Lateral Recruiting Assistant

Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati • Palo Alto, CA

5d • Hybrid

About The Position

Wilson Sonsini is seeking a Recruiting Assistant to join their dynamic Lateral Recruiting Team. This role provides critical support to the Onboarding Coordinator and lateral attorney recruiting teams, handling detailed, high-volume work to ensure a smooth onboarding and integration process. The position requires exceptional attention to detail for data entry, documentation, and tracking, which directly impacts new hire start times and candidate experience. The ideal candidate can work collaboratively within a team, manage individual responsibilities, and adapt to rapidly changing priorities. This is an excellent opportunity for growth in legal recruiting. The Recruiting Assistant will collaborate with the Onboarding Coordinator, Recruiting Coordinator, recruiters, IT, and the conflicts team, while maintaining strong relationships with hiring partners and lateral links to support a seamless onboarding experience for new attorneys. This position is available with a hybrid work schedule.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree preferred.
• Prior administrative, coordination, or recruiting experience in a law firm or professional services environment is a plus.
• Exceptional attention to detail, with a demonstrated ability to manage high volumes of data entry and documentation without errors.
• Strong organizational skills and the ability to track multiple candidates and deadlines simultaneously across different stages of the hiring process.
• Outstanding written and verbal communication skills.
• The ability to set priorities, work independently, and handle a variety of duties effectively under time constraints.
• An understanding of unconscious bias and its effect on recruiting and hiring.
• Excellent interpersonal skills and the ability to work well with different levels of firm personnel and external candidates.
• The ability to handle confidential and sensitive information with the appropriate discretion.
• A proactive, detail-first mindset: comfortable double-checking work, catching discrepancies, and following through on outstanding items without prompting.
• Proficiency with MS Office and applicant tracking systems, preferably Workday, viRecruit, and HireRight.

Responsibilities

• Reviewing resumes and calculating GPAs with a high degree of accuracy, and performing heavy data entry related to applicant tracking.
• Maintaining the candidate database as resumes are received and decisions are made, ensuring all records are accurate, complete, and up to date.
• Coordinating completion of pre-hire conflicts checks: gathering conflicts information from candidates, submitting it to the conflicts team for review, and carefully tracking status for every candidate in the pipeline.
• Sending lists of ethical walls to hiring partners to confirm a candidate may join with those walls in place, and performing a supplemental conflicts check approximately two weeks before each candidate's start date to catch any new matters.
• Coordinating background checks: providing candidates with the background form, inputting information into HireRight, following up directly with candidates if employment or education cannot be verified, and summarizing background reports for recruiter and GCO review to ensure candidates are cleared before their start date.
• Managing Lateral Link assignments: emailing hiring partners for suggestions, confirming availability with suggested lateral links, and sending program and new hire information.
• Assisting with onboarding documentation collection and communications, including new phone orders, orientation schedules, and general information about joining the firm.
• Tracking onboarding progress against key checkpoints and flagging any items at risk of falling behind schedule.
• Answering new hire questions about Workday onboarding and general firm processes, and sending hiring partners and lateral links timely reminders ahead of each new hire's start date.
• Supporting recruiting events, including logistics, invitations, and materials, for Patent Agent hiring.
• Maintaining candidate tracking systems and supporting reporting for the recruiting team.
• Documenting commonly occurring new hire questions and issues to help the team proactively address them for future hires.
• Ensuring compliance with all processes and maintaining a high level of confidentiality with sensitive candidate and new hire information.

Benefits

• Highly competitive salary
• Benefits package

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Entry Level