Law firm question

[rupertpenny]

Is this normal?

My H is an associate at a large (but not big law) law firm and has been told that he can’t take time off in December, especially the last two weeks. The office is closed on the 25th but otherwise open.

We planned to go home for the week of Christmas. There is nothing pressing going on regarding end of year and he can and will work remotely as necessary. He is meeting his hours targets. He has plenty of unused PTO. This wasn’t a problem in the HK office of the same firm, he regularly took 2 weeks off there.

So basically, WTF?

[aliciabella]

This is pretty normal in my experience especially if I am lower on the totem pole. We also can't take off or call in sick the day after a holiday. It has more to do with seniority and the fact everyone wants off than work performance.

[rupertpenny]

Oct 10, 2019 16:09:41 GMT -5 aliciabella said:

This is pretty normal in my experience especially if I am lower on the totem pole. We also can't take off or call in sick the day after a holiday. It has more to do with seniority and the fact everyone wants off than work performance.

He is a senior associate, if that makes a difference. And he will still work! Just not from his office in midtown. Ugh.

[thedutchgirl]

What type of work does he do? That time is traditionally a really busy time for M&A lawyers, because companies try to close deals around that time. The transactional lawyers at my firm are always working 20-hour days around the holidays due to emergency deals. We litigators on the other hand basically take the month of December off.

Who has told him this, though? A partner? Another associate? HR?

[aliciabella]

Oct 10, 2019 16:12:18 GMT -5 rupertpenny said:

Oct 10, 2019 16:09:41 GMT -5 aliciabella said:

This is pretty normal in my experience especially if I am lower on the totem pole. We also can't take off or call in sick the day after a holiday. It has more to do with seniority and the fact everyone wants off than work performance.

He is a senior associate, if that makes a difference. And he will still work! Just not from his office in midtown. Ugh.

He can still be a senior associate but with less years in the firm. We have always gone by the most years in gets first dibs and everyone wants those weeks off especially if they have kids because the schools are off. I am assuming they need people physically in the building. It sucks and maybe he can find someone to give up their time. IDK. I am sorry

[kadams767]

Unfortunately yes. I haven’t had a December day off other than Christmas and sometimes NYE if all deals have closed since the recession, so 2009? It sucks, but we are basically on PTO blackout from Thanksgiving until January 1st.

Sorry, should add that I’m a corporate attorney in a niche practice area, so it affects the whole form.  December is a really busy time for us.  

[brooke77]

I’m a BigLaw Senior Associate and no one can take anytime in March off in my practice area (end of fiscal year). So, I don’t find it odd that a month is blocked off from PTO.

I’m also not surprised if a different office had a different policy since managing partners can run offices differently.

[rupertpenny]

He does private client tax and estate planning. So end of year can be busy if there are estate tax changes or something similar, but that isn’t the case this year. Worst case scenario some rich guy gets mad at his son at Christmas Eve dinner and wants to cut him out of the will.

I could be wrong, but I don’t think it’s an issue of covering for other people, it seems to be a blanket rule.

@@@@
We do have children, one school aged, and H says the expectation is just that associates don’t have kids. This enrages me for many reasons.

[bronxgirl]

Was he previously told that he could have this time off and now it was rescinded? Or did he assume he could take it off, but didn't put in his request until now? That sounds quite frustrating, but not uncommon. Sorry your travel plans are affected. :-(

[kadams767]

Oct 10, 2019 17:12:33 GMT -5 rupertpenny said:

He does private client tax and estate planning. So end of year can be busy if there are estate tax changes or something similar, but that isn’t the case this year. Worst case scenario some rich guy gets mad at his son at Christmas Eve dinner and wants to cut him out of the will.

I could be wrong, but I don’t think it’s an issue of covering for other people, it seems to be a blanket rule.

@@@@
We do have children, one school aged, and H says the expectation is just that associates don’t have kids. This enrages me for many reasons.

