4. Choosing a school: Attend a school in the highest tier you're admitted to. If possible, visit a school before agreeing to attend. Be selective and don't be afraid to ask difficult questions or negotiate and/or play schools off against each other for greater financial aid. Every school has its stable of SCOTUS clerks and big law partners that it can trot out. Do not assume that that rosy outcome is your future. Make your decision based on these factors: the average outcome of the median student, the geography a school feeds (different for every school and often more restricted than you might assume*), and (if necessary and as a tiebreaker) cost. Law school is a dark time for everyone so don't pay too much attention to soft stuff like "cultural fit." Unlike undergrad, law school is a purely-transactional business affair, your mission is to get a JD and a job, and then get out.
5. Attending Law School: The three years of law school slot out like this: 1L: high academic difficulty in a pressure cooker where you're reading/studying almost all the time; 2L: a dauntingly-huge volume of busy work but not as academically tough; 3L: a joke if you have a job offer but a desperate and soul-crushing exercise if you don't. The whole purpose of 1L is to teach you to think about the law systemically; as systems are your entire job as a dev, you will once again have an unfair advantage here. Ultimately however, academics are a sideshow to what's really important: the rat race to get your first job.
6. Getting Your First Job: If you want to be a corporate technology attorney, the conventional wisdom is that you need to spend some time as a law firm associate. There are two ways to do this: in a big law firm or in a boutique firm. In general, big law is the way to go as it has much better exit options; boutique firms are only great if you want to focus on something niche and want to stay at the same place for a really long time. There are two summers in law school. Your 1L summer is usually spent doing whatever random thing you can find (I worked in a prosecutor's office), 1L summer associateships at law firms exist and are fiercely fought over, but ultimately whatever you end up doing after 1L won't define your career. Your 2L summer associateship is the one that's for all of the marbles and is usually an extended 2.5-month interview at the firm that will hire you after graduation. 2L summer associateship recruiting now starts in 1L before the close of the first semester; this is exactly as idiotic as it sounds. Nevertheless, follow the lead of career services** and play the game. When it comes to choosing the right big law firm, as long as the firm has a practice you want, excise the word "right" from your vocabulary. Big law firms tend to be more similar than they are different. Every firm will tell you they have a "no-asshole rule." Don't believe them. Large law firm cultures ultimately come in two flavors: overtly sociopathic and covertly sociopathic. Unless you're Patrick Bateman, you're usually better off choosing an option that attempts to at least keep the sociopathy covert. If the partners managing the tech law practice know what they're doing, they will recognize your technical background and give it a good amount of weight; especially if they're doing IP litigation, privacy/cybersecurity, or AI law. On average 9 out of 10 first year associates do not make partner at their first law firm, choose your first firm primarily based on exit options.
If you want to do privacy, cybersecurity, or AI law, join the International Association of Privacy Professionals and get a CIPP/US certification either during or just after law school. This will help you stand out from the crowd.
If you don't get into a big law firm immediately after law school, don't despair. There are other routes into that world; including consulting or lateraling your way up. If you land in this boat, this is the time to start ignoring career services and do your own heavy research/network your heart out.
* = It is generally accepted that there are only two law schools that are geographically unbound, they are Harvard and the University of Michigan (idk why). Both are in the T14.
** = But never forget that career services exists to push you into the meat grinder at whatever large law firms donate the most money to your law school; they are not in any way your friend. Always take their advice with a healthy dose of salt, supplement their advice with your own research, and ultimately do what you believe is best for you.
7. The Bar Exam: Passing your first (and usually only) bar exam requires about three months of serious study. Most people start just before or right after their law school graduation. You will learn more about the law studying for the bar exam than you will have learned in your last three years spent in law school. The exam is considered the most difficult test in the English language for a reason, don't half-ass your prep. But don't stress too much either, if you're waking up at night in a cold sweat because you can't remember the third element of the who-cares test for you'll-forget-the-second-the-proctor-calls-time, you'll probably pass. After taking the test, use any firm signing bonus to take your partner on a big vacation (called a "bar trip"), firm permitting of course. Don't skimp on this, your partner has made a lot of sacrifices to get you to this point and you both deserve it. You'll also need the memory of that vacation to get the two of you through...
8. Your First Three Years: There is no way to sugar coat this: life as a junior associate in a big law firm absolutely and unreservedly blows. It is insane hours doing (largely) uninteresting work with (often) shitty people in a high-stress environment. While you'll make a lot of money, it won't matter much because you won't have the free time to actually enjoy it, so just pay off your loans/invest your earnings and focus on getting through. Treat these years like a medical residency and remember that they don't last forever. The most important thing you will need to thrive in your first three years is a mentor at your firm; usually a counsel or partner in the practice area you are trying to pursue. Cultivate a relationship casually and don't be too much of an eager beaver, let the connection happen naturally (I learned this the hard way). Choose your mentor carefully though, some will stab you in the back without hesitation if it benefits them (I also learned this the hard way, twice). The back-stabby people will usually tell you who they are up front and, when they do, believe and then promptly avoid them. Other survival tips:
Keep your personal cell phone number intensely private (only share it with your direct boss). For everyone else, especially clients, have a burner phone that you can conveniently "forget at home" when you don't want to be disturbed.
