Toronto firm culture

[HiGuys2020]

I am hoping to gain some insight into the culture/“vibe” at some of the major Bay St. firms. In a few words, would you mind sharing some (respectful and professional) thoughts on the firms you are familiar with?

NOTE: I understand that generalizations are only so helpful and that the culture can vary even between groups within a firm. 
 

Many thanks to those who respond!

[MapleLeafs]

Nobody is going to publicly post their opinions on specific Bay St firms on this forum (aside from Dentons). 

 

You would be better served by having coffee chats with students/lawyers at the firms you're interested in. 

Edited September 11, 2022 by MapleLeafs

[HiGuys2020]

32 minutes ago, MapleLeafs said:

Nobody is going to publicly post their opinions on specific Bay St firms on this forum (aside from Dentons). 

 

You would be better served by having coffee chats with students/lawyers at the firms you're interested in. 

Foolishly, I hoped soliciting only positive comments would be different... Thanks anyways!
 

[Jaggers]

I would be surprised if you get much feedback here. I'd try to work your connections at the various firms if you have any. If you don't, they're mostly all the same anyways, so take your chances.

[mistertubby]

wildeboer dellelce has the best culture 

[Professor Lupin]

Out of curiosity, what is the reason behind the shade thrown at Dentons and Wildeboer on this forum? 

[Rashabon]

The Wildeboer one is people that don’t actually know anything about Wildeboer wanting to be part of an inside joke.

Dentons is because some people don’t like Dentons for various reasons.

[QMT20]

28 minutes ago, Professor Lupin said:

Out of curiosity, what is the reason behind the shade thrown at Dentons and Wildeboer on this forum? 

This is basically the post that started the jokes about Wildeboer. I'm not trying to throw shade at Wildeboer by sharing this. I don't know anything about the firm. The jokes on this forum can be funny though. 

[Jaggers]

Yeah, the Wildeboer thing is an ongoing inside joke. The Dentons thing is just BQ's hobby horse.

[KOMODO]

As I've mentioned so many times here, every firm is just a collection of their lawyers, and every firm will include stars and duds.

I don't know what happened to BQ, but obviously he had a bad experience with a couple of lawyers at Dentons. The truth is that any experienced lawyer has at least one firm that they dislike, based on their personal experiences with a few lawyers. For me, it's A&B - on two separate files a few years apart, two of their real estate partners really acted like jerks, and now I just think of them as a meanspirited place. Does that mean that every lawyer at A&B is bad, or mean, or a jerk? No, of course not! But the only two that I dealt with were awful, so whenever I think of them, I think "that's a horrible place". Based on just two individuals, which isn't really fair.

Conversely, my interactions with the real estate lawyers at Dentons have been positive, they were working on complex files that ran well, etc. So I don't have the same impression as BQ at all, and we were probably dealing with completely different people. Which is the whole point.

How should these anecdotes shape anyone's decisions about where to work? They shouldn't. No single lawyer can give you a good sense of "firm culture" at all or even most of the firms on Bay Street. All of our opinions will be based on a couple of limited interactions with a subset of lawyers. If you take a job at a firm that someone hates, you may never cross paths with the lawyer who is their reason for hating it, and you could have an amazing experience. Similarly, you might choose to work somewhere because a lawyer tells you they think highly of that firm, and then you could get unlucky and complete most of your work for someone terrible there. The only real way to get a sense of the student experience at a place, or culture within a given group, is by talking to the people who currently work there.

One last bit of advice - once you're working at a firm, make sure you treat everyone with respect, and focus on developing strong technical skills in your early years of practice. From day 1, you'll be a representative of your firm, and people interacting with you will form opinions about your firm as a whole based on your attitude and work product. It's a heavy responsibility and you don't want to be the reason in 5 or 10 years that someone says "that firm sucks".

[AHappyLawyer]

It's hard to share details about culture and vibe simply because most of us do not get to work at enough firms to compare them across firms meaningfully. At large firms, I find even different practice groups within the same firm will have different vibes. One awesome partner/mentor can make a practice enjoyable. One awful client or partner can sink your entire experience.

