Bitter Empire

lawyer

On-Campus Interviews: a Bitter Lawyer Lowdown

  /   /   Best of Bitter Lawyer, law school, Lawyer /   5 Comments


Believe it or not, Bitter Lawyer has provided cutting-edge, umm, advice for years. And not all of it has to do with showering with partners or shagging associates. Honest. Which is why, with on-campus interviews starting this week at most law schools, we go a bit soft and pull out bitter highlights of past advice for law students. Who else tells it like it is? Actually, don’t answer that.

Confessions of OCI Hiring Partners

Two years ago, we interviewed law firm hiring partners and produced a three-part series: OCI Hiring Partners Tell All. The highlights include resume padding, favorite interview questions, recovering from disaster, and whether good looks and thank-you notes really matter.

  • OCI Hiring Partners Tell All. Catching an applicant in a lie, favorite interview questions, and what you wish you knew then that you only know now.
  • OCI Hiring Partners Tell All: Part 2. Hiring partners’ worst interviews, including dealing with cocky name-droppers, admitting to sexism in an interview, and what to do if you bomb the interview in the first five minutes.
  • OCI Hiring Partners Tell All: Part 3. Manners and looks. As in, do good looks actually matter? And is the handwritten thank-you note a relic of the 1990’s?

Advice from an Ex-Bitter

Ex-Bitter has, at last count, been providing bitter-pill advice for more than three years and has compiled more than 150 pieces of questionable advice. We list some of the questions he’s received below, along with his opinions about law jobs, job interviews, and OCI. Don’t see what you need? Just ask Ex-Bitter.

Law Student Lists

We’ve been compiling useless Bitter Lawyer lists for years. Between the snark, however, there’s some actual value, including how to network, what to wear, and who you may meet along the way. Some highlights:

Nick Conley, Living the Dream

We’d be remiss (and wouldn’t be serving our haters out there) if we didn’t try to pawn off another Living the Dream episode, at least to insert some humor into the whole job interview and search process. If you watch only the first two minutes, watch Nick at his initial interview where he admits he “didn’t exactly get into Harvard.”

  • Quadoz

    Wow, so BL has come down to a clips-episode. Most tv series do this when they’re getting ready to die in obscurity.

    Quadoz,
    City Cop by Midnight, Rookie Lawyer by Day

    • Sam Glover

      Or—just playing devil’s advocate, here—when they have an archive full of great content that is timely (OCI is going on right now).

    • Hey, Quadoz. Thanks for the feedback. You can call it a clips episode. No biggie. But it’s probably not a post that has you (a lawyer) specifically in mind. A lot of newer law students have yet to read BL, so it takes some good posts from the past (which are still pretty spot on) and provides an introduction. Not a lot more than that really, and not representative of us checking into an assisted living home to die in obscurity. Just a post.

  • Quadoz

    Nah, it’s a clips-episode.

  • Ellen

    When I was on campus, I did NOT get any jobs from the interveiws, even though at least 3 men ogled me and one said he liked me alot.

    So I had to find job on my own. It was NOT easy either, b/c I did not have any real experence at a law job, b/c my father let me work in his company in Manhattan in the summers and he drove me in with HIM.

    So I simpathize with everyone who has to get a JOB on their own, b/c I did to.

    The manageing partner at the firm I work at always tells me how resourseful I am and that he is glad to have me.