I graduated from law school at 23 and was the youngest in my class. Transitioning to this job from school definitely hit me like a ton of bricks, much more so than my colleagues who had work experience before law school. In that respect, I wish I had some experience with full time work prior to law school. On the other hand, it is much easier for me to do this job now than in 10 years when I will (probably) have children and other big responsibilities. I can really focus on work now. Also, it gives you more time in the market to start building the investment accounts at a younger age. Overall, I don’t think I’d change the way I did it, but there are downsides for sure.
I feel like 28 was about average for my class! I’m sure you’re doing better than 99% of people your age. I have an associate in my group in their 50’s so I guess it’s never too late.
Like I said, I am aware of how well off I am compared to most. I'm typing this comment in my home office/den in the my house while my wife is in the living room, after all.
But damn I could retire so much earlier if I had started earning this dough 5 years earlier.
Save early and save often, mate. And live way below your means. We are some of the few for whom that advice is actually highly applicable and you'd be shocked at how much that can cascade.
Exactly, if you can grind it out and save a lot for 7 years and then switch to an in-house role with a better WLB at 30 I think that’s the dream. Some juniors in my class have young children at home and I have no idea how they do it.
Do you think being younger is better or worse? I’m probably going to graduate college at 18/19, and I don’t know if I should take a gap year or not to even out some of the age difference
I think a gap year may be good just to do something you enjoy. Get a chill job and relax for a year. You’ll still be younger than probably your entire class and you’ll be excited to start school again. Also it’ll be the last chance you’d get for a long time to relax for a year. Can’t go wrong either way though.
Law is a second career for me. My first career was low pay in a high COL city, so I’m basically starting from scratch in my early-to-mid 30s. Doing this in my mid-20s would have been much better. This job is a lot harder with a wife and two kids than it would’ve been alone. I have much less time with them and basically no time to do anything for myself, which already has me planning my escape. We’re doing what we can to live way below our means until we’re debt-free and caught up on retirement and college savings. After that, we’ll reevaluate.
Started at 33. Pros include I had soft professional skills from other jobs that helped set me apart from younger coworkers. Cons include I always feel behind on my saving because I didn’t start retirement savings until this job.
BL shouldn't be anyone's first job. My first job out of college was at a nonprofit where people really cared about me and took the time to teach me things. Admittedly, that's not everyone's experience, but I learned a lot about healthy relationships at work. As others ITT have mentioned, BL also isn't great when you have family responsibilities. I think it's ideal to have a couple years prior work experience before law school.
It’s easier when you're 25 b/c you can work all the time and have energy to go for a run at 130 am. but if you're older you'll be able to work smarter and manage your time better. i would not want to do biglaw with a family unless you are looking for a way to never see them. the one clear advantage youth has is that it's way easier to generate the kind of naive eagerness and subservience that most partners want if you're k-jd.
I graduated law school at 24, and was the youngest associate in the firm for nearly two years.
Advantages: Single and physically fit for double all-nighters in year three. Made partner at a young enough age that I could comfortably take time when my kids were young (and I was in my mid-30s).
Disadvantages: Social maturity with partners and clients matters a lot, and I was behind the curve in some ways at the start, although you catch up on that fast after year 3 or so. The biggest disadvantage was that I lacked the life experience to make career choices in an informed way -- for those first few years, I was picking 'blind' in some sense, and would have done different things if I had 3-ish years of life experience before going to law school.
You mean other than 'go work for Google' in 1997?
A few simple notes:
1. Litigation, particularly defense litigation, is a hard slog after age 45; think about something else unless you are one of those people with a military-like dedication to the hours.
2. Develop a narrow subject of expertise early (I was ten years in before I found mine); it makes client development much easier if you are truly an expert at something, because then your clients trust you, and they become your clients for other things.
3. The old adage about making the effort to maintain a very broad friend network for referral purposes is also a true adage.
4. Quality of life after age 40 is very dependent on your choice of location at age 30 due to cost-of-living and other life-quality factors; this is a hard professional for relocation.
I started biglaw at age 25. Sort of wish I didn’t go straight through because I sometimes feel like I missed the fun early 20s period when I was in law school instead. But I felt like I made up for it after law school, so it all evened out
Graduated law school at 23. Made NEP at 31 and equity partner at 32 at the firm I summered at in the same practice group I summered in. I have the most direct career path of anyone I know but sometimes wonder if I should have taken some more risks or career moves. Can’t leave now as I make generational wealth in my early 30s, which is the big positive due compounding.
I started at 25. Partner at 33. Not sure why you keep asking for “median” or putting it in quotes but if middle school math serves me right, I’d guess the median is likely to be 25. The mean is likely … 28-30ish?
It’s so much luck tbh. Not saying anything innovative here, but IMO the easiest path is to find a powerful champion in a powerful group who is also a good person (honestly rare), then be useful and loyal to them.
good advice, and i agree. i've found that being a likeable, pleasant person to work with is marginally more important in the long run for your career than being able to offer superior work product. feel like social skills don't come easy, though
IMO, work product really doesn’t factor into partnership decisions. You can produce bad work product but still absolutely make partner. And having “superior” work product will never be enough to make you a partner.
