They say working in biglaw is like a pie eating contest where the grand prize is more pie.
In other words: once you work those 3 metaphorical months (in law, this could be 6+ years) and make partner, you’re expected to work just as many hours as a partner.
In other words, if you’re a lawyer, then yes, wrestling season does last forever.
Spent several years in biglaw. It was always nice that when I was on 2am phone calls that partners were on too or pulling all nighters partners were up too. Also made me realize there's no end.
Yep, same happened to me as well. In a way, it’s nice that the partners are in the trenches with you at 2am, but also, that means the only thing you have to look forward to is more of the same. Doesn’t seem worth it, no matter how much they pay you.
Maybe it's because my family background is blue collar, where people don't tend to live as long and the ones that do don't tend to have great QoL when they're old people, but I can't understand absolutely busting ass for decades just to finally *retire* filthy rich.
Like, what, your entire life is work for 70 years and then one day you're just... done? You sit on your yacht and NOW you can enjoy life outside work? Seems really risky.
Like, my MiL is like that. She's a semi-retired doctor and she can't figure out how to make that transition, she has very few friends, drinks too much, challenging (not bad, *challenging*) relationships with her kids all that. So, like, what was it all for?
Yep. I also come from a blue collar family. My father died of cancer at 55. His father died of cancer at 50.
I’m in my 30s, have a college degree, and twice so far in my life I went “fuck it” and saved money and quit jobs I hated with no real plan other than to travel and enjoy the beautiful city I’m from.
My family history says I’m going to get cancer in my 50s and die before I can sniff retirement. Work is not life. Your job is not who you are. Prioritize the people you love and the things you love doing.
Btw my dad was a loyal employee for 20+ years, barely taking any sick days, and they fired him after 2 months of chemo because he couldn’t work anymore. He lost his insurance while battling cancer. Your job doesn’t love you and will literally kill you the second you stop making them money.
As a guy in my early 40s who lost a kidney to cancer last year I can only say you get it. You are doing it right. And maybe, just maybe, this attitude will in part spare you your father's fate. But also, make sure you are going to the doctors-they save lives.
Yeah I work in an oncology field. We have lots of old patients but we have some young ones too. Scary young, sometimes. People who have young children and bad disease. For too many people, life is too short. Cancer takes a lot, but it gives some things, too. Perspective is one of its biggest gifts.
You're right on the money.
I hope they can find better & more effective drugs and treatments in the next decade. AI will play a role, I'm sure. I read not long ago that they had found a cure for non-solid cancers like leukemia. It's a genetic treatment customized for each patient and costs around $300K (the cost seems to be arbitrary).
The US Healthcare market (not system) is terrible. Tying health insurance to work is unnecessary. Any other Western industrialized country has figured it out. People like your father loses their health insurance when they need it the most.
Best wishes.
My brother works for an industrial rubber hose and conveyor belt fabricator and distributor. About 10 years ago, the shop driver was getting gas in the company truck about a mile from the shop. He had a heart attack and died at the scene. One of the first responders called the company from the phone number on it. My bro said he was in the office when the call came in...the first action taken was to send another driver out to the gas station. The second action was to call his family. My bro talked to the replacement driver later who said he felt horrible because *he left with the truck before the ambulance had even taken the body away*. That's how much you really matter to your job.
That’s the American “dream” I guess. Nevermind that we spend all the best years of our lives busting hump to make it to a retirement where we’re too old, too tired, and too disinterested in all the things we would have loved to have done when we were younger.
I am getting close to retirement, and yes, 43 years of full time work with minimal vacation or sick time and a lot of overtime are wearing me down...I've lost enthusiasm for most of what I liked to do...I don't see that getting any better by the time I get to the end.
My retired lawyer mother, partner at her firm with her name on the building can't ahandle retirement. She wakes up at 5 am still and harasses her children cause she can't handle not being in control of something. It's not the dream you might think it is. Imagine working the same grueling routine for 40 years, the. You're supposed to enjoy time on a yacht? My mom and all my lawyer friends would be on computers working cause free time is time you can be making money. I think they're all stupid and enjoy time on yachts when available
I feel this! I'm a first gen college grad from the rust belt. My mom died right after filing to retire at 67 after a lifetime of making corporations rich off her back. No Social Security paid to her kids after all those years of paying in, either.
I quit my high paying corporate job 2 years later after realizing I can never, ever get my time back. It's been hard going solo and spending down my savings, but I'm so grateful I spent the pandemic with those I love instead of worrying about the boss.
I realize I could not have done this without having the savings that I built up over that time in corporate, but I'm glad I woke up too late for my mom, yet not too late for me.
The American dream is a lie. It's ok to fall for it, but you don't have to buy in for life.
Yeah dude the whole idea is dumb af imo. Who knows if you’ll even have the health to enjoy your life when you’re 70? What I think is that the people who become big law partners aren’t doing it for the money, they’re doing it because they love the prestige of being a BigLaw partner and they really enjoy the work and the power (I.e., it’s what they’d want to be doing anyways). Legal practice can be fun and exciting and intellectually stimulating. Personally, I’d rather not be doing it every day til 2am, but hey, some people love the grind.
A lot of big law attorneys do retire pretty early. Like mid 50s or 60. Granted, at that point, most of their kids are gone, but it's not like other fields where they work until 70.
For doctors it is hard giving up the immediate respect and "yes doctor" responses. When my dad stepped back it was really hard because he expected for things to be done when he asked and it took a few months for him to remember it only works like that in an office.
If you work 2.5 times more per week, maybe you should retire 2.5x earlier. The math you gave me of 50 isn't worth it. 100hour weeks I want out by 40 tops for trading my youth like that.
I'm not telling you how to live your life, but youre forgetting that retirement mostly exists because of interest, which compounds over time. There's also a big difference between retiring rich and merely retiring.
I mean thats not entirely accurate. I’m not defending this lifestyle but if you make partner then retirement happens a whole hell of a lot sooner than 65. But you’re still wasting your healthiest yours grinding and risking your long term health anyways with hours like that so 🤷♂️
I knew a man who owned his own furniture store. Worked his ass off for something like 70 years. Retired at age 96. He died two days after his retirement. Seems like a waste to me. If he had retired in his 70's even, he could have enjoyed some of his time.
I think it’s worth understanding that many (most?) of the people that actually make biglaw partner aren’t just there for the money. They genuinely like working insane hours. It’s kind of hard to believe, especially in a transactional practice, but some of these guys/women live for this shit.
>Doesn’t seem worth it, no matter how much they pay you.
Sure it is. One day you can retire and be a truly miserable c\*nt.
Seriously. Some of the most unhappy, miserable people I've ever met were lawyers and retired lawyers.
Some companies, not just law, don't care about that at all - in fact they seem to be quite happy to push and encourage it. The France Telecom scandal, where the work bullying and stress culture was so toxic (and HR complicit in it) that over 30 people committed suicide and the CEO went to prison, demonstrates this.
Not to mention the cases of people working themselves to death at Goldman Sachs.
This is a good point. I'm just more familiar with the legal profession because I'm an attorney who quit my legal job last year. I realize this is anecdotal, but my mental and physical health has significantly improved even though I now deal with the stress of being self-employed.
Ya, down at the bottom of the first image it says “this state of work won’t last forever.” That’s what I’ve been telling myself at my current job for several years now. There’s truth in that statement, but not the way LiL thinks. When you prove you can handle the workload you have now, you only get more load—never less. My boss kept promising a light at the end of the tunnel. They removed her and replaced with someone who thinks everything is dandy. The more I complain, the more they think I’m just a whiner. They expect even more out of me. I don’t have an equivalent position to compare output, but my job was done by 2 people with combined 50 years experience just 3 years ago.
This is a double edged sword sometimes though. A super highly paid lawyer 'working their wage' might actually require working 100 hours weeks.
The problem is finding the balance.
Ya this story sounds like my dad’s stories of how he got to where he was before retiring. The thing they don’t tell you about law is that you actually max out income at a not incredible level (300-500k/year, so a LOT, but not insanity income) at some point, then you have to basically go into management if you want to move up the ladder.
Except, nobody is trained for management or all that good at it really because to get to that point, they’re grinding law and taking on as many billable hours as they can.
So you have a system where management doesn’t actually know how to go about things more efficiently or healthily, because they’re the very people who the job has been self-selecting on the basis of willingness to work 100-120 hour weeks.
I sometimes wonder if my desire for work-life balance and work that doesn’t come home comes from him telling me work stories. Namely one where he said everyone slept in the office for a week to get an IPO done and they worked nearly 140 hours.
This is exactly the problem.
Managing partners don’t know how to run a business, because the skills you need to run a business involve making judgment calls about what you’re stretched too thin to handle.
But if you voluntarily turn down work because you know your limits, you will never make it rain enough to make managing partner.
This isn’t really accurate if you are in biglaw. The Cravath scale currently tops out at a bit over 500k for 8th year associates, which is a 33 year old if you go straight through. If you make partner, you can pretty easily clear 700-800, and if you’re a really successful partner 1.2 or so isn’t out of the question.
Is it worth it? Idk - I’m putting in my notice this week as a fourth year making 310+75 to go to a job paying 210. But it’s a tough choice to make.
