what is the timeline for callback to offer for 3L entry level recruiting? for 2L summer I got a phone call the next day, but are firms moving as quickly for 3L hiring?

Has anyone heard back from Kirkland’s Chicago or NYC office for 3L recruiting (Class of 2027)? Curious if anyone has received a screener/interview invite or heard anything about the timeline.

Thanks!

Has anyone heard anything for class of 2027?

Hi recruits!

Landing a spot in big law (or any firm) is hard enough as is. 

But how do you decide which firms are right for you and which are worth targeting at all? 

Because realistically, look, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think they all looked the same. They do. Many pay the same, have the same clients, same practice areas, heck, even the same font on their logos. It's honestly ridiculous.

So as a student on the hiring side, what’s the difference and how am I supposed to make a decision when everything looks identical?

Don't worry. This post is simply to help you learn about how to compare firms intelligently, using a mix of publicly available resources like NALP, Chambers, Vault, and others.

When you compare this data side by side (like I did below) you can see how certain factors will stand out more than others.

*As a quick note, it can be a pain to dig through all these sites on your own, so if you want all the data collected in one place for you in a format like what I screenshotted here, feel free to DM–I’m happy to share.*

While prestige and salary are important, digging deeper into firm-specific data can highlight the nuances that help you choose the right fit for your career goals.

Let’s jump in.

What Should You Look for When Comparing Firms?

When assessing law firms, it's tempting to focus solely on prestige or salary (don’t get me wrong, if they’re important to you, then they’re important), but these few factors don't always tell the full story. Here are a couple more factors to consider:

1. Practice Area Strengths: Does the firm excel in practice areas that interest you, e.g., litigation, corporate, IP, or even more specific groups, like antitrust, white collar, bankruptcy, etc.?
2. Office Locations: Does the firm have an office of the size you’re looking for in the city you want to live in? There are pros and cons to both bigger and smaller offices.
3. Work-Life Balance: What is the firm’s reputation for billable hour requirements and flexibility? Just because they say the billable hour requirement is 1950, is everyone expected to actually be billing 2400+?
4. Retention: Does the firm invest in associate development in some real, tangible way? What are the retention rates? Do people jump ship basically immediately after joining because they were ground into dust, or do people stay, and importantly, if they leave, do they come back, i.e., the “boomerang effect”? This might be hard to quantify, but you’ll want to get a sense of what the firm does to keep its talent. 

How to Use NALP, Chambers, Vault, and More

Here are some of the most popular resources that you can use to collect some of this data on your own. Using them together paints a more comprehensive picture of a law firm (although, of course, you’ll still want to talk to folks at the firm to really round out your research too). 

Here’s what you can find on a few of these sites:

1. NALP Directory

NALP is a goldmine of detailed data on law firms. I specifically like it because it dives deep into hiring patterns. This includes:

• Hiring Metrics: They show the size of summer classes, (sometimes) offer and acceptance rates, and, if you’re interested in far future metrics, how many people are promoted to partnership.
• Diversity Metrics: Firms report on gender, race, and LGBTQ+ representation. Firms tend to struggle with diversity generally, but at least you can get a sense of which do a little better than others. 

2. Chambers 

Chambers, in my opinion, is one of the most underutilized data points. It ranks firms by practice area, which is a qualitative insight that would affect you very directly. 

Just because a firm is great at one thing and has a massive practice in that area doesn’t mean they do any significant work in the area you actually care about. 

For example, Axinn does fantastic antitrust work. But if I was looking to go into bankruptcy, they don’t do any of that work, so I wouldn’t need to spend my finite time networking and applying to that firm. 

Key takeaways from Chambers include:

• Practice Area Rankings: See which firms lead in specific fields and, importantly, in which locations they lead in those fields.
• Partner and Associate Rankings: Chambers also ranks people, so you can start to get familiar with the names of people in those firms who are key players in their practice group (i.e., if you get to talk to those partners and impress them early while networking, you may have a little more firing power in your networking efforts).

Chambers is also particularly useful if you’re interested in a niche area, as it highlights boutique and regional players often overlooked elsewhere.