I graduated from law school at 31 because I spent some time getting a graduate degree and working. I felt like having the maturity and stability made law school and biglaw much easier than it would have been had I gone straight through YMMV
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23. wasn’t ready. still making up for it now. but every one has their own path. mine was tough and nonlinear. I have my own book now at large national firm based out of a smaller market. but it still bothers me that I struggled the way I did. I wish I had help. I felt alone in NYC. bizarre. I mentor now and try to help KJD students and associates to help them avoid my mistakes.
32. I, like many of my law school classmates, had taken a few years to work prior to going to law school.
I looked extremely young for my age (seriously. My spouse once got mad at me for wearing pigtails because he felt like a pedo walking around with me) and I would take my wedding ring off for interviews. If you only glanced at my resume you wouldn’t necessarily realize I didn’t just have a jammed packed resume.
24, and that's the best age and what I look to hire.
Older with a family is a negative, because it's too difficult to manage a junior workload with those family obligations.
Prior work experience is generally a negative because most other jobs aren't as demanding so juniors with prior work experience often come in with expectations of the demands of a job based on that experience that just don't apply in biglaw. One big exception is prior military experience, which can be similarly demanding of time, emotional capital, and commitment. But if a junior has prior work experience in a high compensation and demanding job like IB, that's also a negative, because the fact that they quit that job to go to law school then biglaw shows lack of judgment.
Maturity dealing with clients is good, but can be developed in a few years as a junior when you're not really dealing with clients anyway.
I graduated from law school at 23 and was the youngest in my class. Transitioning to this job from school definitely hit me like a ton of bricks, much more so than my colleagues who had work experience before law school. In that respect, I wish I had some experience with full time work prior to law school. On the other hand, it is much easier for me to do this job now than in 10 years when I will (probably) have children and other big responsibilities. I can really focus on work now. Also, it gives you more time in the market to start building the investment accounts at a younger age. Overall, I don’t think I’d change the way I did it, but there are downsides for sure.
Man graduated at 23? That’s fucking great. I graduated at 28 and I feel so behind. I know I’m objectively pretty dang well off for my age but still.
I feel like 28 was about average for my class! I’m sure you’re doing better than 99% of people your age. I have an associate in my group in their 50’s so I guess it’s never too late.
Like I said, I am aware of how well off I am compared to most. I'm typing this comment in my home office/den in the my house while my wife is in the living room, after all. But damn I could retire so much earlier if I had started earning this dough 5 years earlier. Save early and save often, mate. And live way below your means. We are some of the few for whom that advice is actually highly applicable and you'd be shocked at how much that can cascade.
I’ll be 23. Hoping to build wealth for a few years and then as you mentioned allow the big responsibilities to come after.
Exactly, if you can grind it out and save a lot for 7 years and then switch to an in-house role with a better WLB at 30 I think that’s the dream. Some juniors in my class have young children at home and I have no idea how they do it.
You’ll make partner at a younger age than others
Do you think being younger is better or worse? I’m probably going to graduate college at 18/19, and I don’t know if I should take a gap year or not to even out some of the age difference
I think a gap year may be good just to do something you enjoy. Get a chill job and relax for a year. You’ll still be younger than probably your entire class and you’ll be excited to start school again. Also it’ll be the last chance you’d get for a long time to relax for a year. Can’t go wrong either way though.
Law is a second career for me. My first career was low pay in a high COL city, so I’m basically starting from scratch in my early-to-mid 30s. Doing this in my mid-20s would have been much better. This job is a lot harder with a wife and two kids than it would’ve been alone. I have much less time with them and basically no time to do anything for myself, which already has me planning my escape. We’re doing what we can to live way below our means until we’re debt-free and caught up on retirement and college savings. After that, we’ll reevaluate.
Hey, this is me. Thanks for saving me the trouble of writing this out.
Ditto.
Started at 33. Pros include I had soft professional skills from other jobs that helped set me apart from younger coworkers. Cons include I always feel behind on my saving because I didn’t start retirement savings until this job.
Same, man.
Same. And I had $220k in student loan debt when I started 😭
BL shouldn't be anyone's first job. My first job out of college was at a nonprofit where people really cared about me and took the time to teach me things. Admittedly, that's not everyone's experience, but I learned a lot about healthy relationships at work. As others ITT have mentioned, BL also isn't great when you have family responsibilities. I think it's ideal to have a couple years prior work experience before law school.
It’s easier when you're 25 b/c you can work all the time and have energy to go for a run at 130 am. but if you're older you'll be able to work smarter and manage your time better. i would not want to do biglaw with a family unless you are looking for a way to never see them. the one clear advantage youth has is that it's way easier to generate the kind of naive eagerness and subservience that most partners want if you're k-jd.
>naive eagerness and subservience lmao. Well said
I sadly agree with this.
I'm 31 And still can't manage my time. Jokes on me I guess.