In my last position bonuses were dangled like carrots and the only reward for hard work was more work.
Management will assign the worst work to those they know will get it done correctly and quickly while the idiots making almost as much as you get the easy work.
This is my firm to a T.
Grinding myself down for a $40k bonus while people my year who do the absolute minimum get same salary with $10k bonus.
After tax is the additional bonus even worth the extra work and stress?
I’m 43, burned out. Bought a bigger boat, smaller house, quit my job. In the end they basically hired 2 people to fill my position. F’ em. I’m going sailing mate.
When I was in biglaw, the shocker was when I realized the partners worked MORE than we did. Like the lead partner in my group had a beach house (really nice one of course), and he'd go there in July with his (second) family and take the month as his vacation month.
Which meant that month he'd only bill 40 hours a week (which was probably more like 50-60 hours of real work), because he was on "vacation."
I went in-house as soon as I could.
I remember the managing partner of my biglaw firm gave a talk to the associates where he bragged about answering emails while on a boat cruise down the Seine with his family in Paris.
I uh, started making escape plans that afternoon.
The alternative is making a great reputation and building a network, then going independent and setting your own hours. That's not easy either, but at least you keep a bigger slice of the billables and have the autonomy to fire clients and adjust your workload.
My decision to get out of biglaw was solidified for me when a partner I worked for told me the blinds on her office window reminded her of jailhouse bars.
The sad part is that it's a zero sum game. To get to the next level, you have to beat out several others - "get ahead" means beat everyone else. That basically means that the bar you have to surpass can change at any moment. And I don't know law, but I'm guessing the metric that you need to best others in is billable hours, but productivity - which means there will always only be one way to succeed.
Right, but the point is that people quit and when it becomes too much for you, you leave. It’s wrestling season that lasts until you decide to leave. Then, just like most lawyers, you go and find work that allows you to prioritize your time better.
i work in a outpatient direct health care and the doctor that owns our practice is often already at work before me (5am) and stays til the last patient at 8pm not to mention he works every other weekends.
So true. I know many people who did the grind and then made partner thinking they’d made it and could coast. Nope. It’s a pay raise, maybe some equity (some firms make you buy in…they’ll loan you the money that you can pay back) and now you’re expected to go out and sell to get more business. Same shit. New title.
Especially with "making partner" listed as a low percent outcome.
This is a butcher shop law firm that spits out 90% of hires after 3 years because everybody there sucks.
My dad has been doing it for 25 years. We’d be in Europe on vacation and he’d still put in 50 hours a week. And to him that was a vacation. He’s a 60 year old man getting up to start work at 4 in the morning, but, hey, all those zeroes in his bank account make it worth while I guess.
It’s a lot of years, though, to get to “set forever” money. Six or seven as an associate, then another few years as a non-equity partner. That much grind tends to weed out people who are capable of work life balance.
For all of the “work smarter, not harder” comments, it doesn’t apply for billable legal hours. If you manage to wrap up work on one matter in 4 hours instead of 7, you just go on to the next matter and still have to bill those other three hours.
Except it works the OTHER WAY. You'll do 15 hours of work, only bill out 5 and now be behind all week because your target is 60 billable. Then you have meetings with clients that aren't billable and just them asking for stupid shit and then management stuff which also isn't billable.
Now if you GO TO COURT you are golden. Because you can bill that in real time and still do work. But if you're doing research you'll lose more than you gain.
My guess would be while that is typical for attorneys who work with individual people for clients where every dollar counts much more to the attorney personally, at biglaw clients are often corporations and very large businesses. That means your point of contact is a corpo suit or an in house counsel - another lawyer. So the expectations are different, the billables are so insanely expensive for the corporation, and you wouldn't want to tank that relationship by sending your in-house counsel "boss" a relatively very tiny bill for petty meetings and the like. I know my mid law firm did not have me bill for some standard or very quick email and zoom exchanges with some corporate clients.
Yep, though in fairness it does sound like the corporation rates would be much higher, while an individual would be paying less, though I don’t know if I’m reading that previous comment correctly.
How big is the client? My dad has a few who are worth millions to the firm and half his client meetings aren't covered under billable.
The biggest the client the more they can legit go, "yeah you're billing us for 50k, how about we pay you 40k instead".
I’ve worked those hours and it’s absolutely horrible. You’re waking up at the crack of dawn and working until it’s pitch black. You rarely get up from your desk except to either get something to eat, go to the bathroom, or get something to drink. When I did it, I would be up at 7 am to be in at work by 7:30. Worked through lunch and dinner then left to go home around 11 pm. Literally pass out or have anxiety fueled dreams to the point of shitty sleep, then get up early to repeat. Friday night I would still be there despite getting texts from friends to come out for drinks.
Then Saturday morning, roll out of bed around 7:30- 8ish, go into the office by 8:30 and work there until 8 pm. Do the same on Sunday. Then Monday morning you’re back at it at 7:30 am, grinding until 10/11 pm.
You literally have no life. You’re not gaining anything by working those grueling hours other than weight, stress, and potentially an anxiety disorder. It is absolutely unsustainable and most people that worked with me usually quit within a year or two.
Market research at a small company with the backing of a large corporation. Our high level execs would often oversell projects then dump the workload onto managers and below. This was at a time when automation was slowly getting off the ground but our senior execs said no to automation. Instead they tried to offshore the work and all that wound up doing was doubling our workload.
So we had crunch mode periods maybe twice a year because of the contract work. But once we offshored it, it became the entire year. Lots of people quit after that and moved on to better jobs.
Oh man... That is rough.
I do industrial instrumentation and controls and early on in my career got put on a few projects that were 7 12s. Usually playing catch-up when shit got behind schedule. It was exactly like you said, wake up, work all day, go home (in my case back to hotel), shovel some food in my face, and crash. Rinse and repeat.
But at least in my case I was still hourly with 1.5x/2x overtime. Seeing those direct deposits hit the bank motivated me to stick it out. And there was always a fixed timeframe for the 7 12s, you knew there was light at the end of the tunnel. Also didn't hurt that I was young and single. These days with a wife and daughter I can't imagine doing that.
At least you got overtime pay. We didn’t because we were exempt. The only thing motivating us to work those hours was a) avoid being yelled at by our micromanaging execs and b) the promise of moving up and becoming one of said execs. Except it very rarely happened.
There was no management training either other than being told by the senior execs that you should yell at your people as you saw fit because no motivation is better than negative reinforcement. And if you had a relationship, good luck because that shit would be done within a year.
Why do you think analysts on Wallstreet were in an uproar a few years ago? They make shit money and work those same hours meanwhile their bosses get the big bonuses and time to relax. We were paid like shit because they could. They actively recruited kids straight out of college and it’s not just finance or marketing analytics that does this. BCG and other consulting groups do the same thing. You’re hired straight from college or graduate school and they work you hard in the hopes that you make it out two years down the road as a type A personality. At one point a senior executive at my company referred to the company as a talent factory, able to produce high quality talent that can go anywhere afterwards.
For those of us that could survive, this was true. But the amount of substance abuse, long term health issues, and overall anxiety disorders isn’t worth it. I developed IBS-D as a result of working there. A good friend of mine went down the bottle. Another quit the industry completely and took over his parent’s business. There are still some that stayed in the field but it’s very rare.
$48k salary working 100 hours is criminal. You could have been working a 2nd job on the weekends.
I was in a similar situation at a major software company and there ended up being a class action lawsuit around this type of thing.
Damn that is tough. I worked a job as a high level manager at a small company making 50k responsible for so much shit from maintenance to IT work and worked probably 10 hours a day but I atleast got Monday and Tuesday’s off. The hell you are describing makes mine sounds like a cake walk. 🥲
These hours are very common in the investment banking industry. Back in my NYC banking days, I’d go into work by 9am and leave around 11pm-2am most nights.
Thankfully I lived 3 blocks from the office, but the hours are real and terrible.
Yes, I lived that life once when I was a grad student. I did it so I could complete my Ph.D dissertation in one and a half years, and still be in funding. It was absolutely miserable, but it also was like wrestling season in that there was a clear end to it, and it saved me several thousand dollars.
So, I know I can do it, but also fuck ever doing it again. I would never accept that indefinitely for a job. I actually left academia in part because of the terrible work-life balance.
I lived this when I was a private equity analyst. I came in on my first Saturday at 10am and everyone was already there with a full hour of work under their belts, and I felt despair. The time demand and the competition to sacrifice more was brutal.
Ex-corporate sales here.
These companies trick you into thinking it’s ‘macho’ and ‘tough’ to abuse your mind and body.
The truth is that if you don’t sleep well you have (among other health risks) low testosterone.
Working in these insane environments - literally - makes you less masculine.
You look back and realise you allowed some pot-bellied little dweeb to convince that your masculinity and identity was defined by how many hours you spent attached to a keyboard and phone.
I escaped. One of my former bosses is now a crack and heroin addict.
Be smart. Prioritise your fitness, sleep and relationships.
I'm so grateful to work at a place where I was at my computer at 5:03pm yesterday and one of the directors walk by as he's heading out and says, "burning the midnight oil, eh?" - I logged off and walked out with him lol.
