My first professional job was a 1L summer associate position at Winston & Strawn in Chicago (my hometown). I was beyond excited. Attending Columbia meant bearing not only huge tuition bills but also sky-high cost of living in Manhattan. I had borrowed the legal maximum in student loans before turning to whatever credit cards I could convince a bank (or store) to issue me. I needed a lifeline, and it came in the form of that job. To save money, I decided to live with my grandmother in the suburbs and take the bus to downtown Chicago. That lasted all of three days (the bus was late two days and didn’t arrive at all on the third day). I had to quickly rent a place in the city, which together with buying suits to wear was quickly depleting my anticipated “savings.” Lifestyle creep is real.
The job went fine — at least it seemed to. There was one project near the beginning where I never quite understood what was being asked of me, but eventually I got the hang of things and did several other projects that went well. The summer came to an end, and I went back to New York to start my 2L year. That’s when I got the letter.
As anyone who has worked in BigLaw knows, at the end of the summer the firm sends its summer associates a letter offering them the opportunity to return to the firm the next year. For 2Ls that meant for “permanent employment” (which is really a misnomer) and for 1Ls like me that meant to return for a portion of the following summer. My letter had all the nice stuff up front thanking me for coming, etc., but it was missing the part about welcoming me back. I didn’t have to be a legal genius to know what that meant.
I called the hiring partner, and he graciously agreed to check the file and share any feedback that led to the decision. He called me back to let me know that everything seemed fine, except that one partner had rated me so low on a project that it had doomed my invitation to return. Yep – that project from the start of the summer. I apologized, explained what had happened (without making excuses), and took accountability.
Lesson 1: No news is not necessarily good news. When I sensed ambiguity about whether I was meeting the standard, it was on me to seek clarification and alignment, not on the partner or anyone else. I hadn’t done that and suffered the consequences. But I had learned a valuable lesson that I would keep with me.
Here’s a photo of me preparing for my first day. The double-breasted suit makes me laugh now, but in my defense I was merely following direction from John T. Molloy’s book “New Dress for Success.” 😊
(There is a postscript to the story. After the conversation with the hiring partner, the firm changed its mind and invited me back for the end of my 2L summer. All went smoothly that summer and they extended a permanent offer. But by then I had fallen in love with Los Angeles, which is a story for the next post.)