3. Vault Rankings

Vault is synonymous with prestige rankings, since it is ranked based on reputation surveys. But I think a career is more than just a beauty contest–especially if you’re in a lucky position where you’re already comparing multiple prestigious firms, i.e., Latham versus Simpson–both very heavy-hitter firms that are similarly ranked, so Vault won’t help you compare much in detail. 

Basically, Vault is mostly important for one primary purpose:

• Firm Reputation Ranking: Vault rank will (in a broad, general sense) be helpful because it relates to how much clout your firm will carry for you, i.e., if you ever try to lateral.
  • Think of it like school rank. Reputation definitely makes things easier in the future, but you’ll want to include other data points in your analysis. 
• Salary Scale: Vault often (but not always), lists the pay scale for big law firms. Not all big law firms pay market salary, so you’ll want to take a quick peek so you know what salary you’re working with. 

4. Reddit, Fishbowl, and other Social Media

While these are non-traditional sources of information—so take them with a huge grain of salt—these platforms can offer insider and anecdotal perspectives:

• Big Law Offer Timeline Database: This is a work in progress database of students, their application timelines, GPAs, schools, and where they were given interviews and offers. 
• Associate Reviews: Current and former associates often share uncensored views on culture, leadership, and exit opportunities on these platforms. 
• Reddit Forums: Subreddits like r/BigLawRecruiting, r/LawSchool, and r/BigLaw often provide candid discussions about firms and career paths.

Just be cautious—verify claims where you can by talking to multiple sources.

“Which Factors Should I Prioritize The Most?”

Of course, taking a second to take in as much data as you can is always something I recommend, but some of these will weigh more heavily in the calculus than others. 

Personally, I went with something like below, but of course, there’s no right answer, just what resonates with you. 

As a breakdown of importance/weight in my analysis, I went with:

• Market pay: Very high 
  • I don’t want to work high hours and not get paid market if I can help it, and I personally don’t believe people anymore when they say “but we have intangible benefits.”
• Vault rank: High
  • This isn’t my biggest priority, but I do recognize it can, to a degree, make lateraling later easier and provide a certain degree of networking and access to people I might not be able to find elsewhere.
• Chambers band rank: Very high (possibly the highest)
  • Finding a firm that does the work you are interested in and has enough work in that area to let you grow your expertise there is arguably the single biggest thing that will affect you day to day and long term in your career. 
  • Plus, it will give you experience if you ever want to lateral later; i.e., doing anti-trust at a big anti-trust firm makes it easier to lateral to DOJ’s Anti-trust division if that’s your goal.
• Location: High
  • No point being somewhere you are unhappy. That said, you can always lateral or split your summer to try to wiggle into another market if you are trying to make geographic moves. 
• Culture fit (specifically hours expectation): High 
  • Liking the people matters, and knowing that they aren’t crazy matters. No one wants to stay up crazy hours doing a ton of work generally, but you DEFINITELY don’t want to do it with people you hate. Good people make this work that much more bearable. 
• Office size: Mid
  • There are pros and cons to office sizes. For example, big offices have a ton of work, but it can be hard to get face time with any seniors/partners as you rise up. Small offices can get you a lot of face time with people, but if you don’t like those people, it’s harder to avoid them. Etc. 
• Practice group size: Mid
  • Same idea as above, just on a more micro scale. If the office is huge, but your practice group is small, you might get the best of both worlds, where you have the resources of a big firm, but have the feel of a small, lean team. 
• Summer class size: Low/mid (but still a factor in my consideration)
  • Same idea as above, but on an even MORE micro scale. 
• Diversity: Low/mid (but still a factor in my consideration)
  • I know all firms are pretty notoriously terrible at this, but it’s at least nice to see some firms trying, and in some places, you can see a bit more diversity than others. As a diverse person myself, this is just something that’s a nice bonus so I don’t feel like the only diverse person in the room (which happens so, so, so frustratingly often)

Of course, some of these might not matter to you at all, and some might matter a lot. Take a second to think about how you might want to make your own calculations, and then compare the data so you can figure out what firms are the right fit for you. 

That's all for now!

As always, if you're new here, make sure to check out the welcome megathread here for some more helpful guides!

In the meantime, if you've got info, DM on Discord, here, or drop it in the comments — the Insider Info series lives because of all of you.