@@@

To your last point, I don't think it's expected that they don't have kids, it's just that if the kids travel for the holidays, it's with their SO separately.  I've had to fly/drive solo many times over the years to meet my husband and other family members for holiday festivities.  It is not ideal, but very common.   

[rupertpenny]

Man, it sounds like I was out of the US for too long. Hong Kong is not know for work life balance or generous leave policies but damn, people were allowed to visit their families for important religious holidays.

[brooklyn]

Unfortunately normal. H isn’t a lawyer, but still can’t generally take all that end of year time off, even though he’s entitled to 6 weeks vacation per year.

I generally travel without him, which sucks, but seeing my extended family is important to me.

[aliciabella]

Oct 10, 2019 17:30:08 GMT -5 rupertpenny said:

Man, it sounds like I was out of the US for too long. Hong Kong is not know for work life balance or generous leave policies but damn, people were allowed to visit their families for important religious holidays.

I think the issue is that everyone wants off for the holidays and with American schools the kids are off for at least 2 weeks so finding care is hard.

I work/worked at the most family friendly public defenders/ ACLU offices you could imagine and this was always an issue because literally EVERYONE wants off, everyone has family and kids and it just is impossible to give everyone off and we are required to be open by law. So I get it. It sucks. I am sorry.

[rupertpenny]

I might be unreasonably pissed off about this. My H works all the time. He works hard. He does his job well. He almost never takes true vacation days, he is ALWAYS working. He routinely covers others for their cultural/religious holidays. For example, in five years in HK he was always the person who covered for Chinese New Year. All he wants is to work remotely for a few days on one of the slowest weeks of the year.

I think I’m more mad about this that he is. It will be ironic if we moved to be closer to family but then can’t actually see family for the holidays. I could go without him, but I don’t want him to be alone for Christmas and his birthday (12/31).

[kadams767]

Oct 10, 2019 19:00:13 GMT -5 rupertpenny said:

I might be unreasonably pissed off about this. My H works all the time. He works hard. He does his job well. He almost never takes true vacation days, he is ALWAYS working. 

The problem with this logic is that he is likely working with a group of people just like him.  As a general rule, we all work hard and work all the time and rarely take vacation days.     

[StrawberryBlondie]

Pretty normal. It's common for law firms to not allow vacation, period, in the first X months of employment.

ETA: I don't think it'll be as slow as you're thinking it will be. That week was always really busy when I practiced (family law).

[mcsangel2]

It sounds to me like when you lived in HK, he was one of a few (if not the only one) asking for Christmas holidays off (because of your reference of him working Chinese New Year). Now you live where everyone wants Christmas off. In my entire working life of almost 30 years, the new guy always gets last dibs on vacation requests, regardless of job title.

[rupertpenny]

Oct 10, 2019 19:45:22 GMT -5 mcsangel2 said:

It sounds to me like when you lived in HK, he was one of a few (if not the only one) asking for Christmas holidays off (because of your reference of him working Chinese New Year). Now you live where everyone wants Christmas off. In my entire working life of almost 30 years, the new guy always gets last dibs on vacation requests, regardless of job title.

There is a high proportion of non-Christians in both offices. And culturally celebrating Christmas is a thing both places. He actually got more time off in HK because Boxing Day was a public holiday 🤷🏻‍♀️

So far no one has told him he can’t take off, only that it isn’t the norm, people don’t do this, etc. He will come to FL unless someone tells him out right he cannot. Part of the problem is that he is reporting to 10ish partners right now, only one has registered disapproval and it isn’t the one that does his reviews.

Honestly I’m glad he is finally standing up for himself a little bit. Work always takes priority over everything for him, and I’m left carrying the weight. I know places like law firms will never change if no one, especially WASPy males, never push back at all.

