work for the top of the top firms, but really has no place for the rest of the firms. Many firms that force themselves to it just end up with incompetent people they struggle to fire later.

How bad was NRF in NY after going 100% in 2017?

Norton Rose no offered 3 2Ls in NYC alone. One was pregnant. They also no offered people in their Texas offices.

It's true that some lower V100 occasionally no offer people. Norton Rose is in a league of its own. 2017 was an anomaly. Before 2017, they usually had below-80% rates. If you're considering them, proceed with caution.

[Anonymous User]

People generally forgive a few no-offers or no-offers in a very bad year. But a consistent pattern of no-offers can lead the firm to be one of last resort. Difficulty recruiting is something that may not have any immediate impact, but over a period of many years can lead to significant decline in firm quality. Not everyone can win the war for laterals- a firm has to develop talent in-house if it wants to grow economically.

This is true if we are talking about the supply of freshly minted PhDs in nuclear physics, but law students (with few exceptions) are fungible. The fact that firms have to dig deeper into the medians at a T14 or (God forbid) the top 10% at a T50 for 1st year "talent" will not doom them to failure. On the contrary, what will doom them is their inability to retain rainmakers and clients from the likes of K&E & co. The sooner law students realize the painful fact of their fungibility and increasing lack of leverage in the labor market, the better prepared they will be to hustle. Not sure why this is even being discussed -- all the moaning and griping will not change the economic reality that many of the lesser V100s that make up the bulk of SA openings do and will continue to no-offer people.

This sounds like it was written by someone who has little to no experience managing junior associates on a day-to-day basis.

[nealric]

People generally forgive a few no-offers or no-offers in a very bad year. But a consistent pattern of no-offers can lead the firm to be one of last resort. Difficulty recruiting is something that may not have any immediate impact, but over a period of many years can lead to significant decline in firm quality. Not everyone can win the war for laterals- a firm has to develop talent in-house if it wants to grow economically.

This is true if we are talking about the supply of freshly minted PhDs in nuclear physics, but law students (with few exceptions) are fungible. The fact that firms have to dig deeper into the medians at a T14 or (God forbid) the top 10% at a T50 for 1st year "talent" will not doom them to failure. On the contrary, what will doom them is their inability to retain rainmakers and clients from the likes of K&E & co. The sooner law students realize the painful fact of their fungibility and increasing lack of leverage in the labor market, the better prepared they will be to hustle. Not sure why this is even being discussed -- all the moaning and griping will not change the economic reality that many of the lesser V100s that make up the bulk of SA openings do and will continue to no-offer people.

If law students were truly fungible, salaries in biglaw would be quite a bit lower. The truth of the matter is that there is a reason why top law firms are competing for the very top students- they do make better associates on average. And if one accepts fungibility, then there should be no reason to no-offer associates except for a few outliers. They should hire only the number of associates they reasonably expect to need.

It's also true that the V50-100 firms are increasingly unable to compete with the likes of K&E. But they are currently in a strange place where they haven't fully resigned themselves to the middle market. If you are doing middle market work, you can get by with middle market associates.

Of course law student griping won't really change law firm management decisions, but I think a lot of middle market firms are blind to how damaging no offers are to recruiting. I suspect a lot of prospective hires would take a SA offer at a 100% offer firm paying slightly below market over a 70% offer firm paying market. The second-tier firms have to economize, but no-offers seem to be a poor way to do it.

[Mullens]

Not to defend just STB NY, but the first half of 2018 was the busiest M&A half-year ever. The market is going wild right now. It’s not STB or any other law firms’ fault if their associates are busy during one of the busiest times ever. Law firms are bad about estimating staffing needs, yes, but it’s not random happenstance that we got raises and summer bonuses this year and it shouldn’t reflect poorly just on STB.

If anything, people there were just more honest with you than elsewhere. I’d be more concerned if a firm wasn’t busy in this market (if you’re looking at corporate). The other thing to consider is that you won’t start full time for over 2 years and there’s a good chance the economy dips before then.

[Anonymous User]

Norton Rose Fullbright. They are super shaky financially, and have no offered a good chunk of their class in recent years. If I was going into OCI, I'd only go here if I had no other option.

NY office had 20 Summers after the merger and offered 100% this year...Yes I'm defending my firm but its not "super shaky financially."

I haven't felt compelled to log into my account in a long time, but this is a flat out, dangerous LIE. I know a few summers who were no offered from this office, and it's awful because it had nothing to do with their performance. I'm assuming you're a recruiter, a clueless asssociate, or PR for the firm, because it doesn't make sense why you'd mislead people on this.