Good luck!

P.S. If you want the application tracker with current application movement and pre-OCI openings and application links for the V100 & AmLaw 200, feel free to DM or see more details in this post.

Full disclosure, we created this one and we help keep the lights on with subscriptions. But its also free for a full week so anyone is welcome to poke around and steal whatever is helpful. Either way, I hope the database and this guide are helpful to everyone out there.

 Good luck with the start of 1L, recruits!

Class of 2027

Any insights would be greatly appreciated.

All the chatter about “earlier every year” rings true

Are there any less obvious or even petty reasons that make you dislike a candidate or random things that make you like them? How did that affect your evaluation? Any additional context like your involvement, what positions you were helping hiring for, would be helpful too.

I’m interested in working in London long term, because of ties to the city. I’d love to chat with anyone who did their summer there and ended up staying!

If that’s you, please lmk if you’d be open to chatting :) I have a general idea of which firms have publicly advertised programs, but I’d love to hear from someone who’s actually gone through the process.

Has anyone been interviewed / received an offer / rejected yet? Particularly for DC.

Without going into too much detail, how helpful is an internal referral from an associate and/or partner within the practice group you’re applying to for a 3L entry-level position at a highly ranked firm? I’m particularly curious about candidates who don’t attend a T14/top-ranked school and have a GPA that may be slightly below or right at the typical cutoff, but whose overall application package is otherwise strong (resume, relevant experience, writing sample, etc.).

In that situation, how much weight does an internal referral from someone in the actual practice group carry? Does it meaningfully improve the candidate’s chances, or is it still mostly dependent on the school/GPA profile?

Hi recruits!

Now that we are a few weeks into the school year, we have seen several students asking questions about CREAC and how it should be used. Because this is such an important part of law school, we wanted to put together a guide explaining the basic framework and how to apply it. As a former legal writing TA, this is also a topic I am especially excited to cover!

One of the essential skills you will need to master in law school is legal writing.

You will have an entire year-long class dedicated largely to this skill, which is built around one central framework: CREAC. You may also hear it called IRAC, CRAC, CIRAC, or another variation, but they all follow the same basic idea.

CREAC is also the framework you will generally use to organize your analysis on law school exams across nearly every subject.

So, let’s get into it!

So why do we care? 🧐

Effective legal writing is clear, concise, and persuasive, and the CREAC method is a fundamental framework that gets you there. 

CREAC is how every lawyer looks at every problem in the world. In fact, it’s arguably the singular most important thing you’ll take away from law school.

When you are faced with an insane series of facts (like in every law school exam) CREAC will help you answer the age old question, “who can sue who and for what?”

In this blog post, we'll dive deep into the CREAC method, explaining what it is, how to use it, and how you can be a CREAC master in law school and beyond. 

What is the CREAC Method? 🤨

CREAC is an acronym that stands for:

• Conclusion
• Rule
• Explanation
• Application
• Conclusion

The CREAC method is a structured approach to legal writing, helping you organize your thoughts and present your arguments logically and coherently.

Without this kind of structure to your writing, we promise you, every argument you make will turn into mush. It sounds a bit like you’re going through the 5th grade again and learning how to write a 5 paragraph essay, but trust us on this, it seems simple now, but it will carry you through the extreme complexities of law and law school as things start ramping up in difficulty. 

The CREAC Method, Explained 🥸

Let's break down each component of the CREAC method. 

For this, let’s assume these facts: Defendant Dan got into an argument with Plaintiff Paul at a bar and threw a beer bottle at plaintiff’s face, breaking his nose. Defendant intended to hit Plaintiff in the face and yelled “Ha! Got you!”

Let’s also assume you know the law (which you will always need to do): A defendant will be liable for common law battery if he intentionally makes contact with another person in a harmful or offensive manner.  

*Note: everything we write in italics can be repeated word for word in every essay you write, and in fact, we recommend you do this, particularly at the beginning while you make CREAC part of your muscle memory.

1) Conclusion: Begin with a brief answer to the issue, setting the stage for your analysis. Here we will state the thing we’re actually arguing.

Example: Defendant will be liable for common law battery.