[cosmowife]

This was the case in the law firm where I used to work. In this case, there was one tax credit group that was super swamped at the year end. There was no way for them to take any time around the holidays. To make it “fair”, the firm prohibited anyone from taking vacation for basically the last month of the year. They even had the office holiday party in January so that no time would be wasted in December. This firm also gave out bonuses at 4:45 pm on New Year’s Eve and requires you to be present to get them, so I don’t think that this firm was an example of employee-friendliness in general.

[cville]

My firm didn't say you couldn't take time off or travel, but also didn't care if you'd taken time off* and traveled. If work had to be done, it had to be done. Plus it was expected you monitor your email/text/phone. And deal lawyers always worked the holidays and end of fiscal year.



*the firm actually doesn't have a leave policy for attorneys except I think out of office 2+ weeks in a row had to be authorized by the practice group leader. Buuuuuuut, that's all a lie because you have to hit your billables regardless so "no accrued PTO, leave is whenever" only sounds good.

[suzyp]

I will be the outlier. I have been an attorney for 15+ years and never heard of it. I do litigation, so there is not really a specific busy time of year. You were expected to get your hours in and your work done - so you had to determine when and if you could take time off. There was never any expectation that you would be in the office on 12/26. I also found that most of my opposing counsel would also be cognizant of the holidays when putting together scheduling orders because they didn't want to have to work over them.

I'd be super pissed too. The idea that he would have to be IN the office is ridiculous to me. I have worked plenty a Xmas Eve in my mother's spare bedroom because I had stuff that needed to be done.

I worked in DC and Houston - NYC is a different animal and the work expectations are higher from what I understand.

[isabel]

I'm not an attorney, but my mom is one and has practiced law most of my life. She's always been able to take time off around Christmas. In fairness though, her practice area is in special education representing school districts, which are obviously closed that time of year.

I guess it's surprising to me that this is seemingly the norm. I kind of thought once you get out of the essential employee (by that I mean, needing to show up physically, like doctors or restaurant servers) realm those kinds of rules went out the window.

I hope he's able to go and doesn't face any repercussions. That's a really shitty policy, even if it is not uncommon.

[dorothyinAus]

When I was working at a medium-size corporate defense firm, the rules were always only 2 people off from any department/section at any time and a maximum of 3 partners/Associates/secretaries out on any day. It meant in a firm of 50 people only 9 were allowed any one day off. Holidays were popular and time was awarded on a first-come/first-served basis. If more than one person wanted the same days off, it went on seniority. I was at the first 12 years before I got to schedule my vacation around a holiday and then it was only because I begged someone to trade their time-off with me so I could go on a family reunion cruise to celebrate my father's 60th birthday.

Talking to other people at law firms, this is quite a common set up. It's the way it worked at my father's engineering firm as well.

Sorry you can't get the holidays off, but I don't think it's all that unusual.

[badgergrl]

Another outlier here...

My husband is biglaw in a midsized city

He has unlimited PTO because he has a billable hour requirement.

I’m not even sure how he would request time off. He just marks when he’s out in his calendar. But he’s always available by phone and often works when he’s on vacation.

[klingklang77]

I think it is pretty normal. When I was with my lawyer ex-H, they were usually able to work out the vacation schedule (he was usually able to get that week off between Xmas and NYE), but it was expected that everyone take turns around holidays. He was also expected to work if it were needed. If there was a conflict in vacation timing, then those who had kids had priority, which annoyed me because we didn’t have kids.

[rupertpenny]

Oct 10, 2019 23:51:03 GMT -5 badgergrl said:

Another outlier here...

My husband is biglaw in a midsized city

He has unlimited PTO because he has a billable hour requirement.

I’m not even sure how he would request time off. He just marks when he’s out in his calendar. But he’s always available by phone and often works when he’s on vacation.

This is how it usually works. He technically has a set number of vacation days, but he is always available. There has never been any pushback before.