Edit: Actually, realized this post was made last Augusst, not this one. Whoops! But FWIW, Norton Rose was atrocious this year.

It’s certainly true that we almost always no-offer people, but keep in mind that for many of the V50-100 firms that aren’t as profitable, it’s just harder to recruit talent. Our reputation sort of becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, as we end up attracting lower caliber students of which at least a couple a year we just simply cannot hire, either because they turn out to be functionally illiterate or worse. In what other industry does one walk into a summer internship expecting to get a job with 100% certainty? In that case what’s even the point of doing a summer internship in the first place?

Fact is that the 100% offer thing may work for the top of the top firms, but really has no place for the rest of the firms. Many firms that force themselves to it just end up with incompetent people they struggle to fire later.

what does it mean to be "functionally illiterate?" where do you find these people and why do you hire them in the first place?

It means “spin bought by a dumbass associate who will be blindsided by The Talk”

Name one other industry where 100% of an intern class get $190K starting jobs or else their employers get excoriated on the internet? Delusional K-JDs man... Last I checked tons of firms have <100% offer rates. Nobody is forcing you to go to those firms. I heard Cravath offers 100%, good luck at 3L OCI.

The difference is that other industries do not stigmatize no offers the way the legal profession has chosen to. You don’t get an offer in banking, and you can interview with other banks. Other banks don't automatically think "wtf is wrong with this person?" if you don't receive an offer. Other banks don't automatically ding you because they think you must have thrown up on a partner or walked around the office behaving like an entitled jerk all summer. You get no offered in biglaw, on the other hand, and it's basically career over. Law firms have collectively made a no offer a scarlet letter that identifies you as someone who did something incredibly egregious and therefore should not be hired by any biglaw firm. You can't have your cake and eat it, too. If you are going to make a no offer a career-ruining scarlet letter, then you need to ensure you can extend offers to the entire SA class, save for truly egregious circumstances, or risk the consequences come recruiting season. I find it very hard to believe that biglaw firms are frequently hiring "functionally illiterate" students when top students across the country are fighting to get any biglaw job at all. The much more likely scenario is that some firms consistently overhire and cannot afford to extend offers to all of their summer associates; it is basically baked into their hiring model at this point, and until they lose out on top students over and over and over again because those students are choosing 100% firms, they will continue to pull the same BS.

FWIW, I was a student with very high grades at a T14 who strongly considered Fulbright and turned them down for firms that hadn't consistently no offered a fourth of their SA class.

[Anonymous User]

The difference is that other industries do not stigmatize no offers the way the legal profession has chosen to. You don’t get an offer in banking, and you can interview with other banks. Other banks don't automatically think "wtf is wrong with this person?" if you don't receive an offer. Other banks don't automatically ding you because they think you must have thrown up on a partner or walked around the office behaving like an entitled jerk all summer. You get no offered in biglaw, on the other hand, and it's basically career over. Law firms have collectively made a no offer a scarlet letter that identifies you as someone who did something incredibly egregious and therefore should not be hired by any biglaw firm. You can't have your cake and eat it, too. If you are going to make a no offer a career-ruining scarlet letter, then you need to ensure you can extend offers to the entire SA class, save for truly egregious circumstances, or risk the consequences come recruiting season. I find it very hard to believe that biglaw firms are frequently hiring "functionally illiterate" students when top students across the country are fighting to get any biglaw job at all. The much more likely scenario is that some firms consistently overhire and cannot afford to extend offers to all of their summer associates; it is basically baked into their hiring model at this point, and until they lose out on top students over and over and over again because those students are choosing 100% firms, they will continue to pull the same BS.

FWIW, I was a student with very high grades at a T14 who strongly considered Fulbright and turned them down for firms that hadn't consistently no offered a fourth of their SA class.

The reason its stigmatized is because many firms give everyone offers. In the cases of firms with decent sized summer classes that do not give everyone an offer, even if its for purely financial reasons, the firm is not randomly no-offering summers. Rather, theyll no-offer whoever they believe is the worst 10% or 20% or whatever. Why would a subsequent firm then wish to take the worst summer of NRF unless that is the best they can get?

