Choosing Office Location?

[NCBartender15]

When applying to Big Law how do you end up in a specific office? For example, I am from California but would not mind working in New York City, Chicago, D.C., Texas, or California. So would I apply to each of those locations individually? During OCI will it be seen as an issue that I am open to going to many places?

Or is it more of a we hire you on and ship to which office needs/wants you type of situation?

Thank you

[BlendedUnicorn]

You apply to a specific office during OCI and it's generally seen as wise to focus on a market or two by the time you get to OCI. At some firms it may be possible to transfer from office to office, but by and large it's good to signal that you have ties to a city and that you're likely to stick around.

[Slytherpuff]

Typically you’d apply for each office individually, yes. There will be some firms that only really consider you for one office, so don’t be surprised if you only hear back from one office you apply to though (each firm handles recruiting a little differently).

I think CA won’t care because you’re from there and NYC won’t care because there are a ton of big law openings, but the other places might raise an eyebrow if you don’t have ties there and seem to be interviewing all over - but as long as you can sell why you want to be in X city in an interview, you can hopefully overcome it. But I’d honestly just pick two markets to focus on, ideally NY + somewhere else.