[Jalapeñomel]

Oct 10, 2019 22:50:29 GMT -5 isabel said:

I'm not an attorney, but my mom is one and has practiced law most of my life. She's always been able to take time off around Christmas. In fairness though, her practice area is in special education representing school districts, which are obviously closed that time of year.

I guess it's surprising to me that this is seemingly the norm. I kind of thought once you get out of the essential employee (by that I mean, needing to show up physically, like doctors or restaurant servers) realm those kinds of rules went out the window.

I hope he's able to go and doesn't face any repercussions. That's a really shitty policy, even if it is not uncommon.

When I worked in corporate America, the days around Christmas were blacked out for anyone who wasn’t a supervisor or had seniority.

[momof2]

I’m an attorney that was biglaw but I’ve been in house for years and now manage a team of lawyers. I think your husband may have made some political missteps here. First, before talking to the partners, he should ask around to fellow associates about how vacations and holidays are typically handled. Here are some of my guesses:

1. He probably violated a don’t ask/don’t tell norm. Most lawyers I know don’t spend time tracking vacation. They work whenever they need to but sometimes they are remote.

2. He is asking people way too early. No partner is going to admit at the beginning of 4q that they likely won’t be busy at end of year.

3. He asked for time off rather than offhandedly mentioning that well he will be remote at the end of December.

I could be way off track but this is why he needs to poke around with some associates to see what they do. And if he ends up having to work on site this year, he will gather some excellent intelligence for next year when he sees just who is really at their desk on dec 26, 27, etc.

[knx9211]

My firm is completely empty the last two weeks of December. But we don’t really do transactional work. I’m sorry this is going to mess with your holiday plans. I have friends who do transactional work and they work CONSTANTLY in December.

[kadams767]

Oct 11, 2019 7:36:44 GMT -5 BirdGirl said:

Oct 11, 2019 7:18:49 GMT -5 momof2 said:

I’m an attorney that was biglaw but I’ve been in house for years and now manage a team of lawyers. I think your husband may have made some political missteps here. First, before talking to the partners, he should ask around to fellow associates about how vacations and holidays are typically handled. Here are some of my guesses:

1. He probably violated a don’t ask/don’t tell norm. Most lawyers I know don’t spend time tracking vacation. They work whenever they need to but sometimes they are remote.

2. He is asking people way too early. No partner is going to admit at the beginning of 4q that they likely won’t be busy at end of year.

3. He asked for time off rather than offhandedly mentioning that well he will be remote at the end of December.

I could be way off track but this is why he needs to poke around with some associates to see what they do. And if he ends up having to work on site this year, he will gather some excellent intelligence for next year when he sees just who is really at their desk on dec 26, 27, etc.

Eh. Maybe because I don’t give a f*ck about power games like this (and have the luxury not to now), but I don’t see why asking a partner what the policy is for leave around the holidays is a big deal.* I also have zero patience for the way many firms are managed though.

*The facts of how he found out aren’t totally clear to me either. But even if he did directly ask, I think that’s fine. I also don’t think he asked them to confirm that they wouldn’t be busy, just trying to feel out whether he could WORK remotely.

I used to play chicken essentially with vacation. I would just schedule it and see what happened. There was really no way to ask because no one was going to say “yes we’ll make sure you can go.” So I would take my best guess and then just start telling everyone I would be out on X days. I never had to cancel a vacation, but I know others who did.

As a partner, I'd have no issue if he asked.  But asking me is taking the chance that you aren't going to like my answer.  Which, in my specific area at my specific firm, would be no.  And that's where the benefit of talking to other associates and employees would come in, because he'd know in advance that it's not a good move.  But I wouldn't hold it against someone for asking me about it.        

I am fine with the chicken game all year round, and we do our best to accommodate vacation time.  Except during two months of the year, one of which is December.  If someone just started saying they would be out on such and such days in December, there would be a mutiny here.  So, again, it would definitely pay to feel out the other associates and paralegals as to how things really work, whether official policy or not.