Assistant Director for Professional Development
Last month Joshua Sisco of the San Francisco legal newspaper, The Recorder, did a piece titled "The New Face of In-house Counsel" and featured Katia Bloom (GGU JD 08). Katia started her in-house legal career at a biotech company before passing the bar in 2008. She is currently the sole U.S.-based lawyer at Avira Operations GMBH & Co, a German virus protection company.
The story highlighted that Bay Area companies large and small are selectively hiring graduates with zero to five years of legal experience. Based on Mr. Sisco's interviews with a variety of Bay Area in-house counsel, law firm attorneys and recruiters, here are some of the main reasons why:
- Larger firms are hiring much fewer recent graduates, and the ones they do hire are not receiving the in-depth training they once did. Consequently, there are many more newer attorneys wanting to work in-house, happy to accept lower pay than what they would receive at a firm for the opportunity to grow with a company and its legal department.
- More legal departments are bringing in law students as interns as well as graduates right out of law school to perform law clerk/paralegal work at a much lower cost to what law firms charge for their paralegals and new associates to perform similar work. As well, new graduates are hired in a hybrid business and legal role, the cost of which can be justified since such salaries tend to be lower than hiring someone to perform attorney work exclusively. Many of these hires perform outstandingly and are later offered attorney positions, advancing within the department and growing with the company.
- Some in-house legal departments are becoming more akin to firms and want attorneys at all levels. As some Bay Area companies grow, and/or want younger more tech savvy employees, it makes more business sense to do this.
It
can be quite daunting to start working in-house soon after graduation. The Association of Corporate Counsel (the in-house bar
association) provides a broad spectrum of support for both new and veteran
in-house counsel - everything from a wide variety of technical articles, programs and form legal
documents to the ability to contact and have as mentors other
in-house attorneys who are doing similar legal work and/or working in similar
industries.
*The Recorder article by Joshua Sisco appeared March 15, 2013. We do not have permission to link to the article as it requires readers to have a paid subscription. You might be able to obtain a hard copy version by contacting The Recorder directly.
*The Recorder article by Joshua Sisco appeared March 15, 2013. We do not have permission to link to the article as it requires readers to have a paid subscription. You might be able to obtain a hard copy version by contacting The Recorder directly.