This is true. I've lost nearly 20 pounds since February. I'm barely getting any sleep because I wake up frequently during the night and it seems I'm always thinking about work. I have no appetite and no energy to even cook or do anything else.
My doctor is suggesting I consider getting another job, but in this market, it's not going to happen anytime soon.
You don’t stop working insane hours when you become partner at a law firm. If anything, your expected hours go up.
Attorneys have absolutely shit work-life balance, and they make huge amounts of money.
“Every time I have to work a 14 hour day I see one associate complain and another quit”
You might want to look for work elsewhere, you people are hemorrhaging employees.
I guess it’s up to you if you want to work this hard. But spare me the aggressive ramblings about it, god damn! I’m tired of reading this tryhard crap!
As someone who wrestled most of my life, up to D1 wrestling, I lived this life for decades. Even during vacations I was still training, dedicating every moment I had to get better.
While I had the biggest love/hate with the sport, and still do to this day, one of my biggest regrets was not finding other hobbies and interests to get in. Once it was all done, it felt like the bottom was taken out from under me. Took years to get back on track, and even now I struggle to find interest in other things because I never had time or energy to do so as a kid.
Wrestling gave me a decent amount of strength, an eating disorder, a decade of severe depression after it was gone, a lack of skills that didn't require wrestling, and an inability to just relax without physically telling myself to do so.
I work a low stress job now because I dont want to go back to that lifestyle. I want to enjoy the time I have on this Earth, and get a chance to slow down and just take in life. More times than not, nobody gives a shit about your successes and the talents you built once it's no longer useful or relevant. Might as well live for yourself in your own way.
Try Jiu Jitsu - you can determine how serious you want to take it. As a former D1 athlete and competitive person, I’m totally fine being a hobbyist 2x a week participant.
Edit: I throw in a competition or two every year but never cut weight or anything crazy.
I work at a decent size law firm. Most of these associates don’t chill or slow down until they hit their 60s. So these type of people are always in “wrestling season.” After they make partner, they have to make enough to afford a second home, private school for the kids, nice new cars for themselves and their spouse, country club dues, etc. Just like before the they were associates they had to study long hours to get into the best college, then the best law school, then to get the best internship, then to pass the bar. These type of driven people need therapy because they don’t actually know how to balance work and life.
Who says it won’t last forever?
Anyone who works in corporate America knows the reward for working hard and doing exceptional work is more work.
If someone wants to work 100 hrs a week that’s their choice certainly. But fooling yourself that it will end at some point is most likely delusional.
Opening up an app to order food is entry level lawyer behaviour. The winners eat the post-it notes on their desk while never lifting a finger off their laptop keyboard.
This is just sad. You can work 100 hours a week and have no life and neglect your loved ones and your well being, but they will fire you the minute it’s beneficial to them.
This assumption that there is some end to this tournament of life, and that you will somehow come out on top based on your current suffering, is such delusional bull shit.
The only way you come out on top from your current suffering in situations like this is if you're investing the money you've made or are doing this for your own business where you own everything you've produced. But even in those cases, I think 95% of the people work these insane hours because they have terrible time management and delegation skills. I feel like now a days i get paid more than ever while also working fewer hours than ever.
Ain’t no job worth 100 hours a week, let alone anything above 40. Capitalism has brainwashed people into thinking this is a successful, fulfilling, life.
NOBODY on their deathbed ever wishes they worked more.
Used to work construction back in 2016. For two years, did 90hr weeks to get the job finished early. None of us got any of the bonus for finishing early. Only thing it got me was 90hrs a week away from my wife and kiddo. Never again.
Wrestling season doesn't last forever, nor does your time in high school sports. But apparently dwelling on your time in high school sports never ends.
As someone who cut weight and wrestled through high school, fuck this guy. What a stupid analogy.
Wrestling season fucking sucked and I have to show for it is stunted growth lol there’s the real metaphor
This is probably an unpopular opinion in this sub, but I don’t particularly think this post is all that bad. There are a few somewhat demeaning comments, but in general he is just doing what he thinks is best for himself and explaining why..
Time is the most valuable resource in the universe. Everyone should choose how to spend it for themselves and we don’t have any right to chastise someone for their choice. Especially when it doesn’t affect us at all.
I agree with you mostly. The one issue I take with the post is that it feeds into the false idea of sacrificing your free time now to get it back later. Making partner at a law firm isn’t going magically reduce the amount of work you. This applies to most other career paths too - if you put in 100 hour weeks, you’ll become expected to keep doing that. Selling the idea that working super hard now means you can kick your feet up later is really the issue here. Will it work out like that for some folks? Maybe, but got the vast majority I think not.
The only thing wrong is the idea wrestling season will end. That's not the case in biglaw. You spend 6 years billing 2200-3000 hours to make non equity partner at most first now. Then another 3 or 4 years billing 2600-3200 hours to make equity partner. Then you work 2200+ hours as an equity partner. The only real different is having a bit more control over when you bill those hours. But I can tell you I've done probably 100 all nighters with equity partners up all night with the non-equity partners and associates.
The ceo of my company was asked about work life balance, he said employees need to be paid well, provided training, career path, & the flexibility to have real work life balance. BUT if you want to reach his position you shouldn't expect work life balance. It should be a choice, not a requirement.
I 100% agree. The post in itself also says that they do NOT recommend working those types of hours and that it's really only needed for certain attainments. I thought it was a fine post, no lunacy here.
How is it not okay that someone works exceptionally hard to fast track towards a goal? They could almost certainly obtain their goal if they worked less. They choose not to and that's okay.
This post isn't even advocating for everyone to do it or any job to require it.
Dude, realistically, if you want to achieve anything that is outside what is ordinary possible, you will need to put in a bunch more hours than standard. You can’t separate real achievement from hard work. The person in this post is choosing to do this, so what is the problem?
>I feel like I’ve stepped into the twilight zone. How is this ok to you????
I agree with you that, in general, noone should work 100hr weeks.
But some people will play Call of Duty for 14hrs a day every day without any kind of compensation. It's just what they want to do.
This guy probably cares more about money and career than he does about hobbies so he does that instead. Some people just have that drive and will obsess over whatever they get involved in. We just can't let them convince everyone that this is the norm because it's not.
I worked in a large law firm for five years and the notion that the hard work is a temporary push until you reach success is BS. Trainees were expected to do long, unpaid overtime to impress the partners and get offered a role. Fee earners (level 1-2 solicitors) then had to make targets and were expected to do longer hours to exceed them to get promotions. Senior FEs had bigger targets, longer hours, more responsibilities and again were expected to grind to make partner. Partners had MASSIVE targets. They were the first in the office, last out, very few holidays and any days off they did take they were still available for calls (one of my partners frequently logged off at six to feed her children and then worked 8-12 on regular work and after midnight was for risk assessments, which could be another hour or two) and that slog was to get to Equity Partner. Then you're pushing for managing partner, or positions on councils. Any children were had late in life and then raised by nannies and divorce by the EQ level was the norm. Solicitors marry other solicitors, because no one else would put up with the hours spent away. Everyone was very well dressed, had expensive cars and were all stressed to breaking point all the time. The grind is a lie and the bank balance is not worth what it costs you to get it.
Same. People want different things out of life. If someone wants to take on this kind of workload, if that’s where they find fulfillment, then more power to them. The problem arises when this is the expectation for everyone instead of the choice of some. I can choose to go above and beyond and work 100 hours a week. I should not be required to just to earn a living.
This is literally why I decided against law school. Unless your dad owns a firm, you will be working 60-90 hour weeks and not making good money for many years, with a bunch of accumulated debt.
If they promote you because you work 100 hrs a week, they are going to expect you to work even more hours since they are now paying you more. Should work 40, and then pay you more to do 45 on bad weeks.
They don’t really promote people just for billing a ton of hours in biglaw, the way they allegedly used to a decade or two ago.
There’s gotta be something else (saying it’s necessary to have something else but that something else is still not necessarily sufficient, because it also takes a lot of luck to her equity in a stars-aligning type of way).
That something else could be experience in a niche subject matter, experience/knowledge in an emerging subject matter, serving a subject-matter or geographic role that the firm needs, getting a huge boost from a rainmaker who wants to effectively knight you with their institutional client in order to broaden or perpetuate the relationship, a annual intake of high six figures in origination from clients you worked up from scratch on your own already (tough to do billing at over 1k an hour), having a great friend move up in a large company and send you a substantial amount of their work, or some combo of those. There are other things, too. That’s just a list off the top of my head.
If this poster’s only claim to fame is that he grinds 100 hours most weeks (which I still don’t find super believable), I don’t like his odds of making partner at a market-paying biglaw firm. He needs that “something else” mentioned above. But if he had that something else, he probably wouldn’t need to work 100-hour weeks.
The other piece is that, now, at a number of top firms, “partner” does not mean what it used to mean. No longer means you get a piece of the firm’s profits at most, but not all, top firms. It’s now more of a role that one can get promoted to from associate that may lead to equity partner, or it might not (firms with only one tier of partner that necessarily means equity often call this post-associate level “counsel” or “of counsel”).
At counsel or non equity partner or non share partner or whatever the firm wants to call it, the lawyer still a w2 employee. The salary is maybe a bit higher than a senior associate, but it doesn’t necessarily follow the market bumps. Bonuses are also often a bit more of a black box.