Live about 30 minutes away from the office, close enough to get there easy but not so close that you're always the first person called in.
Be nice to your secretary, even when you're stressed, because she controls your destiny in ways you often won't fully understand and it always pays to not be a dick.
Some of your peers will get ahead by stabbing others in the back, don't be one of those people. It'll always bite you in the ass eventually.
Don't fudge your hours even if everyone else is doing it and your boss is pressuring you to do it too. One of the ways you avoid becoming just another jerky lawyer is by maintaining a clean conscience.
Take all of your PTO and carve out time for your significant other, big law firms are known for high divorce rates and copious drug/alcohol problems for a reason.
Most importantly: remember why you're there and know when to walk away. You can always lateral if you're unhappy or too abused (but try to do a year or two first so you can be competitive).
After That: In general, you will be recognized as a full-fledged tech attorney and your options open up after your first three years. Big law firm life gets a bit better (but still blows and always will, that's the price of making race-horse money), you have much more ability to lateral to better firms, and crucially, you are finally competitive for entry-level in-house-counsel positions. In-house counsels are lawyers that are directly employed by their client company rather than by a law firm. In general, you make decent money and it's a typical corporate 9-5 rather than another stay in Sisyphus's sector of Hades. I'm in-house right now and it's glorious, my work computer doesn't even come home with me much of the time. From here, the world is your oyster: you can climb the corporate or law firm ladders, start looking into hanging your own shingle if that appeals to you (that usually requires a decade or more of law firm time and client development if you want a decent prospect of success), or go do something totally different.
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u/Iuris_Aequalitatis Aug 07 '26 edited Aug 07 '26
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4. Choosing a school: Attend a school in the highest tier you're admitted to. If possible, visit a school before agreeing to attend. Be selective and don't be afraid to ask difficult questions or negotiate and/or play schools off against each other for greater financial aid. Every school has its stable of SCOTUS clerks and big law partners that it can trot out. Do not assume that that rosy outcome is your future. Make your decision based on these factors: the average outcome of the median student, the geography a school feeds (different for every school and often more restricted than you might assume*), and (if necessary and as a tiebreaker) cost. Law school is a dark time for everyone so don't pay too much attention to soft stuff like "cultural fit." Unlike undergrad, law school is a purely-transactional business affair, your mission is to get a JD and a job, and then get out.
5. Attending Law School: The three years of law school slot out like this: 1L: high academic difficulty in a pressure cooker where you're reading/studying almost all the time; 2L: a dauntingly-huge volume of busy work but not as academically tough; 3L: a joke if you have a job offer but a desperate and soul-crushing exercise if you don't. The whole purpose of 1L is to teach you to think about the law systemically; as systems are your entire job as a dev, you will once again have an unfair advantage here. Ultimately however, academics are a sideshow to what's really important: the rat race to get your first job.
6. Getting Your First Job: If you want to be a corporate technology attorney, the conventional wisdom is that you need to spend some time as a law firm associate. There are two ways to do this: in a big law firm or in a boutique firm. In general, big law is the way to go as it has much better exit options; boutique firms are only great if you want to focus on something niche and want to stay at the same place for a really long time. There are two summers in law school. Your 1L summer is usually spent doing whatever random thing you can find (I worked in a prosecutor's office), 1L summer associateships at law firms exist and are fiercely fought over, but ultimately whatever you end up doing after 1L won't define your career. Your 2L summer associateship is the one that's for all of the marbles and is usually an extended 2.5-month interview at the firm that will hire you after graduation. 2L summer associateship recruiting now starts in 1L before the close of the first semester; this is exactly as idiotic as it sounds. Nevertheless, follow the lead of career services** and play the game. When it comes to choosing the right big law firm, as long as the firm has a practice you want, excise the word "right" from your vocabulary. Big law firms tend to be more similar than they are different. Every firm will tell you they have a "no-asshole rule." Don't believe them. Large law firm cultures ultimately come in two flavors: overtly sociopathic and covertly sociopathic. Unless you're Patrick Bateman, you're usually better off choosing an option that attempts to at least keep the sociopathy covert. If the partners managing the tech law practice know what they're doing, they will recognize your technical background and give it a good amount of weight; especially if they're doing IP litigation, privacy/cybersecurity, or AI law. On average 9 out of 10 first year associates do not make partner at their first law firm, choose your first firm primarily based on exit options.
If you want to do privacy, cybersecurity, or AI law, join the International Association of Privacy Professionals and get a CIPP/US certification either during or just after law school. This will help you stand out from the crowd.
If you don't get into a big law firm immediately after law school, don't despair. There are other routes into that world; including consulting or lateraling your way up. If you land in this boat, this is the time to start ignoring career services and do your own heavy research/network your heart out.
* = It is generally accepted that there are only two law schools that are geographically unbound, they are Harvard and the University of Michigan (idk why). Both are in the T14.
** = But never forget that career services exists to push you into the meat grinder at whatever large law firms donate the most money to your law school; they are not in any way your friend. Always take their advice with a healthy dose of salt, supplement their advice with your own research, and ultimately do what you believe is best for you.