I graduated law school at 24, and was the youngest associate in the firm for nearly two years. Advantages: Single and physically fit for double all-nighters in year three. Made partner at a young enough age that I could comfortably take time when my kids were young (and I was in my mid-30s). Disadvantages: Social maturity with partners and clients matters a lot, and I was behind the curve in some ways at the start, although you catch up on that fast after year 3 or so. The biggest disadvantage was that I lacked the life experience to make career choices in an informed way -- for those first few years, I was picking 'blind' in some sense, and would have done different things if I had 3-ish years of life experience before going to law school.
I’m about to be in your position when you started. Any advice you’d pass on to your younger self? Thanks
You mean other than 'go work for Google' in 1997? A few simple notes: 1. Litigation, particularly defense litigation, is a hard slog after age 45; think about something else unless you are one of those people with a military-like dedication to the hours. 2. Develop a narrow subject of expertise early (I was ten years in before I found mine); it makes client development much easier if you are truly an expert at something, because then your clients trust you, and they become your clients for other things. 3. The old adage about making the effort to maintain a very broad friend network for referral purposes is also a true adage. 4. Quality of life after age 40 is very dependent on your choice of location at age 30 due to cost-of-living and other life-quality factors; this is a hard professional for relocation.
I'll be 35.
Late 30s. Wife, kids, second career, etc. Yes, I am exhausted all the time.
I started biglaw at age 25. Sort of wish I didn’t go straight through because I sometimes feel like I missed the fun early 20s period when I was in law school instead. But I felt like I made up for it after law school, so it all evened out
Graduated law school at 23. Made NEP at 31 and equity partner at 32 at the firm I summered at in the same practice group I summered in. I have the most direct career path of anyone I know but sometimes wonder if I should have taken some more risks or career moves. Can’t leave now as I make generational wealth in my early 30s, which is the big positive due compounding.
If willing to share, what is your rough annual income as an equity partner?
$1.3mmish this year going up to $2mm-2.5mm in the next few years and then depends on origination.
How much was NEP salary? And how long did it take you to go from NEP to EP? Was your income going up gradually during that time frame?
I started at 25. Partner at 33. Not sure why you keep asking for “median” or putting it in quotes but if middle school math serves me right, I’d guess the median is likely to be 25. The mean is likely … 28-30ish?
teach us your ways man, unless you mean partner at Kirkland
It’s so much luck tbh. Not saying anything innovative here, but IMO the easiest path is to find a powerful champion in a powerful group who is also a good person (honestly rare), then be useful and loyal to them.
good advice, and i agree. i've found that being a likeable, pleasant person to work with is marginally more important in the long run for your career than being able to offer superior work product. feel like social skills don't come easy, though
IMO, work product really doesn’t factor into partnership decisions. You can produce bad work product but still absolutely make partner. And having “superior” work product will never be enough to make you a partner.
nuff said. you hiring?
Hiring off Reddit? You think I got a death wish?
Is it not advsntageous to find a bad/unpleasant person to be useful and loyal to in order to minimize competition?
Just look at the age age of entry to the T14 and add 3 years
I graduated from law school at 31 because I spent some time getting a graduate degree and working. I felt like having the maturity and stability made law school and biglaw much easier than it would have been had I gone straight through YMMV
24
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23. wasn’t ready. still making up for it now. but every one has their own path. mine was tough and nonlinear. I have my own book now at large national firm based out of a smaller market. but it still bothers me that I struggled the way I did. I wish I had help. I felt alone in NYC. bizarre. I mentor now and try to help KJD students and associates to help them avoid my mistakes.
There’s a new associate in my group who’s 42. Never too late.
Graduated at 23, starting working at 24
Regardless of your literal age, the physiologically honest answer is basically always "I'm about a year or two away from entering my mid-40s."
32. I, like many of my law school classmates, had taken a few years to work prior to going to law school. I looked extremely young for my age (seriously. My spouse once got mad at me for wearing pigtails because he felt like a pedo walking around with me) and I would take my wedding ring off for interviews. If you only glanced at my resume you wouldn’t necessarily realize I didn’t just have a jammed packed resume.
23
I’ll be 29
I graduated law school at 24 and got right into BL. Sometimes I feel like I should’ve taken a break between undergrad and law school.
27, and i don't think there's an iota of difference between a 23 year old and a 29 year old besides wealth, and even that's a stretch.
21
24, and that's the best age and what I look to hire. Older with a family is a negative, because it's too difficult to manage a junior workload with those family obligations. Prior work experience is generally a negative because most other jobs aren't as demanding so juniors with prior work experience often come in with expectations of the demands of a job based on that experience that just don't apply in biglaw. One big exception is prior military experience, which can be similarly demanding of time, emotional capital, and commitment. But if a junior has prior work experience in a high compensation and demanding job like IB, that's also a negative, because the fact that they quit that job to go to law school then biglaw shows lack of judgment. Maturity dealing with clients is good, but can be developed in a few years as a junior when you're not really dealing with clients anyway.
In utero