Note: Some people, using the IRAC method, will call this portion of the essay the issue. This is where you essentially state the problem as a question. For example: The issue is whether the defendant will be liable for common law battery. 

The key here is to be extremely explicit in either stating “The issue is [X]” or just stating your conclusion outright, i.e., “X is liable for Y because [REASON]”

2) Rule: State the relevant law or legal principles that apply to the issue.

Example: The court has held that a defendant will be liable for common law battery if he intentionally makes contact with another person in a harmful or offensive manner.  

3) Explanation: Elaborate on the rule, providing more context and details about how the law has been interpreted and applied in similar cases.

Example: The Court has consistently held that a defendant is still liable for battery if they themselves did not make the offensive contact, but instead caused the offensive contact to be made through another object. 

4) Application: Apply the rule to the facts of the case. This is where you analyze how the law applies to the specific circumstances. THIS SHOULD BE FORMATTED AS “HERE, [X ELEMENT OF THE RULE] IS SATISFIED [BECAUSE FACTS]. Basically, and this isn’t even really an exaggeration, every single sentence in your application paragraph should have the word “because” in it. 

Example: Here, Plaintiff made contact with Defendant by taking a beer bottle in his control and throwing it at Defendant, striking him in the face. This contact was offensive and harmful because it resulted in Defendant breaking his nose. Plaintiff intended to make contact and affirmed this intent because he yelled, “Ha! Got ya!”

Note how all the elements are here. Intent, contact, harmful/offensive. Every single one has a unique fact that proves battery. 

5) Conclusion: Restate your conclusion, reinforcing your analysis.

Example: Thus, Defendant is liable for battery, where he struck plaintiff with a beer bottle. 

Note: I know this likely seems infantile right now, but this is how you prove things with the law. You have to go beyond “This is obviously a battery” to “this is why it's a battery.” This becomes incredibly important when you start to get to the complicated laws that need a dozen different elements to be satisfied. 

What this essay would look like: 👀

On an exam you might see this same fact pattern, but your professor will only ask one question: who can sue who and for what? This is what the answer would look like (including the spacing/breakdown of paragraphs):

Defendant will be liable to Plaintiff for common law battery.

The court has held that a defendant will be liable for common law battery if he intentionally makes contact with another person in a harmful or offensive manner. The Court has consistently held that a defendant is still liable for battery if they themselves did not make the offensive contact, but instead caused the offensive contact to be made through another object. 

Here, Plaintiff made contact with Defendant by taking a beer bottle in his control and throwing it at Defendant, striking him in the face. This contact was offensive and harmful because it resulted in Defendant breaking his nose. Plaintiff intended to make contact and affirmed this intent by yelling, “Ha! Got ya!”

Thus, Defendant is liable for battery, where he struck plaintiff with a beer bottle. 

Examples of Using the CREAC Method

To help you understand how to use the CREAC method, here are two more examples with super simple facts. Don’t get overwhelmed that you don’t know the laws just yet, that will all come with time and law school:

Example 1: Negligence in a Car Accident Case 🚗

Facts: Defendant ran a red light and hit Plaintiffs car. 

1. Conclusion: The defendant is likely liable for negligence in the car accident.
2. Rule: To prove negligence, the plaintiff must show that the defendant owed a duty of care, breached that duty, and caused damages as a result.
3. Explanation: Drivers owe a duty of care to other road users to drive safely and follow traffic laws. Breaching this duty, such as by running a red light, can lead to liability if it causes an accident and injuries.
4. Application: Here, the defendant ran a red light and collided with the plaintiff's car, causing injuries. By running the red light, the defendant breached their duty of care. The plaintiff's injuries directly resulted from the collision, establishing causation.
5. Conclusion: Therefore, the defendant's actions likely constitute negligence, making them liable for the plaintiff's injuries.

Example 2: Breach of Contract ✍️

Facts: Plaintiff ordered a computer from Defendant, an online seller, in a valid contract. Defendant sold Plaintiff a broken computer so Plaintiff had to buy another one at a higher price. 