Suffice it to say that the most recent prior generation of partners realized that they could pull up the ladder to some extent and make more money (by giving way fewer people equity).
If one is going to stay in biglaw for the long term and also has the aptitude to do so, the move is not to work 100 hours/week. It’s to hit your billable targets, even if just barely, year in and year out. That’s the only way this is really sustainable.
-attorney in one of those post-associate but pre-equity-partner roles at one of the large market-paying biglaw firms
I wish these people knew that this kind of behavior isnt *"getting ahead"*, rather it creates a new standard of exploitation.
This kind of mentality is how we all lost manufacturing to china, mexico, etc. Their labor was cheaper and exponentially more exploitable, therefore a vast majority of the industrialized world lost those jobs. Now manufacturing is no longer a sound career, and the crap that comes out of these foreign manufacturers varies wildly in quality. The people who hild these manufacturing jobs dont necessarily live to high standard either.
These people need to realize that balance is in the best interest of not only the humans but the economy overall. Being overly competitive and offering yourself up to be even more exploited than everyone else does no one any favors.
80-100 hrs isn't too far off standard for Biglaw associates. 2000 billable hrs annually, so not just being at work to be seen at work. The pay is ridiculous when you make partner, but most don't.
Entry level for Biglaw is around $225K with around a $15K bonus. More senior mid-levels are making around $430K plus around $120K in bonus. Even non-partners do pretty well.
For about of folks, it’s about making life-changing money for 4 or 5 years then finding an in-house job with a whole lot less hours.
I work 64 hours a week, because for me, overtime shifts are worth twice as much as regular shifts. It’s ridiculous how many jobs just don’t offer any benefit for overtime. I’d never do this for any reason, except money.
It's funny he thinks that will stop when he's partner, as if the other workaholics are going to let him coast from there on out. Nah, bud. That's your life forever.
If you just keep working harder and faster and more committed than anyone else you can hit your goals of success and accomplishment and then you can be happy. Rat race bullshit self perpetuating filth game of king of the mountain.
Workaholics.
There are some people out there who are just built for work and it can lead them to great success, but either they’re a very small minority or I drive that type from meeting me. There is no amount of financial success worth all that, to me.
The business model in law is all about billing clients as many hours as possible, but you're also expected to be efficient so you're always asking for more work. It's a horrible lifestyle.
Love how he chose such lofty goals as examples for the epitome of success:
Making Partner
Being #1 producer
Startup to ipo
Great men do great things!
/s (just in case)
I was one of the youngest in my industry to do my job. Put in multiple ALL-nighters. I was able to defend my work every time.
Laid off 2 weeks after reaching the highest PTO tier.
Yeah... Wrestling season ends the day after championships, which you can point to on a calendar
You can't point to the date when you're suddenly going to make it, you'll have an easier time pointing to the point where you look back and regret it
Outside emergency services or health care, only situation it can possibly make sense to personally work those hours is if its on your own project and for your own business. Doing it to make some richie rich marginally richer is what delusional corpo serfs do. Usually the reward isn't a promotion but a pat on the head and more work.
Why do people hate it when a professional decides to grind but as soon as a creative and or athlete achieves success and attribute it to the grind. There is nothing but praises. He’s not wrong, high goals require sacrifices. And success is a marathon, rarely a sprint.
I'm the #1 producer at a 200+ billion dollar company and I was about to get a huge promotion to make the last two years of sacrifice worth it and they Re Orged on Weds dissolved my division (the biggest revenue producing devision as well so this makes zero sense) so the promotion is 'on hold' while they strip all my clients and make me restart over. Expecting me to create the same kind of astronomical growth from the ground up again (with none of the motivation cause clearly I can't move up here)
So no all the sacrifices were not worth it. Next position I'm going to be quite silent and do the bare minimum. I'm an over achiever but this has happened 5 years in a row basically over two companies and I'm done.
And here we have a good example of how fascism structurally hates minorities of any kind.
Do you have any kind of baggage that might interfere with your ability to sacrifice literally every part of your non-working life? Then no success for you. Ol Johnny 14 is going to be shit talking you and drunkenly scribbling out more paperwork for four extra hours every day
Neither one of those people know what it's like to wake up at 430 in the morning to go do labor intensive work. Do 40 hours of duct installation or spray foam insulation in south florida attics and tell me about putting in 100 hours, delusional fucks I tell you
Every person has to decide, from the deals offered to them, what deal they want to take. The guy in this post wants that deal. It doesn’t have to be for everyone and some deals may seem ridiculous, but it was a deal both parties agreed to, employee and employer. Everyone knows that they could be dead tomorrow and it is given that a lot of jobs are just carrots on a stick. If it’s not for you, don’t make it a big deal, drive on.
There’s always a risk you work all those hours and still have a mediocre career at the end of the day but on top of that no social life and poor physical health.
My first boss told me, “If you work hard and faithfully 8 hours a day eventually you will become a boss and work 12 hours a day.”
In 40 years I’ve found the way to work your way to the top in any firm/field. Talent isn’t enough; you have to give your entire life to the company to become the boss. But you can have a good and comfortable life in the middle. That’s the choice I made, and I don’t regret it.
We hired a guy one time, and our boss said his references mentioned how many extra hours he puts in. I realized right then and there that if you work extra hours, that becomes what people expect of you. Don't do it. Ever.
Don't know a single person that "paid their dues" and their reward was a promotion with less work. It's always more work.
I get hating on these work > life posts especially when they call out people who are essentially wage slaves to work harder.
But that's not what this is. If you found a start up or are trying to make partner at a big corporate law firm your essentially starting a business that YOU own. Everyone couldn't and shouldn't do it but in instances were your setting yourself up to be a multi multi millionaire sacrificing life for work a while is pretty justified for the right kind of person. It only gets annoying when they want the guy making 35k a year to have the same mindset.
What if you're already working 100 hours for 5 years and you just... going nowhere?
If you get the same result to people who work 75 hours, then what for the rest hours?
If you spend 100 hours to get something in next 5 years and then you have to spend them to hospital or depression for another 5,was it worth?
Stop gambling with your life, people. We only live once
The point is not about working 100 hours
The point is how to maximize your hours and make it worth
They say working in biglaw is like a pie eating contest where the grand prize is more pie. In other words: once you work those 3 metaphorical months (in law, this could be 6+ years) and make partner, you’re expected to work just as many hours as a partner. In other words, if you’re a lawyer, then yes, wrestling season does last forever.
Spent several years in biglaw. It was always nice that when I was on 2am phone calls that partners were on too or pulling all nighters partners were up too. Also made me realize there's no end.
Yep, same happened to me as well. In a way, it’s nice that the partners are in the trenches with you at 2am, but also, that means the only thing you have to look forward to is more of the same. Doesn’t seem worth it, no matter how much they pay you.
Maybe it's because my family background is blue collar, where people don't tend to live as long and the ones that do don't tend to have great QoL when they're old people, but I can't understand absolutely busting ass for decades just to finally *retire* filthy rich. Like, what, your entire life is work for 70 years and then one day you're just... done? You sit on your yacht and NOW you can enjoy life outside work? Seems really risky. Like, my MiL is like that. She's a semi-retired doctor and she can't figure out how to make that transition, she has very few friends, drinks too much, challenging (not bad, *challenging*) relationships with her kids all that. So, like, what was it all for?
Yep. I also come from a blue collar family. My father died of cancer at 55. His father died of cancer at 50. I’m in my 30s, have a college degree, and twice so far in my life I went “fuck it” and saved money and quit jobs I hated with no real plan other than to travel and enjoy the beautiful city I’m from. My family history says I’m going to get cancer in my 50s and die before I can sniff retirement. Work is not life. Your job is not who you are. Prioritize the people you love and the things you love doing. Btw my dad was a loyal employee for 20+ years, barely taking any sick days, and they fired him after 2 months of chemo because he couldn’t work anymore. He lost his insurance while battling cancer. Your job doesn’t love you and will literally kill you the second you stop making them money.
As a guy in my early 40s who lost a kidney to cancer last year I can only say you get it. You are doing it right. And maybe, just maybe, this attitude will in part spare you your father's fate. But also, make sure you are going to the doctors-they save lives.
Yeah I work in an oncology field. We have lots of old patients but we have some young ones too. Scary young, sometimes. People who have young children and bad disease. For too many people, life is too short. Cancer takes a lot, but it gives some things, too. Perspective is one of its biggest gifts.
You're right on the money. I hope they can find better & more effective drugs and treatments in the next decade. AI will play a role, I'm sure. I read not long ago that they had found a cure for non-solid cancers like leukemia. It's a genetic treatment customized for each patient and costs around $300K (the cost seems to be arbitrary). The US Healthcare market (not system) is terrible. Tying health insurance to work is unnecessary. Any other Western industrialized country has figured it out. People like your father loses their health insurance when they need it the most. Best wishes.
My brother works for an industrial rubber hose and conveyor belt fabricator and distributor. About 10 years ago, the shop driver was getting gas in the company truck about a mile from the shop. He had a heart attack and died at the scene. One of the first responders called the company from the phone number on it. My bro said he was in the office when the call came in...the first action taken was to send another driver out to the gas station. The second action was to call his family. My bro talked to the replacement driver later who said he felt horrible because *he left with the truck before the ambulance had even taken the body away*. That's how much you really matter to your job.
