Suspect ADD? A Few Insights for Attorneys

If you’re unhappy in law because you

hate the lack of creativity in it,
despise having to show each tiny piss-ante step of reasoning when it’s freaking OBVIOUS how you got there,
get bored and pissed with all the pointless bickering back and forth about commas and such–except when you’re really exorcised about something you wrote,
rail at all [...]

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Do Law Firm Layoffs Have to Happen? Part 1

So Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal axed 37 attorneys not long ago. Plus another 90 or so support staff. If you are one of those people and reading this, my condolences to you. Getting laid off sucks, no matter how bad the job.
[Aside: Don't miss this funkalicious article in the WaPo written by a guy who [...]

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Friday Files: Lawyers and Carolyn Hax

Here’s another one of my guilty addictions: Carolyn Hax’s Tell Me About It columns and online chat. I’ve been reading her since her very first column appeared in the Washington Post. Strictly coincidentally, her column started about a year before I left law. I remember reading the column in the firm library on Fridays. Good [...]

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Law Firms and Work-Life Balance–um, rite

So I’ve been reading a couple of blogs that discuss whether law firms are becoming more hospitable to those who want a work-life balance. (Here, and here.) I think ultimately, law firms will change some of how they manage their resources, just because of the sheer number of Millennials. But I’ve been waiting since the [...]

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Fairness: Dying by the (Billable) Hour

Alright, if you want to gin me up, just start talking about billable hours. Like in the WSJ’s Law Blog today.
The story is about a Chicago firm, Chapman & Cutler, which has upped associate salaries to NYC levels, but with an explicit catch/escape clause (depends on whether you’re a glass half-full or –empty kind [...]

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A Vacation?

In my varied freelance life, I often interview attorneys for stories I’m working on. And though I wouldn’t want the life that comes with lightning-quick response to press inquiries, I personally appreciate it when busy partners get back to me within 12 hours of when I contact them.
I also get blown off a lot, and [...]

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Lawyer Layoffs Looming? Get a Plan!

Part 1 of a series.
So Thacher Proffitt has finally admitted that it will lay off associates early in 2008. I was in practice in the early 1990s, when the economy was sucking and firms were taking the then-unheard of step of laying off associates. At first (a small history lesson) many firms did not [...]

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Friday Files: The Mad Partner Editor

I worked for a couple years in a boutique firm of about 30 attorneys. Smaller numbers did not make this a warm fuzzy place to work. The parnter I worked for most of the time billed a ridiculous amount of hours, like 3,000 annually. Some of it was actual legal work, but a lot of [...]

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Working Hard: The Lawyer Religion

Lawyers love to talk about how hard they work. Who can blame them? Working — and billing — lots of hours is how most become partner. Working hard is the lawyer’s version of religion.
But there’s another side of the “working hard” talk. It’s used as a shield against criticism. As in, “I’ve been working so [...]

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Are Boomer Lawyers to Blame?

I admit it, I love that some of the things that used to irk me most about working in law firms — required pantyhose-wearing in the summer chief among them — have finally changed.
I love even more that boomer lawyers might just get some comeuppance from their own kids, Gen Y, aka Millenials.
In case you’ve [...]

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