Thank You Notes in Legal Recruiting

Send thank you notes. For some reason, to send or not to send a thank you note is one of the more controversial questions in the recruiting game. Some practitioners counsel against sending thank you notes, considering them as just one more opportunity to err through grammatical mistakes or other embarrassing boo-boos. Other attorneys, though, consider a thank you note an absolute requirement, no ifs, ands or buts. Legal recruiter Gavin Rubin has seen law firms drop candidates from consideration if the postman is empty-handed. "There's no downside, only upside, in sending thank you notes -- everyone appreciates polite behavior," adds Rubin.

A thank you note will only reaffirm someone's positive opinion of you, or improve the opinion of someone on the fence.

Rubin recommends sending short handwritten notes to each of the attorneys you interviewed with, or, at minimum, the recruiting coordinator. He also counsels against two mistakes. First, do not send thank you notes to some attorneys and not others. Second, be careful when using a computer to write thank you notes or address envelopes. Rubin has seen job candidates' chances plummet when they forgot to change the law firm's name or address when using computer templates -- it would be somewhat inappropriate to send attorneys at Smith & Smith thank you notes addressed to Jones & Jones.