This is the updated Am Law 200 jobs list. I’ve automatically shared it as a Google document with members of the site. If you have any questions, feel free to send me an e-mail, give me a call, and/or chat with me if I’m available.
Remember, site membership is open for anyone who subscribes to my newsletter on or before March 1, 2010 at 12:01 AM EST.
I was on a roll so I decided to update the Am Law 200 jobs. Who knows, maybe if I keep it up, I’ll update the lists every other week?
I will post the updated Am Law 200 job listings in the next post (members-only, folks but see: this good news!). In the meantime, I wanted to point out a few alternative job listings that caught my eye:
Kasowitz, Kelley Drye, & Jackson Lewis have quite a few open positions. Go get ‘em!
Now that I worked out a few glitches, I’m also going to extend free membership to anyone who signs up for my newsletter on or before March 1, 2010 at 12:01 am EST. After you sign up for the newsletter, you will receive an e-mail with your username and password within 24 hours. It will come from WordPress with [RecruiterEsq] in the subject line. Finally, anyone who signed up for the newsletter after membership was closed last time will also receive free membership to the website.
I sent out this e-mail last night to all site members. I’d also like to post it here as a general announcement.
Hi!
This is the Google document for the Am Law 100 job listings that I posted yesterday on the site. Remember, if you’d like to sort by practice area or location, view it in the Google doc as a list. (Under View, pick List view.) Once it’s in list view, click on the link to sort how you’d like.
From now on, I will automatically give you access to the Google document when I publish the post. Therefore, I will not send out any more e-mails like this.
In addition, I will start sending my newsletter once per month with links to the updated listings in case you missed them when I posted them. So you know, I try to post the Am Law 100 listings during the first half of the month and the Am Law 200 listings during the second half of the month. However, there is no set schedule.
If you would like, you can always subscribe to the RSS feed of the blog portion of my site. Since January, I have a new RSS feed so make sure the feed address you have is up to date. (To test, make sure you can see the last five updates on the Blog page in your RSS viewer.)
Finally, I mentioned to some of you that I have a new, geeky feature on my site: a live chat! If I’m around, it will say I’m available. Feel free to send a message. It’s only me 
Best,
mjs
For my observations on this list and hiring at Am Law 100 firms, please refer to this post: Firms Take Recruiting In-House and Other Am Law Job Observations.
Key: New jobs highlighted in green. If a firm removed any job(s), the firm’s name is highlighted in red.
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I love updating the Am Law job listings. You can really see the industry through the eyes of how its recruiting. I will publish the list in my next post but I’d like to note some brief observations here. (Remember, the list is accessible by members-only whereas this post is public.)
Observation #1: Firms Get Smart About If/When to Use Search Firm
Although I don’t note it on the list, many of the firms explicitly state that they are not accepting resumes from search firms for XYZ position. Sometimes it’s a firm-wide decision, sometimes it depends on the position.
Those are just a few examples. Personally, I think this type of information is great. It helps everyone involved – the firm, the potential laterals, and the search firms.
I left my job at a contingency search firm in the beginning of 2009. By that time, explicit announcements like these were pretty much non-existent. This meant that candidates and recruiters didn’t know if a firm was working with outside agencies when filling a position. Based on my conversations with candidates, they were hesitant to apply on their own if they thought they should be working with a recruiter. (Perhaps the recruiter had a special relationship, had inside knowledge, or other advantages the recruiter may bring….). Even stellar candidates – smart, friendly, high achievers, perfect matches – would question whether they could find a position without a recruiter.
On the other hand, as a recruiter, I spent countless hours trying to get in touch with firms about advertised positions only to find out – after plenty of phone tag – that the firm was not using recruiters to fill that position. Or, worse, I spent countless hours – at the firm’s request – trying to find candidates to fill advertised positions that the firm knew they would be filling internally or through a referral. Not only did the firm play me, it played all of those stellar candidates who may end up opposing counsel or co-counsel. I had to tell those candidates, “Hey, it’s not you. Here’s what happened….”
Recruiting fees are expensive. However, they’re well-worth the money if a recruiter finds that perfect candidate who would never have applied on their own. It’s about time that firms used recruiters for their true potential.