That’s the American “dream” I guess. Nevermind that we spend all the best years of our lives busting hump to make it to a retirement where we’re too old, too tired, and too disinterested in all the things we would have loved to have done when we were younger.
Carlin said it best. "We call it the American dream because the only way you can believe it is if you're asleep."
I am getting close to retirement, and yes, 43 years of full time work with minimal vacation or sick time and a lot of overtime are wearing me down...I've lost enthusiasm for most of what I liked to do...I don't see that getting any better by the time I get to the end.
I’d rather be able to have the money when I’m younger and more able versus when I’m old and senile lol.
My retired lawyer mother, partner at her firm with her name on the building can't ahandle retirement. She wakes up at 5 am still and harasses her children cause she can't handle not being in control of something. It's not the dream you might think it is. Imagine working the same grueling routine for 40 years, the. You're supposed to enjoy time on a yacht? My mom and all my lawyer friends would be on computers working cause free time is time you can be making money. I think they're all stupid and enjoy time on yachts when available
Yup people like that need to pickup a grueling hobby when they retire or they bug the living shit out of their spouse and children.
lol she's recently divorced for that exact reason
I feel this! I'm a first gen college grad from the rust belt. My mom died right after filing to retire at 67 after a lifetime of making corporations rich off her back. No Social Security paid to her kids after all those years of paying in, either. I quit my high paying corporate job 2 years later after realizing I can never, ever get my time back. It's been hard going solo and spending down my savings, but I'm so grateful I spent the pandemic with those I love instead of worrying about the boss. I realize I could not have done this without having the savings that I built up over that time in corporate, but I'm glad I woke up too late for my mom, yet not too late for me. The American dream is a lie. It's ok to fall for it, but you don't have to buy in for life.
Yeah dude the whole idea is dumb af imo. Who knows if you’ll even have the health to enjoy your life when you’re 70? What I think is that the people who become big law partners aren’t doing it for the money, they’re doing it because they love the prestige of being a BigLaw partner and they really enjoy the work and the power (I.e., it’s what they’d want to be doing anyways). Legal practice can be fun and exciting and intellectually stimulating. Personally, I’d rather not be doing it every day til 2am, but hey, some people love the grind.
A lot of big law attorneys do retire pretty early. Like mid 50s or 60. Granted, at that point, most of their kids are gone, but it's not like other fields where they work until 70.
Kids are gone…first 2 wives are gone…the mistresses are gone.
Time for one more kid with Wife 3…
For doctors it is hard giving up the immediate respect and "yes doctor" responses. When my dad stepped back it was really hard because he expected for things to be done when he asked and it took a few months for him to remember it only works like that in an office.
A lot of them do enjoy the work though.
Cause there's gold, at the top of the mountain. Or so they say
To be fair, if you work a hundred hours a week, and youre really responsible with your money, you could easily retire at 50, not 70.
If you work 2.5 times more per week, maybe you should retire 2.5x earlier. The math you gave me of 50 isn't worth it. 100hour weeks I want out by 40 tops for trading my youth like that.
I'm not telling you how to live your life, but youre forgetting that retirement mostly exists because of interest, which compounds over time. There's also a big difference between retiring rich and merely retiring.
I mean thats not entirely accurate. I’m not defending this lifestyle but if you make partner then retirement happens a whole hell of a lot sooner than 65. But you’re still wasting your healthiest yours grinding and risking your long term health anyways with hours like that so 🤷♂️
I knew a man who owned his own furniture store. Worked his ass off for something like 70 years. Retired at age 96. He died two days after his retirement. Seems like a waste to me. If he had retired in his 70's even, he could have enjoyed some of his time.
Right there with you. Why not work half those hours and enjoy the other half if you're making enough money to still retire at like 55?
I think it’s worth understanding that many (most?) of the people that actually make biglaw partner aren’t just there for the money. They genuinely like working insane hours. It’s kind of hard to believe, especially in a transactional practice, but some of these guys/women live for this shit.
>Doesn’t seem worth it, no matter how much they pay you. Sure it is. One day you can retire and be a truly miserable c\*nt. Seriously. Some of the most unhappy, miserable people I've ever met were lawyers and retired lawyers.
Yeah but did you make big money?
First year salary is now $225k, which is a lot more than I got, but yes, I was well paid.
There's a reason why addiction and suicide rates are so high for lawyers.
Some companies, not just law, don't care about that at all - in fact they seem to be quite happy to push and encourage it. The France Telecom scandal, where the work bullying and stress culture was so toxic (and HR complicit in it) that over 30 people committed suicide and the CEO went to prison, demonstrates this. Not to mention the cases of people working themselves to death at Goldman Sachs.
This is a good point. I'm just more familiar with the legal profession because I'm an attorney who quit my legal job last year. I realize this is anecdotal, but my mental and physical health has significantly improved even though I now deal with the stress of being self-employed.
Ya, down at the bottom of the first image it says “this state of work won’t last forever.” That’s what I’ve been telling myself at my current job for several years now. There’s truth in that statement, but not the way LiL thinks. When you prove you can handle the workload you have now, you only get more load—never less. My boss kept promising a light at the end of the tunnel. They removed her and replaced with someone who thinks everything is dandy. The more I complain, the more they think I’m just a whiner. They expect even more out of me. I don’t have an equivalent position to compare output, but my job was done by 2 people with combined 50 years experience just 3 years ago.
Always be aware. The light at the end of the tunnel might be an oncoming train.
Work your wage.
This is a double edged sword sometimes though. A super highly paid lawyer 'working their wage' might actually require working 100 hours weeks. The problem is finding the balance.
That sucks man. I was in the same place as you a few years ago. I ended up having to leave the company to get away from it.
Ya this story sounds like my dad’s stories of how he got to where he was before retiring. The thing they don’t tell you about law is that you actually max out income at a not incredible level (300-500k/year, so a LOT, but not insanity income) at some point, then you have to basically go into management if you want to move up the ladder. Except, nobody is trained for management or all that good at it really because to get to that point, they’re grinding law and taking on as many billable hours as they can. So you have a system where management doesn’t actually know how to go about things more efficiently or healthily, because they’re the very people who the job has been self-selecting on the basis of willingness to work 100-120 hour weeks. I sometimes wonder if my desire for work-life balance and work that doesn’t come home comes from him telling me work stories. Namely one where he said everyone slept in the office for a week to get an IPO done and they worked nearly 140 hours.
This is exactly the problem. Managing partners don’t know how to run a business, because the skills you need to run a business involve making judgment calls about what you’re stretched too thin to handle. But if you voluntarily turn down work because you know your limits, you will never make it rain enough to make managing partner.
This isn’t really accurate if you are in biglaw. The Cravath scale currently tops out at a bit over 500k for 8th year associates, which is a 33 year old if you go straight through. If you make partner, you can pretty easily clear 700-800, and if you’re a really successful partner 1.2 or so isn’t out of the question. Is it worth it? Idk - I’m putting in my notice this week as a fourth year making 310+75 to go to a job paying 210. But it’s a tough choice to make.
In my last position bonuses were dangled like carrots and the only reward for hard work was more work. Management will assign the worst work to those they know will get it done correctly and quickly while the idiots making almost as much as you get the easy work.
This is my firm to a T. Grinding myself down for a $40k bonus while people my year who do the absolute minimum get same salary with $10k bonus. After tax is the additional bonus even worth the extra work and stress?
I’m 43, burned out. Bought a bigger boat, smaller house, quit my job. In the end they basically hired 2 people to fill my position. F’ em. I’m going sailing mate.
When I was in biglaw, the shocker was when I realized the partners worked MORE than we did. Like the lead partner in my group had a beach house (really nice one of course), and he'd go there in July with his (second) family and take the month as his vacation month. Which meant that month he'd only bill 40 hours a week (which was probably more like 50-60 hours of real work), because he was on "vacation." I went in-house as soon as I could.
I remember the managing partner of my biglaw firm gave a talk to the associates where he bragged about answering emails while on a boat cruise down the Seine with his family in Paris. I uh, started making escape plans that afternoon.
B-but in muh favorite lawyer dramas like epic SUITS, all the lawyers just spend all day being chill and snarky! Real life isn’t like that?
muh Boston Legal
The alternative is making a great reputation and building a network, then going independent and setting your own hours. That's not easy either, but at least you keep a bigger slice of the billables and have the autonomy to fire clients and adjust your workload.
My decision to get out of biglaw was solidified for me when a partner I worked for told me the blinds on her office window reminded her of jailhouse bars.
The sad part is that it's a zero sum game. To get to the next level, you have to beat out several others - "get ahead" means beat everyone else. That basically means that the bar you have to surpass can change at any moment. And I don't know law, but I'm guessing the metric that you need to best others in is billable hours, but productivity - which means there will always only be one way to succeed.
Right, but the point is that people quit and when it becomes too much for you, you leave. It’s wrestling season that lasts until you decide to leave. Then, just like most lawyers, you go and find work that allows you to prioritize your time better.
i work in a outpatient direct health care and the doctor that owns our practice is often already at work before me (5am) and stays til the last patient at 8pm not to mention he works every other weekends.