[nealric]

The difference is that other industries do not stigmatize no offers the way the legal profession has chosen to. You don’t get an offer in banking, and you can interview with other banks. Other banks don't automatically think "wtf is wrong with this person?" if you don't receive an offer. Other banks don't automatically ding you because they think you must have thrown up on a partner or walked around the office behaving like an entitled jerk all summer. You get no offered in biglaw, on the other hand, and it's basically career over. Law firms have collectively made a no offer a scarlet letter that identifies you as someone who did something incredibly egregious and therefore should not be hired by any biglaw firm. You can't have your cake and eat it, too. If you are going to make a no offer a career-ruining scarlet letter, then you need to ensure you can extend offers to the entire SA class, save for truly egregious circumstances, or risk the consequences come recruiting season. I find it very hard to believe that biglaw firms are frequently hiring "functionally illiterate" students when top students across the country are fighting to get any biglaw job at all. The much more likely scenario is that some firms consistently overhire and cannot afford to extend offers to all of their summer associates; it is basically baked into their hiring model at this point, and until they lose out on top students over and over and over again because those students are choosing 100% firms, they will continue to pull the same BS.

FWIW, I was a student with very high grades at a T14 who strongly considered Fulbright and turned them down for firms that hadn't consistently no offered a fourth of their SA class.

The reason its stigmatized is because many firms give everyone offers. In the cases of firms with decent sized summer classes that do not give everyone an offer, even if its for purely financial reasons, the firm is not randomly no-offering summers. Rather, theyll no-offer whoever they believe is the worst 10% or 20% or whatever. Why would a subsequent firm then wish to take the worst summer of NRF unless that is the best they can get?

Except it's not necessarily the worst 10 or 20% in terms of objective merit. Sure, one out of every 20 summers might be lazy/entitled, and 2-3 more might do legitimately poor work. But sometimes no-offers happen because you happened to be assigned to a department that was particularly slow, or because you had a personality clash with the wrong partner, or had one bad day from illness or personal problems which turned into the bad review that sunk your candidacy.

The problem is that subsequent firms have don't want to give you the benefit of the doubt that it was just a bad luck no-offer and treat it like you must have done something awful. So going to a low-offer firm can leave a candidate worse off than no summer associateship at all through no fault of their own.

[Schotes]

Except it's not necessarily the worst 10 or 20% in terms of objective merit. Sure, one out of every 20 summers might be lazy/entitled, and 2-3 more might do legitimately poor work. But sometimes no-offers happen because you happened to be assigned to a department that was particularly slow, or because you had a personality clash with the wrong partner, or had one bad day from illness or personal problems which turned into the bad review that sunk your candidacy.

The problem is that subsequent firms have don't want to give you the benefit of the doubt that it was just a bad luck no-offer and treat it like you must have done something awful. So going to a low-offer firm can leave a candidate worse off than no summer associateship at all through no fault of their own.

A no-offers in a good economy is usually a major failure on the part of the SA. Anyone who doesn't treat their entire SA time as an extended interview is foolish.

[Anonymous User]

The mention of firms doing stealth layoffs because of financial instability, specifically Dechert, don't make much sense when those firms are making record revenue and growing ppp. Dechert might be laying off people to hit a ppp target, but it isn't because they are in financial trouble. Idk which is worse though.

[QContinuum]

Except it's not necessarily the worst 10 or 20% in terms of objective merit. Sure, one out of every 20 summers might be lazy/entitled, and 2-3 more might do legitimately poor work. But sometimes no-offers happen because you happened to be assigned to a department that was particularly slow, or because you had a personality clash with the wrong partner, or had one bad day from illness or personal problems which turned into the bad review that sunk your candidacy.

The problem is that subsequent firms have don't want to give you the benefit of the doubt that it was just a bad luck no-offer and treat it like you must have done something awful. So going to a low-offer firm can leave a candidate worse off than no summer associateship at all through no fault of their own.

A no-offers in a good economy at a firm that typically offers 100% or close is usually a major failure on the part of the SA. Anyone who doesn't treat their entire SA time as an extended interview is foolish.

FTFY.

[Schotes]

A no-offers in a good economy at a firm that typically offers 100% or close is usually a major failure on the part of the SA. Anyone who doesn't treat their entire SA time as an extended interview is foolish.

FTFY.

Getting a no-offer from a firm that only offers 80% is a failure. That means that you are the designated dork in a group of five SA.

Law jobs are an unfair competition that begins with undergrad grades. There is no reason to expect that SA bids and offers should be any different. Either perform well relative to the rules of the game or reset expectations.