Observation #2: Observation #1 Applies to Staff Attorney/Contract Attorney Positions as Well
More and more, I see advertised positions for staff attorneys, part-time attorneys, and other non-partner track positions. (E.g., Staff Attorney, Staff Associate, Contract Attorney(!), Career Associate, Part-Time/Hourly Attorney, Staff Attorney, etc.) This also makes me really happy. A lot of these positions – and, therefore, the attorneys who work in these positions – do not get the respect they deserve. By advertising these positions, the firms show that they’re open to candidates who need/want alternative work schedules. In addition, they are including these attorneys as employees of the firm. Regardless of the legal significance, the cultural significance is tremendous.
Observation #3: … Those Non-Legal “Legal” Careers
Usually, I limit my list to attorney positions or something similar. (I’ve been known to throw a few patent agent positions in there.) I’m not sure if I’m simply looking harder nowadays but I’m seeing firms advertise many “alternative” careers – law firm management careers – that are J.D. preferred. When one of these positions pops out at me, I’ve included it on the list.
There are a few positions I’d like to highlight:
This updated Am Law Tweeple list is for members only. Like the public list, it color codes the ‘tweeple by their firm role. It also lists practice areas and whether the attorney is a partner, associate, counsel, etc.
Feel free to add anyone else who you may know.
Be sure to read the other posts in this series:
#1: Every Lawyer Knows the AMLAW Firms, First Post in the #AMLAWTweeple Series
#2: Creating & Maintaining the #AMLAWTweeple List
Disclaimer: I use FreshBooks. A lot.1 Based on my use, these are my opinions and this is my endorsement. While I’d like for you to sign up using my affiliate page (at not cost to you!), I’d like even more if you trusted my recommendation to go check it out.
Freshbooks proclaims on its website that it’s:
Then it goes on to say, “Send, track and collect payments quickly. Great for teams, freelancers and service providers.”
Not only are lawyers service providers, they are the quintessential example of service providers who bill by the hour.2 Moreover, the majority of law firms that bill by the hour use time-tracking methods that are either a) expensive or b) outdated (think: pen & scrap paper). Government agencies, nonprofit groups, or firms that have alternative fee structures in place or get paid under contingency agreements, may not have any defined time-tracking methods in place, however helpful they may be. Regardless of howmost firms and legal agencies use billing software that is expensive at the outset and more expensive to maintain.
Freshbooks offers an easy, web-based solution to complete a firm’s time-tracking and billing – it even prints out or e-mails professional-looking invoices! – at a relatively low cost. (There are different pricing plans based on how many users have access and how many clients the user would like to manage.)
A firm creates an account with a secure login page (e.g. yourfirm.freshbooks.com). Once signed in, the account administrator may add employees, contractors, clients, and projects to keep track of time, estimates, invoices, and billing. The administrator may designate whether certain activities are billed at an hourly rate, a project rate, and/or if they’re non-billable. The administrator may also controls each user’s access and determines what information each user is able to view or edit.
Lawyers can sign in to track their time and then assign their time to different projects or different tasks within projects. Firm clients can sign in to view the status of their accounts.
Whenever a lawyer works on a client’s project, s/he can choose to track their time with Freshbook’s timer. This timer pops up in a separate browsing window. It features a “play” button and a “pause” button so users can start it and pause it as they work. For any users with an iPhone, there’s also an app to track time. A user also has the choice to enter time manually. Because most lawyers juggle numerous projects at once, it’s easy to start the timer, do work for one client, stop the timer, and start over for the next client.
Time is logged and categorized by project and task. In addition, time may be marked as billed or unbilled. As soon as the time is entered and tagged, it automatically shows up on the corresponding invoice or estimate. Users then have the option to send clients estimates and invoices via snail mail or e-mail. Even if a firm bills at a flat-rate, lawyers and employees still may track their time for efficiency purposes.
While I’m sure you found my description riveting, it’s probably best to learn-by-doing. With Freshbooks, you’ll probably want to see it in action to determine the benefits. Of course, if you do sign up for it, feel free to use my affiliate link.
2 Don’t believe me? Google search “billable hour” and look at the top five hits.