15 Challenges to Working in a Large Law Firm
Life in a large law firm may mean higher salaries and challenging work but it is not without its disadvantages. Below are fifteen challenges to working in a large law firm.
Long Hours
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Long hours are the norm in most large law firms. 50 to 80 work weeks are not uncommon among lawyers and paralegals.
High Billing Quotas
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Large law firms are notorious for imposing high billable hour quotas. Typical quotas range from 2,000 to 2,200 hours a year which equates to around 42 hours of billed time a week. Since administrative tasks (such as billing time) and non-billable tasks (such as marketing) are inevitable, billing 42 hours means working 60 or more hours a week.
Long Partnership Track
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The road to partnership in a large law firm may be longer than that of small firms, with many tiers and stricter requirements for advancement.
Irregular Hours
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Weekend work and late nights are not uncommon for those employed in a large law firm where the motto is "work until the task is done". High-end work such as M&A (mergers and acquisitions), commercial real estate and complex civil litigation lends itself to long workdays and irregular hours.
Mundane Tasks
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New associates in large law firms may operate with little autonomy and complete routine, mundane tasks such as document review, cite-checking, and multi-jurisdictional research, leaving the juicier assignments for more experienced attorneys. Paralegals might be stuck with low-end work so that more complex tasks can be billed by attorneys at a higher rate.
Strict Academic and Experiential Requirements
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Large law firms may be harder to break into for those lacking experience or top academic credentials. Lawyers in the top firms generally have superior academic credentials and first-tier law school training. Paralegals in large law firms often have a four-year degree, a paralegal certificate and several years of experience in their specialty.
Large Law Firm Bureaucracy
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Large law firms often have many tiers of management as well as complex, well-established procedures and formal divisions of responsibility. Employees may have little input into firm processes and management and little control over their work or their economic and professional futures.