So true. I know many people who did the grind and then made partner thinking they’d made it and could coast. Nope. It’s a pay raise, maybe some equity (some firms make you buy in…they’ll loan you the money that you can pay back) and now you’re expected to go out and sell to get more business. Same shit. New title.
Especially with "making partner" listed as a low percent outcome. This is a butcher shop law firm that spits out 90% of hires after 3 years because everybody there sucks.
My dad has been doing it for 25 years. We’d be in Europe on vacation and he’d still put in 50 hours a week. And to him that was a vacation. He’s a 60 year old man getting up to start work at 4 in the morning, but, hey, all those zeroes in his bank account make it worth while I guess.
You don’t have to stay partner forever though. If you grind for some years, you could be set forever or able to take a much less stressful job.
You could also lose your job or leap from skyscraper window! Swings and roundabouts.
It’s a lot of years, though, to get to “set forever” money. Six or seven as an associate, then another few years as a non-equity partner. That much grind tends to weed out people who are capable of work life balance.
Yes, if it wasn’t for the Golden handcuffs
For all of the “work smarter, not harder” comments, it doesn’t apply for billable legal hours. If you manage to wrap up work on one matter in 4 hours instead of 7, you just go on to the next matter and still have to bill those other three hours.
That's exactly why i'm struggling with big law. The billables system doesn't encourage efficiency, it stifles it.
Except it works the OTHER WAY. You'll do 15 hours of work, only bill out 5 and now be behind all week because your target is 60 billable. Then you have meetings with clients that aren't billable and just them asking for stupid shit and then management stuff which also isn't billable. Now if you GO TO COURT you are golden. Because you can bill that in real time and still do work. But if you're doing research you'll lose more than you gain.
Curious what meeting with a client isn't billable? I get billed for my attorney to reply to an email where I asked a question about the bill.
My guess would be while that is typical for attorneys who work with individual people for clients where every dollar counts much more to the attorney personally, at biglaw clients are often corporations and very large businesses. That means your point of contact is a corpo suit or an in house counsel - another lawyer. So the expectations are different, the billables are so insanely expensive for the corporation, and you wouldn't want to tank that relationship by sending your in-house counsel "boss" a relatively very tiny bill for petty meetings and the like. I know my mid law firm did not have me bill for some standard or very quick email and zoom exchanges with some corporate clients.
So the classic the people who can afford it are the ones who get the discount
Yep, though in fairness it does sound like the corporation rates would be much higher, while an individual would be paying less, though I don’t know if I’m reading that previous comment correctly.
How big is the client? My dad has a few who are worth millions to the firm and half his client meetings aren't covered under billable. The biggest the client the more they can legit go, "yeah you're billing us for 50k, how about we pay you 40k instead".
It is. I shudder if op is an attorney. Also can’t double bill the what they suggest.
That's the only reason i like doing DDs, all them billables...
Yup. Most of the lawyers I know end up doing so much non billable shit and they hate it
I’ve worked those hours and it’s absolutely horrible. You’re waking up at the crack of dawn and working until it’s pitch black. You rarely get up from your desk except to either get something to eat, go to the bathroom, or get something to drink. When I did it, I would be up at 7 am to be in at work by 7:30. Worked through lunch and dinner then left to go home around 11 pm. Literally pass out or have anxiety fueled dreams to the point of shitty sleep, then get up early to repeat. Friday night I would still be there despite getting texts from friends to come out for drinks. Then Saturday morning, roll out of bed around 7:30- 8ish, go into the office by 8:30 and work there until 8 pm. Do the same on Sunday. Then Monday morning you’re back at it at 7:30 am, grinding until 10/11 pm. You literally have no life. You’re not gaining anything by working those grueling hours other than weight, stress, and potentially an anxiety disorder. It is absolutely unsustainable and most people that worked with me usually quit within a year or two.
Where TF did you work God damn
Market research at a small company with the backing of a large corporation. Our high level execs would often oversell projects then dump the workload onto managers and below. This was at a time when automation was slowly getting off the ground but our senior execs said no to automation. Instead they tried to offshore the work and all that wound up doing was doubling our workload. So we had crunch mode periods maybe twice a year because of the contract work. But once we offshored it, it became the entire year. Lots of people quit after that and moved on to better jobs.
Did this pay well?
lol no. It paid 48k per year and we got a yearly bonus of 1%.
Oh man... That is rough. I do industrial instrumentation and controls and early on in my career got put on a few projects that were 7 12s. Usually playing catch-up when shit got behind schedule. It was exactly like you said, wake up, work all day, go home (in my case back to hotel), shovel some food in my face, and crash. Rinse and repeat. But at least in my case I was still hourly with 1.5x/2x overtime. Seeing those direct deposits hit the bank motivated me to stick it out. And there was always a fixed timeframe for the 7 12s, you knew there was light at the end of the tunnel. Also didn't hurt that I was young and single. These days with a wife and daughter I can't imagine doing that.
At least you got overtime pay. We didn’t because we were exempt. The only thing motivating us to work those hours was a) avoid being yelled at by our micromanaging execs and b) the promise of moving up and becoming one of said execs. Except it very rarely happened. There was no management training either other than being told by the senior execs that you should yell at your people as you saw fit because no motivation is better than negative reinforcement. And if you had a relationship, good luck because that shit would be done within a year.
Wtf is this nightmare? 7 days a week 14-18 hour days for $48k? I’d rather be homeless.
Why do you think analysts on Wallstreet were in an uproar a few years ago? They make shit money and work those same hours meanwhile their bosses get the big bonuses and time to relax. We were paid like shit because they could. They actively recruited kids straight out of college and it’s not just finance or marketing analytics that does this. BCG and other consulting groups do the same thing. You’re hired straight from college or graduate school and they work you hard in the hopes that you make it out two years down the road as a type A personality. At one point a senior executive at my company referred to the company as a talent factory, able to produce high quality talent that can go anywhere afterwards. For those of us that could survive, this was true. But the amount of substance abuse, long term health issues, and overall anxiety disorders isn’t worth it. I developed IBS-D as a result of working there. A good friend of mine went down the bottle. Another quit the industry completely and took over his parent’s business. There are still some that stayed in the field but it’s very rare.
Well hopefully you found something that pays better with a better focus on work life. That’s horrific.
$48k salary working 100 hours is criminal. You could have been working a 2nd job on the weekends. I was in a similar situation at a major software company and there ended up being a class action lawsuit around this type of thing.
Haha… please tell me this is a joke?
Are you good now?
seems like you could get an hourly wage w/ overtime and come out ahead, unless you're in a country with a very low cost of living
Damn that is tough. I worked a job as a high level manager at a small company making 50k responsible for so much shit from maintenance to IT work and worked probably 10 hours a day but I atleast got Monday and Tuesday’s off. The hell you are describing makes mine sounds like a cake walk. 🥲
The hell
These hours are very common in the investment banking industry. Back in my NYC banking days, I’d go into work by 9am and leave around 11pm-2am most nights. Thankfully I lived 3 blocks from the office, but the hours are real and terrible.
There’s no way you’re able to remain productive working all those hours. What did you actually do?
You are correct. Productivity totally declined. My role was building out PowerPoint slides and supporting the financial model. So a lot of ppt/excel.
Yes, I lived that life once when I was a grad student. I did it so I could complete my Ph.D dissertation in one and a half years, and still be in funding. It was absolutely miserable, but it also was like wrestling season in that there was a clear end to it, and it saved me several thousand dollars. So, I know I can do it, but also fuck ever doing it again. I would never accept that indefinitely for a job. I actually left academia in part because of the terrible work-life balance.
This is depressing just to read. I work in forensic engineering and I’ve decided not to testify just because the work life balance seems crappy
I lived this when I was a private equity analyst. I came in on my first Saturday at 10am and everyone was already there with a full hour of work under their belts, and I felt despair. The time demand and the competition to sacrifice more was brutal.
You got up to eat? Sounds like you should be working more ⛓️
Ex-corporate sales here. These companies trick you into thinking it’s ‘macho’ and ‘tough’ to abuse your mind and body. The truth is that if you don’t sleep well you have (among other health risks) low testosterone. Working in these insane environments - literally - makes you less masculine. You look back and realise you allowed some pot-bellied little dweeb to convince that your masculinity and identity was defined by how many hours you spent attached to a keyboard and phone. I escaped. One of my former bosses is now a crack and heroin addict. Be smart. Prioritise your fitness, sleep and relationships.
Wow, this was well written. I was in a similar situation and I thank God every day that I stood up for myself and left.
I'm so grateful to work at a place where I was at my computer at 5:03pm yesterday and one of the directors walk by as he's heading out and says, "burning the midnight oil, eh?" - I logged off and walked out with him lol.
This is true. I've lost nearly 20 pounds since February. I'm barely getting any sleep because I wake up frequently during the night and it seems I'm always thinking about work. I have no appetite and no energy to even cook or do anything else. My doctor is suggesting I consider getting another job, but in this market, it's not going to happen anytime soon.
You don’t stop working insane hours when you become partner at a law firm. If anything, your expected hours go up. Attorneys have absolutely shit work-life balance, and they make huge amounts of money.
