Link to a previous thread on MBA’s- started off with a “what don’t they teach you” OP but discusses a lot of what to expect in a business/MBA-based career…
In his defense, I don’t think that’s an unfair thing to say. I’m starting a JD here in Ontario next year, and I’m fortunate that the admissions process is (supposedly) a bigger gatekeeper than in the states. (I finished in top 12% of the LSAT or something like that; I don’t hold much stock in it, though)
There are people with legitimate grievances about their law school experience. My buddy is on a full scholarship to one of the bottom of the barrel law schools in California. Although his grades are exemplary, he knows that he needs to move up to a better school for 2L if he stands a chance of getting employed in law. Now, if he stays there and gets a paralegal job, or office job, that pays less than a lawyer, is that law school’s fault, or his?
Anecdote here: I know a few MBAs that own their own business, or who work in arts administration (I just did my master’s in music). They’re doing well. I also enough people stuck in a rut, who went out and decided an MBA will open doors. My mother works as a chartered account, and was high up the corporate chain before I was born. She’s quite disdainful of MBAs, whom she’s referred to as “stupid apes who bought a twelve month degree.” I think the truth is somewhere in between: it shows a level competence and financial accumen, but it depends where you go. A Harvard MBA >=< university Phoenix online MBA. Same as a JD. See what school these bitter resentful people graduated from. Neither is a sure thing, IMO.
I know several people who went to Harvard Law whom I would not trust to handle any litigation. Two of them never practiced law, except on who represented himself poorly. Another fancied himself a great lawyer who was well educated and well connected, but was a complete screaming lunatic. (I model myself on him.)
President Obama is a Harvard law grad whom “they” actually let teach constitutional law, and I am convinced that he knows very little about the subject based on his actions and words in the Bradley Manning case alone. Even a first year cub reporter knows that Bradley Manning allegedly broke the law. The operative word being allegedly.
I also know several Harvard Law grads to whom I would entrust litigation matters.
I hear that a lot. Mostly from people without MBAs who don’t make as much money. I’m curious how someone would think that having MORE education would make them less intelligent.
You sir, have the boorish manner of a Yalie!
Actually a lot of lawyers, especially those in corporate law, never really “practice law” in the sense of representing clients in a courtroom. Mostly they just gather lots of information and file forms, much like an accountant.
And why are they always “practicing” law? Don’t they ever just “do” law? Amiright?
He’s not threadshitting. He’s offering a perspective from the other side, which is helpful when 99% of the people posting in these threads - including lawyers - are saying “don’t do it!”
That said, I’m a student at a fourth tier law school, and the only reason I’m going is that I have a job waiting for me on the other side. Three quarters of my classmates who graduate won’t have jobs within two years - and that’s based on the school’s own statistics.
“Oh good, someone linked to a butthurt whiner lamenting [blah blah blah]” is not offering a perspective, it’s well-poisoning. Plenty of people were offering solid reasons to go to law school, lavenderviolet was pretty much the only one with a “don’t do it!” type post. The linked article may very well be bullshit - but we’ve seen this routine from RR before, and we know how deep the rabbit hole goes.
Well, she made more money than the MBAs she hired, thanks. And I’ve hung around enough people doing PhDs in cultural and interdisciplinary studies to know that there’s no 1:1 relation between doing more degrees and being more intelligent. I think it’s a parabola on a line graph. 
The point isn’t that people with MBAs are dumb, it’s that dumbasses who get MBAs aren’t suddenly transformed into these intellectual titans. Were I a more dickish Canadian, I would point to one of your former presidents as a case in point.
I wish you the best of luck. Remember that my perspective is tempered by my own experiences. You’ve got to make the call on what’s best for you…and please don’t give too much weight to the words of a burned out cynical country lawyer. I didn’t have the opportunties Rand did. I went to an ABA accredited law school, but it wasn’t in the top 100 law schools or anything. I just missed graduating in the top third of my class. Biglaw would never even think about looking at a guy like me. My loan payments are $820/month, and on a public interest lawyer’s salary, that’s painful.
On the up side, I have tried cases against Biglaw guys many times, and I usually kick their ass in court. It can be really satisfying to just PWN one of those guys. Guys like that probably pay more in taxes than I earn in a year…but I can go toe to toe with them anytime.
I’m curious–what are these “opportunities” that I had, exactly?
Let me just put it this way-
*I make more money as an MBA summer intern than I did as a GS-14 federal attorney working in Los Angeles on multi-million dollar health care real estate transactions. So while I had to pay/indebt myself with an MBA tuition to do it…I basically surpassed my old salary within 10 months
*I find my current job infinitely more fun and all the less fun shit I basically just get to email over as questions to the lawyers
*I have international mobility
*Allowed a great deal more creativity
*The curriculum is far more fun and interesting.
*Your classmates will be better socially adjusted and more mature.
All that said, law school was the more intellectually rigorous program and the one that really thought me how to think and analyze issues very carefully. I was nervous going back to b-school because I studied philosophy undergrad and then went to law school and didn’t do anything quanty since the end of high school…and it turned out more than fine. If you can write well, think logically and have reasonable social skills…it’s not that hard. The math was just mechanical. I do a lot of stats based work at my current job and it’s honestly not that hard-I was at a one on one meeting with my boss the other day and she told me she was just impressed that I picked up an entire industry without much assistance…and well, honestly, that’s because I did that all the time when I was practicing law (except imagine obscure areas of law).
By the way, there is a solid segment of business schools made up of creatives/non-profit people/alternative careers (the school lumps me and all the other lawyers in here…even the one that came from Skadden Arps!). I have two friends who are ex-teachers. One is at Bain and the other is at Google.
You said you went to a name school and you did well. That gave you the opportunity to get into Biglaw, and now you’re a partner.
I went to a mediocre school, and did ok. Biglaw wouldn’t even look at a guy like me. My employment options were pretty much to hang my own shingle, work for the government in some capacity, work in a smaller firm, or work for a non-profit.
I’m not knocking you, Rand, or anything that you’ve achieved. You’re reaping the rewards for what you’ve accomplished, and good on ya. I guess I am a little bitter that I’ll never hit the big time…but that’s my fault, not yours.
OK. I didn’t go to a “name school” though, but I did do really well there.
I just sometimes see this “opportunities” talk as a way of implying that somehow people who’ve done well had stuff handed to them instead of working for it. It’s a way of casting my accomplishments in a way that downplays my role in creating them. So it rubs me the wrong way. I see you don’t mean anything like that, though.
Rand, if I’ve read the tea leaves correctly, you went to JMLS and there was a bit of luck in the form of graduating when you did. I know a few JMLS grads who did very well there as well, but Biglaw firms aren’t hiring their graduates in a down economy. (Every JMLS grad I’ve met has been a fine attorney, and more than just technically competent, but the school has an unfavorable reputation and when firms contract their summer classes, it’s not the Harvard or Chicago grads who feel the pinch.)
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I didn’t got to JMLS.
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I could have been hit by a truck the day I graduated law school, so I guess from that perspective everything that’s happened in my life is due simply to the luck of not getting hit by a truck.
That’s not untrue, so I’m not sure what you think it proves. Of course, not being hit by a truck is a fairly common state, so it doesn’t differentiate you from most folks. On the other hand, business cycles run about a decade or so, so a moderate number of people graduate during peaks and another during troughs. And this is a little more volatile.
Out of curiosity, where did you go?
I don’t wanna say. I’ve already said too much about myself on here really.
Out of curiousity, when exactly do you think I graduated?
On the basis of past posts: 2001.
Wow. That’s closer than I thought you’d get. 