Lawyers, Pass on Advice to Younger Lawyers

[Henry Mein]

I'm a young BigLaw associate. I know the odds are against it, but I'm very driven to make partner at my firm.

Do you have advice? Mistakes you made or saw people make: both in attitutde and in their work?

Things you wish people had said to you?

What about the softer skills -- you know, client relations, general image, rapport, etc.

I'm newly minted, but so far things seem to be going pretty well.

 

[LARon]

Its a long road; pace yourself. But, more importantly, get to know yourself and mold your practice (to the extent you can) around who you are, not the other way 'round (don't mold who you are to your practice). It will lead to a much more fulfilling life in a very demanding profession.

 

[hye]

You have to bill well over 2,000 hours per year, you have to develop a reputation as being driven, hard-working (even on weekends or all night or through your planned vacation if need be), and you have to be seen as someone who has the potential to bring in new clients and develop new business relationships. At your early stage, you would be wise to cultivate a powerful mentor at your firm - someone who will champion your cause when the time comes. Best of luck -- you can do it!

 

[lawyerdad]

I agree with pretty much everything that's been said. Also, take every opportunity to learn to market yourself. A good mentor at your firm can be very helpful in this regard. But also join professional/bar groups focusing on areas where you have an interest and/or expertise and play an active (and eventually a leadership) role therein. Take opportunities to write or speak on topics that will help establish you as an expert in a particular field. Also, make sure you acquire and continue to refine an understanding of what the partnership criteria are at your firm, both in terms of the official line and the backroom politics.
I'd also suggest you periodically reassess your goal of making partner at your firm and how you feel about what you're investing in pursuit of that goal. There's nothing wrong with ambition, and if a few years down that road it still makes sense for you and you feel good about where your life is going, then more power to you. But sometimes people who have achieved "success" throughout school and other areas of life move into BigLaw life and find themselves spending several years making themselves miserable only because the consensus next benchmark of "success" is making partner. Some people enjoy practicing law, and some find they do not. And some find big firms to be a great place to practice, while others do not. If you feel challenged and rewarded by what you do (in the big picture of course, even great jobs have ****** days, weeks, and months) that's going to make it much more likely that you'll achieve your goal in the long run.
To my own ear I'm sounding a bit like a new-age feel-good life coach, but you get the idea.

 

[briancl]

Originally Posted by hye

You have to bill well over 2,000 hours per year

That's only around 96% utilization, or 38.5 hours per week. I thought lawyers had to work long hours....

 

[Renault78law]

"On Being a Happy, Healthy, and Ethical Member of an Unhappy, Unhealthy, and Unethical Profession"
http://www.averyindex.com/happy_healthy_ethical.php

This is an excellent article about the legal profession, particularly in larger firms. It's making the rounds, and a good read.

 

[MrPL007]

Originally Posted by briancl

That's only around 96% utilization, or 38.5 hours per week. I thought lawyers had to work long hours....

bear in mind that not every hour an associate works is a billable hour... far from that - my estimate (as a law student, after two internships at BigLaw firms) would be 65%-75%...

would other forum members who are practising lawyers agree?

 

[lawyerdad]

Originally Posted by MrPL007

bear in mind that not every hour an associate works is a billable hour... far from that - my estimate (as a law student, after two internships at BigLaw firms) would be 65%-75%...

would other forum members who are practising lawyers agree?
That's probably about right, although it varies widely. As a junior associate at a BigLaw firm you can get assigned spend 90% of your time doing spadework on one masssive case. When that's basically all you're doing from when you walk in in the morning until you leave in the evening (hopefully it is evening and not the next morning) it's fairly easy to achieve a high "utilization rate". But you also could get assigned to working on a dozen smaller matters with various clients, partners and senior associates. When you're jumping around from project to project in the course of the day, constantly getting interrupted, and running between various "masters", there tends to be a lot more "lost" time.
But generally speaking, to actually bill 2000 hours in a year you're going to be putting in a whole lot more than 40 hours per week of actual time.

 

[odoreater]

Originally Posted by lawyerdad

That's probably about right, although it varies widely. As a junior associate at a BigLaw firm you can get assigned spend 90% of your time doing spadework on one masssive case. When that's basically all you're doing from when you walk in in the morning until you leave in the evening (hopefully it is evening and not the next morning) it's fairly easy to achieve a high "utilization rate". But you also could get assigned to working on a dozen smaller matters with various clients, partners and senior associates. When you're jumping around from project to project in the course of the day, constantly getting interrupted, and running between various "masters", there tends to be a lot more "lost" time.
But generally speaking, to actually bill 2000 hours in a year you're going to be putting in a whole lot more than 40 hours per week of actual time.

