Balancing In-house vs. Firm Interviews for Building Your Client Book

Description

• Going in-house could hurt your chances of returning to a law firm as your skills may deteriorate.
• Law firms typically don't like to hire people from in-house as they may not be committed.
• In-house work is different from law firm work, with shorter hours and less sophisticated work.
• If you want to work in a law firm, going in-house is not a good move.
• When interviewing, focus on your experience in a law firm rather than in-house jobs.

Transcript

Transcript:

Okay, so if you go in-house, the odds of you going back to a law firm are very slim. You do not build a book of business in-house. That's just different from how it works. Your skills deteriorate, you spend more time giving work to the outside counsel, the hours are shorter, and the work could be more sophisticated.

In most cases, law firms do not like to hire people from in-house because they usually know they're going to leave. They're not committed, and there are a bunch of reasons. Going in-house if you want to work in a law firm is not a good move. I certainly know people that have gone in the house and gone back. Still, even in the height of the corporate market, Silicon Valley, New York, and all these different markets, you could take someone that had been and doesn't matter. You may be able to make contacts that could be business, but you're not going to develop the same habits.

Working in-house as you would working in a law firm. It's just different from how it works. If you're interviewing, a mixing in-house and law firms and people are asking you that, just tell them about the law firm. You don't tell them about in-house jobs you're interviewing with; that would be my advice.