[hoos89]

A no-offers in a good economy at a firm that typically offers 100% or close is usually a major failure on the part of the SA. Anyone who doesn't treat their entire SA time as an extended interview is foolish.

FTFY.

Getting a no-offer from a firm that only offers 80% is a failure. That means that you are the designated dork in a group of five SA.

Law jobs are an unfair competition that begins with undergrad grades. There is no reason to expect that SA bids and offers should be any different. Either perform well relative to the rules of the game or reset expectations.

Except there is reason to expect that SA offers will be different at most big law firms because they ARE different at most big law firms. Why would I choose an offer at a firm that regularly no offers several summers over one that consistently offers all summers? Why take that risk with my career? Firms that consistently no offer multiple summers should be avoided unless you have no other offers.

Also getting a no offer at an 80% offer firm does NOT necessarily just mean that you're the "dork" in a group of 5.

[nealric]

A no-offers in a good economy at a firm that typically offers 100% or close is usually a major failure on the part of the SA. Anyone who doesn't treat their entire SA time as an extended interview is foolish.

FTFY.

Getting a no-offer from a firm that only offers 80% is a failure. That means that you are the designated dork in a group of five SA.

Law jobs are an unfair competition that begins with undergrad grades. There is no reason to expect that SA bids and offers should be any different. Either perform well relative to the rules of the game or reset expectations.

Better yet, just avoid such firms- which is in fact the point of this thread.

[Anonymous User]

A no-offers in a good economy at a firm that typically offers 100% or close is usually a major failure on the part of the SA. Anyone who doesn't treat their entire SA time as an extended interview is foolish.

FTFY.

Getting a no-offer from a firm that only offers 80% is a failure. That means that you are the designated dork in a group of five SA.

Law jobs are an unfair competition that begins with undergrad grades. There is no reason to expect that SA bids and offers should be any different. Either perform well relative to the rules of the game or reset expectations.

This is absolutely not true, especially in Texas. I personally know several competent people who were no-offered for no other reason than the firm overhired, had to cut 30%, and they got unlucky.

Read this thread and tell me all of these people are "dorks" or "functionally illiterate" or "failures": http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 3&t=212272.

What we see in this thread is survivorship bias: I got an offer and am therefore amazing. Everybody else who got no offered deserved it and is not as amazing as me.

[QContinuum]

This is absolutely not true, especially in Texas. I personally know several competent people who were no-offered for no other reason than the firm overhired, had to cut 30%, and they got unlucky.

Read this thread and tell me all of these people are "dorks" or "functionally illiterate" or "failures": http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 3&t=212272.

What we see in this thread is survivorship bias: I got an offer and am therefore amazing. Everybody else who got no offered deserved it and is not as amazing as me.

Agreed. Getting no-offered at a firm that routinely no-offers a significant chunk of its summer class hardly means the unlucky SAs are "major failures". "Major" implies a, well, major screwup on the no-offered SAs' part. Very unfair to describe competent SAs who get cut due to a pre-determined quota as "major failures".

[Anonymous User]

This is absolutely not true, especially in Texas. I personally know several competent people who were no-offered for no other reason than the firm overhired, had to cut 30%, and they got unlucky.

Read this thread and tell me all of these people are "dorks" or "functionally illiterate" or "failures": http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 3&t=212272.

What we see in this thread is survivorship bias: I got an offer and am therefore amazing. Everybody else who got no offered deserved it and is not as amazing as me.

Agreed. Getting no-offered at a firm that routinely no-offers a significant chunk of its summer class hardly means the unlucky SAs are "major failures". "Major" implies a, well, major screwup on the no-offered SAs' part. Very unfair to describe competent SAs who get cut due to a pre-determined quota as "major failures".

Additionally, in Houston, only three biglaw firms have always been 100% offer. As a candidate, you can try to make an educated decision, but if you don't have an offer from one of those three, then you'll have to go with a firm that has no-offered before. So say you choose a firm with a 95% or 100% offer rate the past year. That firm may no offer 20% your summer. I know that at least in Texas, it can be really tough as a candidate to ensure before you accept an offer that you're going with a firm that won't no offer due to factors out of your control.

[Schotes]

Additionally, in Houston, only three biglaw firms have always been 100% offer. As a candidate, you can try to make an educated decision, but if you don't have an offer from one of those three, then you'll have to go with a firm that has no-offered before. So say you choose a firm with a 95% or 100% offer rate the past year. That firm may no offer 20% your summer. I know that at least in Texas, it can be really tough as a candidate to ensure before you accept an offer that you're going with a firm that won't no offer due to factors out of your control.

