Summer 2009: More Work, Fewer Perks

[WSJ_law_blog]

Here he is again, our beleaguered young lawyer. Why’s he so sad today? Because the Los Angeles Daily Journal (link not available) on Wednesday has put some pants on what we’ve long suspected. This year’s summer associate programs are going to feature more work for the newbies, and fewer of those legendary booze-fueled take-a-helicopter-to-Pebble-Beach-with-Tiger-Woods outings to which summers have become so accustomed in recent years.

According to the story, “there will be less travel, fewer restaurants and a limited number of s****y events. Fewer associates are working shorter summers; entertainment budgets are capped and weekends in wine country have been replaced by dinners at partners’ houses.”

The move is attributable to the fact that — no surprise here — many firms are struggling, and simply don’t need the bodies they used to. As a result, there will be fewer offers, and the offers that are doled out won’t necessarily start the following fall, as has been the pattern in the past.

Morgan Lewis, for example, where start dates for this year’s class were pushed back until November 2010, summer associates have already been told “that we are going to give them a terrific summer associate experience as we have tried to give all summer associates, but at the end we’ll make a decision on offers,” firm wide hiring partner Eric Kraeutler said. “But that the offers will be for some time in 2011.”

From where we sit, all this is mostly a huge bummer for the summers. Having to do actual real work during the summer, as opposed to just billing 12 hours to the firm’s administrative code day after day (as we know one summer associate once did and still got an offer), is a drag. As is, of course, the stress of not knowing if you’ll be given a permanent job and, even if you are, not knowing when it will start.

But we say “mostly” a bummer because we strongly feel that all the wining-and-dining is mostly a big waste of time and money. Back when we summered at a large New York law firm, we found all the events downright exhausting and tedious, especially after we’d discovered that there was only so much to say to the associates and partners who were presumably judging your social performance and, as the summer wore on, even less to say to the other summer associates. Granted, we were probably on the less social end of the spectrum, but we know others felt similarly.