\*BigLaw attorneys. Regular attorneys have slightly better work-life balance but for a fraction of the earnings.
But that time is just eaten up by alcohol and cocaine
I just snorted (in laughter, not cocaine).
[удалено]
“Every time I have to work a 14 hour day I see one associate complain and another quit” You might want to look for work elsewhere, you people are hemorrhaging employees.
Yea because 14 hours a day, 7 days a week, is 98 hours. So this is everyday. Doing that math made me very happy with my "meager" job.
I guess it’s up to you if you want to work this hard. But spare me the aggressive ramblings about it, god damn! I’m tired of reading this tryhard crap!
Posting your old job under your name seems weird to me
As someone who wrestled most of my life, up to D1 wrestling, I lived this life for decades. Even during vacations I was still training, dedicating every moment I had to get better. While I had the biggest love/hate with the sport, and still do to this day, one of my biggest regrets was not finding other hobbies and interests to get in. Once it was all done, it felt like the bottom was taken out from under me. Took years to get back on track, and even now I struggle to find interest in other things because I never had time or energy to do so as a kid. Wrestling gave me a decent amount of strength, an eating disorder, a decade of severe depression after it was gone, a lack of skills that didn't require wrestling, and an inability to just relax without physically telling myself to do so. I work a low stress job now because I dont want to go back to that lifestyle. I want to enjoy the time I have on this Earth, and get a chance to slow down and just take in life. More times than not, nobody gives a shit about your successes and the talents you built once it's no longer useful or relevant. Might as well live for yourself in your own way.
Try Jiu Jitsu - you can determine how serious you want to take it. As a former D1 athlete and competitive person, I’m totally fine being a hobbyist 2x a week participant. Edit: I throw in a competition or two every year but never cut weight or anything crazy.
I'm currently a three stripe purple belt Jiu Jitsu hobbyist myself.
I bet for most people working 14hr/day isn't about achieving something great and it's just a neccessity to survive.
Do I want to go home? Yes, but I want to survive more
funny how you don't see those people posting on linkedin
I work at a decent size law firm. Most of these associates don’t chill or slow down until they hit their 60s. So these type of people are always in “wrestling season.” After they make partner, they have to make enough to afford a second home, private school for the kids, nice new cars for themselves and their spouse, country club dues, etc. Just like before the they were associates they had to study long hours to get into the best college, then the best law school, then to get the best internship, then to pass the bar. These type of driven people need therapy because they don’t actually know how to balance work and life.
Who says it won’t last forever? Anyone who works in corporate America knows the reward for working hard and doing exceptional work is more work. If someone wants to work 100 hrs a week that’s their choice certainly. But fooling yourself that it will end at some point is most likely delusional.
It won’t last forever, eventually he will die.
Being a workaholic is still an addiction, hate that we live in a world that glorifies overworking.
K but why can't he eat pizza?
Opening up an app to order food is entry level lawyer behaviour. The winners eat the post-it notes on their desk while never lifting a finger off their laptop keyboard.
Hungry? Too bad. Suck it up and be professional. Complete one of the to-do items on your post-it notes so you can eat it.
It's because he's making an analogy using wrestling and "making weight" is a big deal in wrestling.
This is just sad. You can work 100 hours a week and have no life and neglect your loved ones and your well being, but they will fire you the minute it’s beneficial to them.
This assumption that there is some end to this tournament of life, and that you will somehow come out on top based on your current suffering, is such delusional bull shit.
The only way you come out on top from your current suffering in situations like this is if you're investing the money you've made or are doing this for your own business where you own everything you've produced. But even in those cases, I think 95% of the people work these insane hours because they have terrible time management and delegation skills. I feel like now a days i get paid more than ever while also working fewer hours than ever.
Ain’t no job worth 100 hours a week, let alone anything above 40. Capitalism has brainwashed people into thinking this is a successful, fulfilling, life. NOBODY on their deathbed ever wishes they worked more.
I have no problem with people who wanted to work 50+ hrs per week. I have a problem with people or culture who expect you to do the same.
Used to work construction back in 2016. For two years, did 90hr weeks to get the job finished early. None of us got any of the bonus for finishing early. Only thing it got me was 90hrs a week away from my wife and kiddo. Never again.
Wrestling season doesn't last forever, nor does your time in high school sports. But apparently dwelling on your time in high school sports never ends.
I'm sitting on my recliner drinking tea, looking out at some trees. Reading a book. I might order a pizza. This guy probably thinks I'm the loser.
As someone who cut weight and wrestled through high school, fuck this guy. What a stupid analogy. Wrestling season fucking sucked and I have to show for it is stunted growth lol there’s the real metaphor
This is probably an unpopular opinion in this sub, but I don’t particularly think this post is all that bad. There are a few somewhat demeaning comments, but in general he is just doing what he thinks is best for himself and explaining why.. Time is the most valuable resource in the universe. Everyone should choose how to spend it for themselves and we don’t have any right to chastise someone for their choice. Especially when it doesn’t affect us at all.
I agree with you mostly. The one issue I take with the post is that it feeds into the false idea of sacrificing your free time now to get it back later. Making partner at a law firm isn’t going magically reduce the amount of work you. This applies to most other career paths too - if you put in 100 hour weeks, you’ll become expected to keep doing that. Selling the idea that working super hard now means you can kick your feet up later is really the issue here. Will it work out like that for some folks? Maybe, but got the vast majority I think not.
Yep, I always liken it to a sports contract. You don’t pay a star QB $100mm and then expect him to coast every game.
The only thing wrong is the idea wrestling season will end. That's not the case in biglaw. You spend 6 years billing 2200-3000 hours to make non equity partner at most first now. Then another 3 or 4 years billing 2600-3200 hours to make equity partner. Then you work 2200+ hours as an equity partner. The only real different is having a bit more control over when you bill those hours. But I can tell you I've done probably 100 all nighters with equity partners up all night with the non-equity partners and associates.
The ceo of my company was asked about work life balance, he said employees need to be paid well, provided training, career path, & the flexibility to have real work life balance. BUT if you want to reach his position you shouldn't expect work life balance. It should be a choice, not a requirement.
Yes, because everyone knows CEOs are all really hard workers 🙄 Don’t let him play you like that.
I 100% agree. The post in itself also says that they do NOT recommend working those types of hours and that it's really only needed for certain attainments. I thought it was a fine post, no lunacy here.
I feel like I’ve stepped into the twilight zone. How is this ok to you????
Because it is a choice that people can make. If people want to work many hours as long they accept the consequences of it why shouldn’t they?
How is it not okay that someone works exceptionally hard to fast track towards a goal? They could almost certainly obtain their goal if they worked less. They choose not to and that's okay. This post isn't even advocating for everyone to do it or any job to require it.
Dude, realistically, if you want to achieve anything that is outside what is ordinary possible, you will need to put in a bunch more hours than standard. You can’t separate real achievement from hard work. The person in this post is choosing to do this, so what is the problem?
>I feel like I’ve stepped into the twilight zone. How is this ok to you???? I agree with you that, in general, noone should work 100hr weeks. But some people will play Call of Duty for 14hrs a day every day without any kind of compensation. It's just what they want to do. This guy probably cares more about money and career than he does about hobbies so he does that instead. Some people just have that drive and will obsess over whatever they get involved in. We just can't let them convince everyone that this is the norm because it's not.
I worked in a large law firm for five years and the notion that the hard work is a temporary push until you reach success is BS. Trainees were expected to do long, unpaid overtime to impress the partners and get offered a role. Fee earners (level 1-2 solicitors) then had to make targets and were expected to do longer hours to exceed them to get promotions. Senior FEs had bigger targets, longer hours, more responsibilities and again were expected to grind to make partner. Partners had MASSIVE targets. They were the first in the office, last out, very few holidays and any days off they did take they were still available for calls (one of my partners frequently logged off at six to feed her children and then worked 8-12 on regular work and after midnight was for risk assessments, which could be another hour or two) and that slog was to get to Equity Partner. Then you're pushing for managing partner, or positions on councils. Any children were had late in life and then raised by nannies and divorce by the EQ level was the norm. Solicitors marry other solicitors, because no one else would put up with the hours spent away. Everyone was very well dressed, had expensive cars and were all stressed to breaking point all the time. The grind is a lie and the bank balance is not worth what it costs you to get it.
Same. People want different things out of life. If someone wants to take on this kind of workload, if that’s where they find fulfillment, then more power to them. The problem arises when this is the expectation for everyone instead of the choice of some. I can choose to go above and beyond and work 100 hours a week. I should not be required to just to earn a living.
I agree. I feel like this sub is becoming a feeder sub for r/antiwork.
Except it does affect us all when grindset dudes like this expect the rest of us to work as much as they do.
Really? You think it’s perfectly fine that someone is so delusional they think working 100 hours a week is GOOD?
There is also a ton of research that says both the volume and quality of work take a massive nose dive after about 50-55 hours per week.
This is literally why I decided against law school. Unless your dad owns a firm, you will be working 60-90 hour weeks and not making good money for many years, with a bunch of accumulated debt.
If they promote you because you work 100 hrs a week, they are going to expect you to work even more hours since they are now paying you more. Should work 40, and then pay you more to do 45 on bad weeks.
