Take it or Leave It: Why is it so Hard to Accept Your Offer?

Above the Law has spent the last week or so discussing e-mails, similar to the one below, from law school career offices to law students, advising students to accept their offers ASAP due to tumultuous job market conditions. This morning, UT students received our first such e-mail:

Dear Students,

We received reports yesterday directly from a few law firms and from some of our students that some 2L summer clerkship offers have been rescinded before the offer deadline. Current market conditions suggest that less deliberation of opportunities and quicker response time to offers is prudent. With unusually high acceptance rates and concern of over-subscribing summer clerkship classes, some firms have decided to rescind outstanding offers once their target class size has been met. While we are directly aware of only a few such instances, we recommend that you make your acceptance offers and communicate those results to employers as soon as possible. Please contact the CSO at 232-1150 or come by if you have any questions or need assistance.
Sincerely,

David A. Montoya
Assistant Dean for Career Services

After years of working as a paralegal prior to law school, I had a very specific idea of which firm was my #1. So much so, that I accepted my offer verbally, right after it was made. Attorneys are people, after all, and I think they feel both encouraged and excited about a candidate who accepts an offer in a timely fashion compared to one that drags their heels. It seems to help reassure them that, yes, this is a good match. (Of course, it is completely unnecessary and, in some cases, ill-advised to accept an offer on the spot as I did.)

Having said that, I realize that it is tough to distinguish one firm from another if you haven't known staff or attorneys at various firms prior to the recruiting process. After a certain point, all of the firms start to look the same. It's tough to decide. I'm grateful that I had years of experience interacting with attorneys at various firms as a paralegal (believe me, no one is worried about impressing the adverse firm's paralegal) and friends already working (and complaining) as attorneys in firms before I started OCI last year. Making my decisions on the basis of more than just the NALP guide or the Vault 100 rankings helped me feel confident in my choices.

But not all law students have that luxury and this year, in particular, law students are struggling to figure out which firms are financially stable and that seems to be amplifying the indecision. No one wants their summer firm to fold before they graduate. As a law student, how can you assess the financial health of your prospective firm? Most of us haven't the slightest clue. If Career Services Offices were able to give students some guidance as to how to assess firm stability, given the inevitable uncertainty in such an assessment, it might help move some of these decisions along.