The University of Chicago Law School Office of Career Services
OCS Bidding Guide
BIDDING: INFORMATION
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Bid List Review is July 5–July 15; this gives you a chance to discuss your bidding strategy
with an OCS counselor. Your draft bid list should indicate the employers in your proposed
bidding order, noting which office you intend to bid on and the number of interview slots
for each employer.
* Email your bid list to: [email protected]
* Sign up ends July 20
You have 50 bids: #1 is your first choice and #50 is your last choice.
- The date and time you submit a bid does not affect if you get scheduled for an
interview.
- Employers will never see what bid number you’ve assigned to them.
Upload one legal resume to bid on an interview with an employer; do not upload cover
letters or transcripts.
* Mac users: Convert your resume to a PDF before uploading to Symplicity!
Based on your bid numbers, Symplicity will run a lottery and assign your interviews with
employers.
- Employers do not prescreen or preselect individuals they want to interview.
* Grades do not matter when assigning OCI interviews.
- Your interview schedule is available in Symplicity on July 28th.
BIDDING STRATEGY
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We recommend that you only bid in one or two geographic markets.
The more interview slots an employer has, the more likely you are to get an interview.
- See how many interview slots an employer has in the “Estimated Slots” column.
Consider whether an employer is a “Multi-Office Employer” (one interview for
multiple branch offices) or a “Single Office Employer” (each branch office is treated as
a separate employer and requires separate interviews).
SYMPLICITY INSTRUCTIONS:
HOW TO SUBMIT BIDS FOR OCI
1. Log in to Symplicity
2. Select DOCUMENTS and upload your default resume
a. Save the resume with your first and last name, e.g., John Smith Resume
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The University of Chicago Law School Office of Career Services
OCS Bidding Guide
b. Submit your final resume before bidding closes (July 25 at 12:00 p.m.)
SYMPLICITY INSTRUCTIONS:
HOW TO SUBMIT BIDS FOR OCI
3. Select ON-CAMPUS INTERVIEWING, then EMPLOYERS/BIDDING
a. Search for the employers you want to interview with, and use the BIDDING
COLUMN drop-down menu to select a rank (1-50) for each employer.
b. Once you assign a rank it is automatically saved, and an asterisk will appear next
to the bid number in the bid drop down menu. You will not be able to use the
number again.
c. If you’ve made a mistake when assigning a bid number, open the drop-down
menu and select “BLANK.” When you select the blank entry, the screen will
refresh and you will be able to select a new bid number for that employer.
d. Don’t worry if you’ve mistakenly numbered your bids by omitting a bid rank.
Before the scheduler runs, an internal check is made to make sure that everyone’s
bid ranks are sequential, unused bid numbers are detected, and all choices are
moved up and re-sequenced.
e. There is no “submit” or “save” button once your bids are input. The system will
register your bid numbers once bidding closes.
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