How is a no offer in the situation described out of a candidates control? It's a 10 week competition with 80% winners. The people who are perceived as the worst fit get dinged.

[QContinuum]

Additionally, in Houston, only three biglaw firms have always been 100% offer. As a candidate, you can try to make an educated decision, but if you don't have an offer from one of those three, then you'll have to go with a firm that has no-offered before. So say you choose a firm with a 95% or 100% offer rate the past year. That firm may no offer 20% your summer. I know that at least in Texas, it can be really tough as a candidate to ensure before you accept an offer that you're going with a firm that won't no offer due to factors out of your control.

How is a no offer in the situation described out of a candidates control? It's a 10 week competition with 80% winners. The people who are perceived as the worst fit get dinged.

This attitude is exactly why candidates should avoid non-100% (or close to 100%) offer firms whenever possible.

[Anonymous User]

Additionally, in Houston, only three biglaw firms have always been 100% offer. As a candidate, you can try to make an educated decision, but if you don't have an offer from one of those three, then you'll have to go with a firm that has no-offered before. So say you choose a firm with a 95% or 100% offer rate the past year. That firm may no offer 20% your summer. I know that at least in Texas, it can be really tough as a candidate to ensure before you accept an offer that you're going with a firm that won't no offer due to factors out of your control.

How is a no offer in the situation described out of a candidates control? It's a 10 week competition with 80% winners. The people who are perceived as the worst fit get dinged.

I mean, you're just wrong. Say 8 people out of 50 are no-offered due to the firm taking on more SAs than they have spots for. Maybe 1 or 2 had poor work product and another 1 was socially inept. The other 5 - how do you decide who to cut? Those who survive may have gotten lucky because their work assignments were for more powerful partners than those 5. Maybe those 5 therefore didn't have someone powerful enough that was willing to go to bat for them. You can't necessarily control your work assignments as a summer (depending on the firm, you may have more or less control), and social events only give you so much facetime with people.

Look, I get that you think you are amazing and everyone who got no offered just isn't an amazing as you, but you're blatantly wrong. If it comes down to having to choose 5 people out of 50 to cut and all of them were chill socially and did good work, it might come down to who connected with the *right* partner at the *right* time. A lot of that is just luck. Maybe you did meet the right partner, but he wasn't in a fantastic mood the times you guys spoke and therefore didn't remember you as well. It's built into these firm's hiring practices to ruin these student's careers because they choose to overhire.

[TheoO]

If a firm has 10 summers and can only hire 8, they will have to fire 2, no matter what. The decision could come down to two summers who perhaps didn't develop a rapport with the right people. There's a lot of reasons why you may be cut, and many, if not most, can be pretty arbitrary. Let's be serious, an SA isn't the most indepth experience out there for determining ability. Nevermind the fact that firms generally create a strong expectation of full offers, even if they don't give them. I doubt anyone at a 80% firm is told "some of you won't make it." There's also some unfairness in that there is a limited amount of work to really be had during a summer. Some projects you get on may not pan out because the associates don't want to deal with juniors or work heats up to make it difficult to accommodate a junior, etc. etc.

Woops. Looks like others here said as much.

[nealric]

Additionally, in Houston, only three biglaw firms have always been 100% offer. As a candidate, you can try to make an educated decision, but if you don't have an offer from one of those three, then you'll have to go with a firm that has no-offered before. So say you choose a firm with a 95% or 100% offer rate the past year. That firm may no offer 20% your summer. I know that at least in Texas, it can be really tough as a candidate to ensure before you accept an offer that you're going with a firm that won't no offer due to factors out of your control.

How is a no offer in the situation described out of a candidates control? It's a 10 week competition with 80% winners. The people who are perceived as the worst fit get dinged.

I've already described why this is not the case, but I'd also like to share my own experience. I summered in 2009. This was the class where most SA offers were made prior to the Lehman Brothers collapse and the start of the Great Recession, but the summer happened after. Everyone knew it was going to be a grim summer with even firms like Cravath shortening the summer to save money.

My old firm was traditionally a 100% (or close) firm, but ended up around 50% my year. Of ~20 people in the summer class, there was only one who did not take the summer seriously as an interview. Everyone else worked hard and pulled many late nights trying to present outstanding work product. While I did get an offer, I'm fully cognizant that a lot of it came down to luck- I had the opportunity to do some substantive work for partners who had influence. Not everyone did.