A former Biglaw associate has taken LinkedIn self-promotion to remarkable new heights by posting his own performance reviews from the Obama era online.
The reviews, dating back roughly 15 years, were shared publicly on LinkedIn, drawing swift and sharp ridicule from the legal community on social media.
The stunt was branded as peak “LinkedInMaxxing,” a term used to describe the most aggressively try-hard forms of self-promotion carried out on the professional networking platform.
A parody account on X, posting as Paul Clement’s Burner, captured the mood of many observers with a single pointed remark directed at the unnamed associate.
“This guy is approaching levels of hardo not previously seen,” the parody account posted, a line that quickly began circulating among lawyers and legal commentators online.
The reviews themselves appear to date from a period spanning approximately two years and four months at the associate’s Biglaw firm during the Obama administration.
At least one former supervisor offered a glowing endorsement in the reviews, describing the associate in unusually strong terms that stood out even among typical performance appraisals.
“The top junior associate with whom I have ever worked,” the supervisor wrote, in phrasing that itself attracted commentary for its awkward construction.
Critics noted the irony that a review ostensibly praising writing ability was itself written in a strained and convoluted style designed to avoid ending a sentence with a preposition.
The episode has sparked a broader conversation in legal circles about the culture of self-promotion on LinkedIn, which has become an increasingly prominent platform for lawyers to market themselves and their achievements.
LinkedInMaxxing has become a recognised phenomenon in professional circles, referring to the practice of squeezing every possible drop of personal branding from the platform, often to the embarrassment of onlookers.
Posting current performance reviews would already be considered an aggressive move in most professional environments, but sharing reviews from 15 years ago raises the behaviour to an entirely different level of audacity.
The legal community, never shy about passing judgment on the conduct of colleagues and peers, reacted with a mixture of disbelief, amusement, and a certain grudging admiration for the sheer confidence on display.
Whether the post has helped or hindered the associate’s professional reputation remains to be seen, though the widespread mockery suggests the reception was not entirely what he may have intended.