Rather, I think about firms with respect to their business model and footprint, as I think it impacts their culture. From a corporate and Toronto perspective only, here's how I view some firms (all personal views and conjecture from friends obviously): 

Large National Firms (more like a BLG, Norton Rose, Gowling, Fasken, sort of a McCarthys):  I find these types of firms have a greater range of cultures and personalities and are harder to generalize. These large national firms are more likely to have free-standing practice groups that carry their own files, and have their own clients and distinct leaders. Yes, the Gowling IP group will advise on the cross-border transaction that the corporate group is dealing with, but it also carries on independently with its very own IP litigation files. Sure, the BLG health group will advise on some hospital merger with the corporate group, but is plenty busy representing the Ontario Medical Association in front of the health board. As a result, my thoughts here are these firms are tough to pin down on culture (other than being generically nice, friendly, blah blah blah) because different groups have very different leaders and workstreams, and the firms themselves are an amalgamation of practice groups (loosely) held together under the national banner. If you're joining one of these firms, I think it'll be most useful to assess the practice group partners and associates in a group you think you'll work with, as that will be most indicative of your day-to-day culture. You might even ask the question - "how is the energy or personality of the  _________ practice group different from the rest of the firm?", and the lawyers in the group will happily offer their thoughts. 

Elite Transactional Firms (like a Stikeman, Osler, maybe like a Blakes): These firms are more so geared around the core transactional group of the firm, the engine of the firm (corporate, or private equity, or w.e. each firm wants to call it). The firms makes money mostly by doing deals (M&A for example) and assembling large teams together to push the deal to closing. As a result, the culture of the firm is more likely to coalesce around what the corporate group culture is. At a Stikes for example, the real estate group or the tax group is more likely to be servicing a transaction that the corporate group brought in (rather than being off on their own and litigating some independent tax matter before the Tax Court for example). The commercial lawyers or IP lawyers at Osler will be tending to the high growth company clients and start-ups of the emerging and high growth companies team. If you're joining one of these firms, you can expect the culture to be a bit tighter and uniform around what the general culture of the corporate group is. 

Toronto Centric Transactional Firms (like a Davies, Torys, definitely a Goodmans, Wildeboer, sort of a Cassels):  These firms are Toronto-centric firms with smaller headcount. Yeah, they might have a Montreal office, or a Halifax office, or even a Calgary office, but the Toronto mothership is far and away the the most important office and all the heavy hitters are in Toronto. In my opinion, these firms are a bit more cult-y (not necessarily in a bad way, just depends what you like), and culture coalesces around the office leaders who contribute more to the firm's values than say a national firm. For example, Davies and their distinct work style, focus on "excellence" etc is drive by the important deal makers in the Toronto office. Goodmans and the friendly "camp Goodmans" energy is a bit more discernable simply because it's a solo Toronto office. If you're joining one of these firms, you'll have a better gauge of "culture" just from visiting the office, and meeting with the students, as the variation is likely to be low. 

Again, these are obviously just my thoughts, and posts like these invite generalizations. Just trying to be helpful in a way that doesn't steer you towards firm stereotypes as truth. 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 12, 2022 by AHappyLawyer

[Jaggers]

Tory's, Wildeboer and Cassels are in one group? I have never worked at any of them, but I have either hired or done legal work for all of them, and they are not similar at all from what I've observed.

[AHappyLawyer]

2 hours ago, Jaggers said:

Tory's, Wildeboer and Cassels are in one group? I have never worked at any of them, but I have either hired or done legal work for all of them, and they are not similar at all from what I've observed.

Grouped not by quality of work or being similar firms....but by being Toronto centric firms where the culture is discernible. I can tell you exactly how I seperately feel about Torys, or Wildeboer or Cassels culture (yes, they are not alike). I couldn't say what the nationwide NRF culture is for example. Just my opinion.

Edited September 13, 2022 by AHappyLawyer

[Jaggers]

I don't think that's true, but as you note, it's hard to compare them meaningfully since almost no one has spent time inside more than one or two of them, and practice groups vary within firms probably more than firms vary from one another.

[Rashabon]

Yeah I don't really agree with the post either. The litigation and tax groups at Stikeman and Blakes and Osler have distinct personalities completely separate from, for example, the corporate groups. Even the corporate groups among the firms aren't the same. Certain firms might split theirs into multiple practice areas with their own culture and personality while others have a giant group that touches on multiple workstreams.

[Turtles]

I'll also throw in that just because you're in Toronto doesn't mean you'll deal with others in Toronto exclusively (especially depending on practice area). The differences in culture between offices can be quite stark. The one person I found off-putting at my summer firm was someone I worked with virtually from the Montreal office, while Vancouver maintained its reputation for being very chill. 

Edited September 13, 2022 by Turtles