by Nony » Wed Feb 10, 2021 8:43 pm
Yeah, I agree. I'd literally never set foot in a law firm before I interviewed with the firm I worked for during my 2L summer and genuinely wanted to know what it was like, and was able to talk about what I liked but why I ultimately found it unsatisfying. And to be clear, no one actually asked me that question directly - unless you get an interviewer who likes to be adversarial on purpose, you're more likely just to get asked to talk about what your experience was like, and why you want to work in [whatever PI/gov job], rather than being directly confronted.
And I agree it will depend who you're interviewing with, and what other experience you have. If you have a 2L SA on your resume with a bunch of other varied experiences, it takes on much less significance than if you haven't done anything else that might suggest an interest in PI/government work. There are also some PI/government jobs that hire laterals out of biglaw, so they will probably not be offended by you doing a 2L SA. (This is going to sound pedantic, but I don't usually see 2L firm gigs called internships - they're more just jobs.)
Just avoid saying you did it for the money (not that you've suggested you would). Everyone gets that that's a good reason to do a biglaw job, but it doesn't sound good to say it out loud if you're interviewing somewhere that pays way way less.
Yeah, I agree. I'd literally never set foot in a law firm before I interviewed with the firm I worked for during my 2L summer and genuinely wanted to know what it was like, and was able to talk about what I liked but why I ultimately found it unsatisfying. And to be clear, no one actually asked me that question directly - unless you get an interviewer who likes to be adversarial on purpose, you're more likely just to get asked to talk about what your experience was like, and why you want to work in [whatever PI/gov job], rather than being directly confronted.
And I agree it will depend who you're interviewing with, and what other experience you have. If you have a 2L SA on your resume with a bunch of other varied experiences, it takes on much less significance than if you haven't done anything else that might suggest an interest in PI/government work. There are also some PI/government jobs that hire laterals out of biglaw, so they will probably not be offended by you doing a 2L SA. (This is going to sound pedantic, but I don't usually see 2L firm gigs called internships - they're more just jobs.)
Just avoid saying you did it for the money (not that you've suggested you would). Everyone gets that that's a good reason to do a biglaw job, but it doesn't sound good to say it out loud if you're interviewing somewhere that pays way way less.