Questions to Ask at a Law Firm Interview
Questions for candidates interviewing at a law firm, covering billable targets, how work is assigned, feedback and review, attrition, the partnership track, and what an ordinary week actually looks like.
The questions
Open any question for the note
What does a first-year associate here spend most of their time doing?
Why ask it
The honest answer for many groups is document review, research memos, and closing checklists, and there is nothing wrong with that. What you are listening for is whether the interviewer describes real tasks or reaches for words like sophisticated and cutting-edge.
How does work get assigned: from a central pool, or from individual partners?
Why ask it
A central assignment system spreads work and gives you a person to go to when you are drowning. A free market means your year depends on which partners find you, and that a quiet start can turn into a bad review.
What is the billable hour target, and what counts toward it?
Why ask it
The target is the least interesting half. Whether training, pro bono, recruiting, and business development count is what decides how many actual hours you sit at your desk to reach it.
What did associates in this group actually bill last year?
Why ask it
Real averages usually sit above the stated target, and the gap is the truth about the group. If the interviewer does not know or will not say, that answer is worth as much as a number.
Who reviews my written work, and how does feedback usually reach me?
Why ask it
Being edited by a senior associate line by line is how you learn. Getting silent redlines back from a partner you never speak to is how people plateau for three years and then get told they are not developing.
How much client contact does a junior associate get, and when does it start?
Why ask it
Early client contact is the main reason to prefer a smaller group or a leaner staffing model. Firms that keep juniors away from clients until year four are also keeping them away from the skills partnership is judged on.
Is the client base a few large clients or many smaller ones?
Why ask it
Concentration cuts both ways: a handful of large clients means deep, repeat work and a serious problem if one leaves. Many smaller clients means more variety, more origination pressure, and more matters that stop and start.
How does pro bono work count toward the billable target?
Why ask it
Firms with strong stated commitments sometimes cap creditable pro bono hours at a level that makes real cases impossible. Ask for the cap and whether anyone in the group has hit it.
What are the expectations about being reachable at night and on weekends?
Why ask it
Every firm says it depends on the deal. The useful follow-up is what happened the last time an associate here was unreachable for an evening, because the answer describes the actual norm.
How does remote or flexible working operate in this group day to day?
Why ask it
Written policies are firm-wide and practice is group-specific, usually set by whichever partner runs the group. Ask how many days people are in and whether anyone senior works the same way.
What training happens in the first year besides live matters?
Why ask it
Structured training in deposition practice, drafting, or negotiation costs the firm billable time, so its presence signals real investment. Its absence means you learn by watching, which depends entirely on who you are staffed with.
How do associates get staffed on matters outside their own practice group?
Why ask it
Cross-group work is how you find out what you actually like practicing before you are committed. In siloed firms it is discouraged quietly, through staffing rather than policy, so ask for recent examples.
How many of the associates who started five years ago are still here?
Why ask it
This is the single most informative number in the interview and one candidates rarely ask for. Heavy attrition is not automatically bad, but the reasons should be something the interviewer can explain without hesitation.
Where did the people who left this group most recently go?
Why ask it
Departures to clients and government roles suggest people leaving on good terms with useful training. Departures to direct competitors, or a pattern of people leaving without a next job, tells a different story.
How does someone make partner here, and who in this group did it most recently?
Why ask it
If nobody in the group has been promoted for years, the track exists on paper only. The named example also lets you ask what that person had done by that point, which is more concrete than a list of criteria.
Is there a long-term non-partner track, and how is it regarded internally?
Why ask it
Counsel and staff attorney roles can be a sensible landing place or a holding pattern for people who were passed over. How the interviewer talks about the people in those roles tells you which it is here.
How are billable targets and reviews handled for someone taking parental leave?
Why ask it
Ask whether targets are prorated, whether bonus eligibility survives, and whether anyone has taken the full allowance recently. A generous policy nobody uses is a policy that costs something to use.
How has the makeup of the partnership changed in the past five years?
Why ask it
This asks for evidence rather than intentions, and it can be answered from public information you can check afterward. A firm with committee names and no changed numbers is telling you where the effort is going.
What is the hardest part of working here?
Why ask it
Every honest lawyer has an answer ready. A response of nothing really, or a rehearsed complaint about how demanding the clients are, usually means the interviewer has decided to sell rather than describe.
What has kept you here?
Why ask it
Best asked of a mid-level associate rather than a partner, since a partner's reasons are structural. Answers about specific people and specific work hold up; answers about prestige and the platform generally do not.
Interviewing at a law firm
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Match the question to the interviewer
- Partners can answer strategy, client base, and what the group is trying to build. They are the wrong audience for hours and lifestyle questions, and asking them there produces the official line.
- Mid-level associates are the most useful people in the process. They know the real hours, who is difficult to work for, and why the last few people left, and they are far enough along to answer honestly.
- First-year associates know the onboarding and the training, but they have not yet seen a review cycle or a slow month.
- Recruiting staff know process, timing, and policy documents precisely. Use them for logistics rather than culture.
- Ask the same question of two people at different levels. The gap between the answers is often the most reliable thing you learn all day.
Preparation that shows
- 1Read two or three recent matters the group has handled and be able to say why one interested you. Naming a case is a small effort that very few candidates make.
- 2Check the firm's public associate and partner numbers over the past few years before you walk in, so you can ask about a change rather than a general trend.
- 3Look up the people you are meeting: where they trained, what they write about, whether they moved firms recently.
- 4Have a short, honest answer ready for why this firm rather than the three others in the same market. Vague enthusiasm reads as an application sent everywhere.
- 5Prepare two questions you actually want answered for each interviewer, and keep them written down. The end of an interview is a bad time to think of something.
Warning signs
- Nobody will name a billable figure, or the answer shifts between interviewers.
- Every mention of hours is immediately followed by reassurance you did not ask for.
- The interviewer cannot say when anyone in the group was last promoted internally.
- Recent departures are described as people who were not the right fit, more than once.
- The interview process itself is disorganized: rescheduled at short notice, interviewers who have not read your resume, long silences between rounds.
- You are told the group is like a family. It is usually said in the groups with the least structure to protect you.