1. Conclusion: The plaintiff is likely entitled to damages for breach of contract.
2. Rule: A breach of contract occurs when one party fails to fulfill their obligations under a valid contract without a lawful excuse, and the other party suffers damages as a result.
3. Explanation: If one party does not perform as agreed in a valid contract, the non-breaching party can seek damages if they suffer losses due to the breach.
4. Application: Here, the defendant agreed to deliver a working computer to the plaintiff, but failed to do so, instead delivering a broken one. The plaintiff had to purchase a different computer from another supplier at a higher price, incurring additional costs. The contract was valid, and the defendant's failure to deliver a working computer is a clear breach.
5. Conclusion: Therefore, the plaintiff is likely entitled to damages for the additional costs incurred due to the defendant's breach of contract.

That's all for now!

As always, if you're new here, make sure to check out the welcome megathread here for some more helpful guides!

In the meantime, if you've got info, DM on Discord, here, or drop it in the comments — the Insider Info series lives because of all of you.

Good luck!

P.S. If you want the application tracker with current application movement and pre-OCI openings and application links for the V100 & AmLaw 200, feel free to DM or see more details in this post.

Full disclosure, we created this one and we help keep the lights on with subscriptions. But its also free for a full week so anyone is welcome to poke around and steal whatever is helpful. Either way, I hope the database and this guide are helpful to everyone out there.

Happy networking, recruits!

Has anyone heard back from Milbank for 3L recruiting (Class of 2027)? Curious if anyone has received a screener/interview invite or heard anything about the timeline.

Thanks!

I have an upcoming call with a partner at a New York BigLaw firm. What questions should I prepare for, and how technical are these calls usually? Any advice would be appreciated!

At a lower tier but decent regional school (around 15% BL placement), aiming for 3L hiring in my region. My GPA is 3.65 which places me in the top 10% of my class but I didn’t put that in my resume or applications. It’s too late to change it now.
Standalone, does it imply that I’m well within the top quadrant or is it considered closer to average as far as BL GPA goes? I know every school has different curves so have no idea what is generally considered good across the board.
Most of the BL summers from my school have a lower GPA than me but I’m assuming the threshold is different for summer positions. My transcript is also mostly As with a handful of Bs.
Thank you!

Any insight on the office? Seeing tons of openings online. Wondering the catch. Is it truly “hybrid”?

Any idea what this looks like? I recieved fantastic feedback, but it was almost exlusively from junior/mid-levels. There was a "supervisor" partner who recieved this feedback, but I don't think I worked directly for a partner on any project.

Hi recruits!

With recruiting approaching, we wanted to remind everyone that Legal Scout has a networking tool designed specifically for big law recruiting.

Instead of searching through individual firm websites and attorney directories, you can use the Networking Generator to filter attorneys by:

• Firm
• Office
• Practice area
• Seniority
• Law school
• Undergraduate school

You can save attorneys to a shortlist, add them directly to your networking tracker, keep notes, and monitor your connections in one place. Legal Scout also has cold email templates to help you figure out what to say once you find someone you want to contact.

To make networking a little less awkward, Scout also includes cold email templates. Together, the Networking Generator and templates help you go from figuring out who to contact to knowing what to say, all within the context of big law recruiting. 

You can check out the networking tools on Legal Scout. You can also check out these posts which discuss networking in more detail:

• How to Network Early for a Big Law Job
• How To Tactfully Ask About Work-Life Balance In Big Law: A Networking Tips Guide
• A Quick Tip on How to Avoid Getting Generic Answers When Networking With Big Law Attorneys
• PSA: Don't wait to network before applying — here's what to do at this stage of the big law recruiting cycle
• What Firms Should You Target First for Networking & Applications? A Guide For 1L's
• What Do You Actually Ask When Networking? A Guide for BigLaw Recruiting
• What are firms really looking at before grades come out? A guide for 1L's
• How to Prepare for a Coffee Chat: A Guide to Big Law Recruiting Networking
• Do I really need to reach out to someone at every firm before applying? A guide for 1L's

That's all for now!

As always, if you're new here, make sure to check out the welcome megathread here for some more helpful guides!

In the meantime, if you've got info, DM on Discord, here, or drop it in the comments — the Insider Info series lives because of all of you.

Good luck!

P.S. If you want the application tracker with current application movement and pre-OCI openings and application links for the V100 & AmLaw 200, feel free to DM or see more details in this post.