Yeah, this has been my experience so far. I spend my time working on a lot of smaller matters and constantly have to jump from one matter to another. For example, today I've done work on 6 different matters being handled by 3 different partners. Some days I do some work on up to 10 matters in the day. However, the time I spend on each matter can be as little as a couple of tenths of an hour. I work on average of about 55 hours a week and bill about 40-45 hours a week. I'm on track to bill over 2000 for the (fiscal) year.

 

[lawyerdad]

Originally Posted by odoreater

Yeah, this has been my experience so far. I spend my time working on a lot of smaller matters and constantly have to jump from one matter to another. For example, today I've done work on 6 different matters being handled by 3 different partners. Some days I do some work on up to 10 matters in the day. However, the time I spend on each matter can be as little as a couple of tenths of an hour. I work on average of about 55 hours a week and bill about 40-45 hours a week. I'm on track to bill over 2000 for the (fiscal) year.
Yeah, that can be really annoying. Nothing like being in the office for 9 hours, fielding a barrage of short phone calls and emails, running between partners' offices (and being made to stand around outside each of their offices for 15 minutes while they finish up a "just one minute" phone call), feeling like you've been scrambling all day, and then trying to fill out your timesheet and being able to account for about 2.3 billable hours.

You need to get yourself assigned to a case with numerous depositions all over the country. The depo's themselves and the travel time can really add up. (Plus, I thought it was fun to get to fly around and see different parts of the country back in the day when I was single and a lawyernotdad.) Being on a huge document review project can also make more solid billables, but the miserable tedium can easily outweight the benefits.

 

[Associate]

Originally Posted by lawyerdad

Yeah, that can be really annoying. Nothing like being in the office for 9 hours, fielding a barrage of short phone calls and emails, running between partners' offices (and being made to stand around outside each of their offices for 15 minutes while they finish up a "just one minute" phone call), feeling like you've been scrambling all day, and then trying to fill out your timesheet and being able to account for about 2.3 billable hours.

You need to get yourself assigned to a case with numerous depositions all over the country. The depo's themselves and the travel time can really add up. (Plus, I thought it was fun to get to fly around and see different parts of the country back in the day when I was single and a lawyernotdad.) Being on a huge document review project can also make more solid billables, but the miserable tedium can easily outweight the benefits.

As one senior associate told me when I complained about spinning my wheels and billing too few hours: "I take the total number of hours in the office, deduct one hour for eating and f****** on the internet, and allocate the result among the clients I worked on that day based on a secret formula". I think he was joking.

 

[lawyerdad]

Originally Posted by Associate

As one senior associate told me when I complained about spinning my wheels and billing too few hours: "I take the total number of hours in the office, deduct one hour for eating and f****** on the internet, and allocate the result among the clients I worked on that day based on a secret formula". I think he was joking.
Let's hope he was joking, but for a lot of people I think that would be pretty close to the truth.
That method actually can work reasonably well when you've got the one big case workload. When you're splitting your time amount various matters, though, it has obvious problems.

 

[Associate]

Getting back to the original questions, here are a few tips:

1) Pay mind to appearances. Dress slightly better than the other associates (not too hard usually). Try to get in before the partners and leave after, so you won't be seen coming and going (again, not too hard usually).

2) Let partners feel you're on top of things, keep them informed of status and progress, communicate, don't leave them in the dark. There's nothing they hate more.

3) Be formal and polite in your written communications with clients and partners, even those you work with closely. It doens't cost anything, and it's better to appear overly decorous than too comfortable.

5) Unless specifically instructed otherwise, take as many hours as you need to accomplish an assignment and bill every minute. Let the partner worry about the client's reaction. And if any hours are written off - make sure you get credit internally.

6) This may sound obvious, but don't do anything half assed. The fewer comments you get on your drafts, the better your reputation will be. Try to get stuff to partners in as perfect a shape as possible. And before pressing "send" on that email to a partner with a draft for review, stop, open the attachment, and read it again. You'll find plenty to fix, don't worry.

7) Mind your English - a pet peave for many old school partners.

 

[Joffrey]

Associate, you just did a walk through of my job. Unfortunately I make 1/4 what a fresh out of [a top] lawschool kid makes

, anyway im about 4-6 years younger than that age so I guess I dont feel totally screwed

 

[dirk diggler]

1) be very nice to clients, esp. when you have had a phucked up day. Nothing incurs my wrath sooner (and gets you off of my cherry assignments faster) than being an asshole. Trust me - you have to bill, but I have internal politics. I don't need your ****.

2) try to make the client's job "easy" (i.e., ask if they want a document in word or pdf, is it ok to call home or cell after hours?, don't wait to the last minute and make everything urgent, don't hide the ball when it comes to my questions: if you don't know, say so, but get back to me after you check.

3) check your email and voicemail over the weekend - clients don't work on your schedule - you work on ours. this is an easy way to get bonus points. I don't expect you to slave away all weekend, but sometimes, ideas about a case pop into my head. I leave emails and messages. reply back, even if to say, "let me look into it and get back to monday".