Navigate substantial challenges
As a White & Case lawyer, you’ll work on fast-paced cutting-edge projects from the start of your career, working with our international teams on cross-border matters. You’ll gain client exposure early on, as you handle substantive matters that integrate your law school studies with on-the-job insight and guidance from your mentor.
Collaborate with enterprising teams
As an organization, we celebrate both individual excellence and team success. Our culture expects, encourages and recognizes enterprising, Firm-focused achievement, realized through teamwork with talented colleagues worldwide.
Think and work globally
At White & Case, “global” is considerably more than a market description. Over the past 100 years, we’ve built an unrivaled network of 45 offices in 30 countries. Many of our clients are multinational organizations with complex needs, and you will help create innovative solutions that span multiple jurisdictions. We also offer selected paths to placement in our network of offices around the world.
We look for globally minded citizens of the world who are eager to work across borders and cultures, and are intrigued by solving problems within multiple legal systems. Our people are recognized for their diversity, which you’ll experience from the day you start here. At last count, 110 nationalities and 87 languages were represented in our workforce.
Become a great lawyer
We will help you become a great lawyer, in a “high-stretch, high-support” culture that provides you with guidance, training and feedback every step of the way. You’ll work with peers who are as committed as you are to being the best at what they do and who are equally inspired by the success of others.
Make an impact
We live our Firm’s global commitment to social responsibility through a robust, international pro bono program in which all lawyers are invited to participate. Last year, White & Case lawyers billed more than 100,000 pro bono hours and we were named 2021 Pro Bono Firm of the Year by Who’s Who Legal.
Click here for some of the highlights of this work.
Our Diversity Initiative
Diversity and inclusion are inherent core values of White & Case, embedded in all we do as one Firm around the world. The diversity of our people strengthens our work across practices and regions. As we serve clients around the world, our diversity not only enriches us collectively, but also enables us to be an employer law firm of choice worldwide.
Our mission remains to educate leaders and execute strategies to allow all professionals to leverage their diverse backgrounds, maximize their contributions to the firm and revolutionize our business. Our D&I Strategic Plan is aligned with the Firm’s global strategic plan, with priorities focused on recruitment, professional development and retention, client engagement and effective communication about all our efforts. It also includes making a meaningful increase in the percentage of diverse lawyers in partnership and leadership roles, reflective of a strong percentage of senior level diverse partners retained.
Click here for a snapshot of our Diversity and Women’s Initiatives.
Affinity Groups
Our US offices have attorney-driven affinity groups—Asian, Black, Alianza, Spectrum LGBT and Middle Eastern—that are open to all lawyers and business services personnel. These groups organize social and cultural events throughout the year, and provide their members with an opportunity to support and mentor each other.
Women’s Initiative
Our Women's Initiative strongly emphasizes talent management for all our associates. We have a sophisticated program to help women at all stages of their careers succeed. We have active women’s networks in our US offices that offer networking, professional development and the opportunity to connect with clients.
Learn more about our Global Women's Initiative.
Global Citizenship
As a global law firm, we not only have an opportunity but also a responsibility to provide legal counsel and assistance to the communities in which we do business. Through our Global Citizenship Initiative, we look for ways to apply our experience to the challenges faced by the global community. The centerpiece of our Global Citizenship Initiative is our pro bono work, but it also encompasses our legal education programs—such as our sponsorship of the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition—and our volunteer activities, charitable contributions and Green Initiative.
Join us and help make a difference in your community and around the world
You will have unparalleled opportunities to do cutting-edge pro bono work on the issues that matter most to you—both locally and cross-border, with many of the world’s leading nonprofits and international organizations. Our global Pro Bono practice is one of the largest in the world, and all of our offices and practice groups participate—last year we provided over 100,000 hours of pro bono legal service.
Your pro bono work will accelerate the development of your legal skills and your contribution will be celebrated and rewarded. You can feel proud of being part of a firm that takes its responsibilities as a global citizen seriously and does work that makes a tangible difference on a wide range of social and environmental issues.
Learn more in our Global Citizenship Review.
Learning & development
Our strategic commitment to fostering a culture of stewardship and mentorship means continuous supervision, feedback and support. We will help you become a great lawyer, at a Firm respected everywhere, with globally available training and mentoring programs to support you at every stage of your career here.
Our goal is to align our People Development efforts with the Firm’s objectives and work demands and expectations of our lawyers. People Development at White & Case is made up of a number of elements: work assignments; training courses; mentoring and support; and feedback and formal reviews.
All our customized programs are developed, refined and taught in conjunction with leading industry experts, skilled partners and senior lawyers, as well as our in-house professional development team to provide you with invaluable skills and best practices. Your course progress is closely monitored, and through normal sequencing, you’ll more than meet your continuing legal education training requirements.
Milestone programs
Milestone programs bring associates together at key career stages to receive business skills training on topics such as negotiation skills, delegation and supervision, matter scoping and client service and business development. Our Milestone programs align with our Associate Career Framework, a career development tool that specifies the skills, attitudes and behaviors expected at different career stages. By bringing together participants across offices and practice areas, these programs also provide opportunities to network and create contacts with colleagues across the Firm.
First-Year Instruction (FYI) series
The First-Year Instruction (FYI) series is a curriculum to support associates in the Americas throughout their first year. It provides a foundation for future years and eases the transition into their second-year.
The FYI programs are designed to develop technical skills and facilitate first years’ integration into the Firm. FYI program topics are presented by both internal and external speakers, and connect with the Firm’s Competency Framework—a guideline of the skills, experiences and behaviors expected at each level.
FYI program topics*
As a first-year associate, you would receive training on topics such as:
- Effective upward communication. Effective upward communication will help you to be a successful associate. Topics include responsiveness, asking and answering questions skillfully, following up, active listening, email etiquette and staying connected to the senior members of the team.
- Writing: Back to basics. Learn key elements of good legal writing: clear, concise, proper grammar, sentence structure and self-editing techniques.
- Time management, organization and prioritization. There will never be enough time in the day. Develop skills to thrive under the pressures of handling multiple assignments.
- Financial literacy. An overview of financial statement basics for both litigators and transactional associates.
- Feedback. What does feedback look like? What is informal feedback? Learn how to be coachable, receive feedback and how to put feedback into action.
*This list of program topics is subject to change to address the needs of our first-year class.
Alumni
We know that as your career progresses, you will have many options as you gain valuable experience and broaden your interests. We understand that some of you will eventually choose to go elsewhere—to clients or in-house positions, or you may decide to pursue non-legal work. Our view is that once you have worked here, you will always be a White & Case lawyer. We host alumni events and send out periodic alumni newsletters and other communications so we can keep in touch.
We truly value the contribution and achievements of our alumni and the importance of staying connected. Our alumni are very important to us because they are a part of our history, our past and our future. We believe that it is difficult to move forward without knowing where you came from, and we are grateful to have the opportunity to stay in touch with you as we continue to build our community through the White & Case Alumni Network.