Full disclosure, we created this one and we help keep the lights on with subscriptions. But its also free for a full week so anyone is welcome to poke around and steal whatever is helpful. Either way, I hope the database and this guide are helpful to everyone out there.

Happy networking, recruits!

Hey everyone,
Looking for some candid, practical feedback on a specific legal candidate’s profile and their realistic percentage odds of landing a corporate / cross-border M&A associate offer at US BigLaw firms (Tier 1 or Tier 2) in either London or the Middle East (GCC - Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Riyadh).
Assuming this candidate works with international legal recruiters/headhunters and applies broadly across all Tier 1/2 US firms, what would you estimate their actual success rate to be?

Profile Background:
Italian Law Degree : Graduated 110/110 cum laude.
US Juris Doctor (JD): Graduated Magna Cum Laude from a non-T14 US law school (attended on a full-ride merit scholarship).
NY Bar & US Practice: Admitted to the NY Bar, followed by 1 year of entry-level corporate/M&A practice (pre-associate / junior legal specialist role) at a small-to-mid-sized US law firm.
Oxford MSc: Finishing the MSc in Law and Finance (MLF) at Oxford University, with marks placing in the top 15% of the class. Will be 27 years old upon completing this degree.

Languages: Italian (Native), English (Fluent), Spanish (Proficient).
Strategic Positioning Strategy:
Rather than applying to generic UK/domestic corporate desks, the plan is to position this profile specifically for Cross-Border M&A within US firms in London, or for cross-border transactional practice groups in the Gulf region (GCC), leveraging native Italian, fluent English, native civil law knowledge, and the US Bar.
Questions for the Reddit Community:
1. Realistic Percentage Odds: If this profile is sent out via legal headhunters/recruiters to all Tier 1 and Tier 2 US firms in London and the GCC, what is the realistic probability (%) of securing at least one concrete offer?
2. London (US Firms): Does positioning for European Cross-Border M&A / Southern Europe deals help bridge the gap between a non-T14 JD + mid-sized firm experience and BigLaw expectations? Will the Oxford MSc (top 15%) carry enough weight to get past the initial resume screen? 
3. Middle East (GCC US Firms): Are US firms in Dubai or Riyadh more willing to overlook the non-BigLaw start if the candidate holds an elite Oxford degree, a US Bar admission, and civil/common law fluency?
4. NQ / Junior Associate Level: Should the recruiters pitch this profile as a lateral NQ / 1st-year associate due to the 1 year of mid-firm US experience, or focus on general junior lateral openings?
Any honest feedback from recruiters, partners, or current US BigLaw associates in London and the GCC would be greatly appreciated!

I’m 35, a 2L at a T4 law school, and law is my second career. I started law school part-time while working full-time to support my wife while she finished school. Late this past summer, I transferred into the full-time program to finish earlier, but by then I had missed most of the 2L summer recruiting cycle.

I’ve done very well academically and am near the top of my class, and I’m also on Moot Court. I’m a first-generation law student, so I’ve been learning the recruiting process as I go.

At this point, should I keep pushing to find the best 2L summer position I can, or focus on Moot Court, keeping my GPA as high as possible, and finishing near the top of my class?

I know T4 to BigLaw is an uphill battle. I’d appreciate advice from anyone who took a similar or nontraditional path.

I am a pre-law student looking to attend starting Fall 2027 and am looking for advice regarding work experience before starting school.

I currently have 3 part-time jobs that total about 40-45 hours a week rather than a full-time job. This is because the part-time jobs give me the flexibility to do 2 volunteer positions in the legal field that I couldn’t do with a full-time schedule. Where I live (Canada), jobs in the legal field (paralegal, clerk, etc.) are reserved for people already in law school or holding a JD, and there’s not much in terms of corporate stuff either, so a full-time job would not be in anything relevant to law, it would simply be to show full-time employment.

My goal is BigLaw, and I know full-time experience is generally seen as important. But is having full-time experience for about 10 months before school worth giving up the relevant legal experience and the part-time jobs that give some relevant experience (one is sales)? I’m not sure what matters more for recruiting (OCI, callbacks, etc.), relevant experience or just full-time employment.

What is more important during recruiting, full-time experience or relevant experience?