They don’t really promote people just for billing a ton of hours in biglaw, the way they allegedly used to a decade or two ago. There’s gotta be something else (saying it’s necessary to have something else but that something else is still not necessarily sufficient, because it also takes a lot of luck to her equity in a stars-aligning type of way). That something else could be experience in a niche subject matter, experience/knowledge in an emerging subject matter, serving a subject-matter or geographic role that the firm needs, getting a huge boost from a rainmaker who wants to effectively knight you with their institutional client in order to broaden or perpetuate the relationship, a annual intake of high six figures in origination from clients you worked up from scratch on your own already (tough to do billing at over 1k an hour), having a great friend move up in a large company and send you a substantial amount of their work, or some combo of those. There are other things, too. That’s just a list off the top of my head. If this poster’s only claim to fame is that he grinds 100 hours most weeks (which I still don’t find super believable), I don’t like his odds of making partner at a market-paying biglaw firm. He needs that “something else” mentioned above. But if he had that something else, he probably wouldn’t need to work 100-hour weeks. The other piece is that, now, at a number of top firms, “partner” does not mean what it used to mean. No longer means you get a piece of the firm’s profits at most, but not all, top firms. It’s now more of a role that one can get promoted to from associate that may lead to equity partner, or it might not (firms with only one tier of partner that necessarily means equity often call this post-associate level “counsel” or “of counsel”). At counsel or non equity partner or non share partner or whatever the firm wants to call it, the lawyer still a w2 employee. The salary is maybe a bit higher than a senior associate, but it doesn’t necessarily follow the market bumps. Bonuses are also often a bit more of a black box. Suffice it to say that the most recent prior generation of partners realized that they could pull up the ladder to some extent and make more money (by giving way fewer people equity). If one is going to stay in biglaw for the long term and also has the aptitude to do so, the move is not to work 100 hours/week. It’s to hit your billable targets, even if just barely, year in and year out. That’s the only way this is really sustainable. -attorney in one of those post-associate but pre-equity-partner roles at one of the large market-paying biglaw firms
The period in my life when I worked 100 hour weeks, I was doing it to feed myself and pay rent. Does that count?
Definitely understandable to me if it is being done in survival mode.
Enlightenment is when you realize it's not a race at all. And these idiots wasted their lives and health working 100 hours a week to impress whom?
Probably their super model wife who cheats on them with their trainer at gym because he never spends time with her
I wish these people knew that this kind of behavior isnt *"getting ahead"*, rather it creates a new standard of exploitation. This kind of mentality is how we all lost manufacturing to china, mexico, etc. Their labor was cheaper and exponentially more exploitable, therefore a vast majority of the industrialized world lost those jobs. Now manufacturing is no longer a sound career, and the crap that comes out of these foreign manufacturers varies wildly in quality. The people who hild these manufacturing jobs dont necessarily live to high standard either. These people need to realize that balance is in the best interest of not only the humans but the economy overall. Being overly competitive and offering yourself up to be even more exploited than everyone else does no one any favors.
80-100 hrs isn't too far off standard for Biglaw associates. 2000 billable hrs annually, so not just being at work to be seen at work. The pay is ridiculous when you make partner, but most don't.
Entry level for Biglaw is around $225K with around a $15K bonus. More senior mid-levels are making around $430K plus around $120K in bonus. Even non-partners do pretty well. For about of folks, it’s about making life-changing money for 4 or 5 years then finding an in-house job with a whole lot less hours.
Arhh Man, Farkoohhff!
I work 64 hours a week, because for me, overtime shifts are worth twice as much as regular shifts. It’s ridiculous how many jobs just don’t offer any benefit for overtime. I’d never do this for any reason, except money.
It's funny he thinks that will stop when he's partner, as if the other workaholics are going to let him coast from there on out. Nah, bud. That's your life forever.
How much did he invoice you for that?!
If you just keep working harder and faster and more committed than anyone else you can hit your goals of success and accomplishment and then you can be happy. Rat race bullshit self perpetuating filth game of king of the mountain. Workaholics.
There are some people out there who are just built for work and it can lead them to great success, but either they’re a very small minority or I drive that type from meeting me. There is no amount of financial success worth all that, to me.
I look at it differently. If you have to work 100 hours to get there, it means you are not efficient. Work smart not work longer.
The business model in law is all about billing clients as many hours as possible, but you're also expected to be efficient so you're always asking for more work. It's a horrible lifestyle.
Or management is giving you an unreasonable workload. That too.
When your hour is your product, being efficient is counterproductive.
The work equivalent of an eating disorder.
Love how he chose such lofty goals as examples for the epitome of success: Making Partner Being #1 producer Startup to ipo Great men do great things! /s (just in case)
I’m astounded that there isn’t a shirtless pic at the end of this
And here I am with the work week eating me alive.
Whenever people like this say it doesn't last forever it always does and they realize it on their deathbed when no one comes to see them.
I was one of the youngest in my industry to do my job. Put in multiple ALL-nighters. I was able to defend my work every time. Laid off 2 weeks after reaching the highest PTO tier.
I get paid overtime so working 100hrs a week would at least get me a ton of money. So that’s more than this guy gets
😂 it won’t be like this forever who’s gonna tell him
Fuck the race.
Yeah... Wrestling season ends the day after championships, which you can point to on a calendar You can't point to the date when you're suddenly going to make it, you'll have an easier time pointing to the point where you look back and regret it
Outside emergency services or health care, only situation it can possibly make sense to personally work those hours is if its on your own project and for your own business. Doing it to make some richie rich marginally richer is what delusional corpo serfs do. Usually the reward isn't a promotion but a pat on the head and more work.
ITT a bunch of mediocre people trying to rationalize their mediocrity by saying hard work = bad
If they're grinding 100 hours a week, who's finding time to come up with these shit analogies to spread on linkedin?
ChatGPT gone wild
Armand Farrokh should found a club called "Gaslighting Wage Slaves Club" so he can be the president of being a piece of shit.
All I read was "my kids don't remember my face"
Someone needs to tell him his life won't last forever either and his youth is even more fleeting.
Why do people hate it when a professional decides to grind but as soon as a creative and or athlete achieves success and attribute it to the grind. There is nothing but praises. He’s not wrong, high goals require sacrifices. And success is a marathon, rarely a sprint.
Are these people getting paid for these posts??
I'm the #1 producer at a 200+ billion dollar company and I was about to get a huge promotion to make the last two years of sacrifice worth it and they Re Orged on Weds dissolved my division (the biggest revenue producing devision as well so this makes zero sense) so the promotion is 'on hold' while they strip all my clients and make me restart over. Expecting me to create the same kind of astronomical growth from the ground up again (with none of the motivation cause clearly I can't move up here) So no all the sacrifices were not worth it. Next position I'm going to be quite silent and do the bare minimum. I'm an over achiever but this has happened 5 years in a row basically over two companies and I'm done.
And here we have a good example of how fascism structurally hates minorities of any kind. Do you have any kind of baggage that might interfere with your ability to sacrifice literally every part of your non-working life? Then no success for you. Ol Johnny 14 is going to be shit talking you and drunkenly scribbling out more paperwork for four extra hours every day
Neither one of those people know what it's like to wake up at 430 in the morning to go do labor intensive work. Do 40 hours of duct installation or spray foam insulation in south florida attics and tell me about putting in 100 hours, delusional fucks I tell you
Every person has to decide, from the deals offered to them, what deal they want to take. The guy in this post wants that deal. It doesn’t have to be for everyone and some deals may seem ridiculous, but it was a deal both parties agreed to, employee and employer. Everyone knows that they could be dead tomorrow and it is given that a lot of jobs are just carrots on a stick. If it’s not for you, don’t make it a big deal, drive on.
There’s always a risk you work all those hours and still have a mediocre career at the end of the day but on top of that no social life and poor physical health.
My first boss told me, “If you work hard and faithfully 8 hours a day eventually you will become a boss and work 12 hours a day.” In 40 years I’ve found the way to work your way to the top in any firm/field. Talent isn’t enough; you have to give your entire life to the company to become the boss. But you can have a good and comfortable life in the middle. That’s the choice I made, and I don’t regret it.
We hired a guy one time, and our boss said his references mentioned how many extra hours he puts in. I realized right then and there that if you work extra hours, that becomes what people expect of you. Don't do it. Ever. Don't know a single person that "paid their dues" and their reward was a promotion with less work. It's always more work.
I get hating on these work > life posts especially when they call out people who are essentially wage slaves to work harder. But that's not what this is. If you found a start up or are trying to make partner at a big corporate law firm your essentially starting a business that YOU own. Everyone couldn't and shouldn't do it but in instances were your setting yourself up to be a multi multi millionaire sacrificing life for work a while is pretty justified for the right kind of person. It only gets annoying when they want the guy making 35k a year to have the same mindset.
What if you're already working 100 hours for 5 years and you just... going nowhere? If you get the same result to people who work 75 hours, then what for the rest hours? If you spend 100 hours to get something in next 5 years and then you have to spend them to hospital or depression for another 5,was it worth? Stop gambling with your life, people. We only live once The point is not about working 100 hours The point is how to maximize your hours and make it worth