Dealing with Rejection: Job Searching in a Dating Context

Rejection. While this isn’t my favorite topic to discuss, I think it’s a necessary one. As much as we hope that every effort we make in securing a new position will be positive, it’s often not the case. I thought it might be helpful to discuss a few reasons you may be rejected and the best strategy for dealing with that scenario. In order to make it relatable, I’ll put it in the context of dating. We’ve all heard these reasons before, right?

1. It’s not you, it’s me. Just because they decide to pass on your candidacy, it doesn’t mean that you are the problem. They may realize that their practice doesn’t support your interests within your area of law. Or they may not realize just how fantastic of a candidate you are because you have a non-traditional resume/story. Either way, remember that it’s not personal!
2. Timing is everything. You might be the right person, just at the wrong time. I’ve had firms tell me that they wish the candidate had come through just six months earlier because they would be a perfect fit for the group but they recently hired someone with the same level of experience and now need someone with slightly more/less. I’ve also had candidates receive offers at firms that rejected them the previous year. Timing really is everything.
3. Fear of commitment. There are a few firms in every market that are constantly soliciting resumes and interviewing candidates. But when it comes down to making an offer, they can’t seem to pull the trigger. These are the hardest situations because I often don’t get any good feedback from the firm for my candidate. Recruiters typically know which firms go fishing most often and can give you their insight on them.
4. There is someone else. This one is a tough pill to swallow, both in the dating and work world. But, at the end of the day, sometimes there is someone else who is just a better fit. It doesn’t mean you aren’t a great candidate, just that someone else might be better for the particular and present need.
5. You deserve someone better. This one is probably the most surprising on the list, but it really does happen. If you are coming from a top firm in New York and are interviewing at a ten person firm in suburban Connecticut, they likely are intimidated by your resume. They may think they can’t pay enough or hold your interest long enough and actually might pass because they don’t think they can live up to your expectations.

As with any break-up, you have to find the best way to deal with the job rejection and use it to your benefit. When a firm decides you aren’t the right fit for them, you absolutely cannot get discouraged. It is extremely rare that a candidate doesn’t get rejected from a few places before finding a good place to land. Try to take any feedback they give you and improve your resume: sit for a bar exam in that state if you haven’t already; gain exposure to a niche area of law within your practice; learn from any interview mistakes you made; bolster your resume in areas they saw as weakness (take more depositions, pump up your deal list, etc.); and above all try to learn from the experience.

As my mom always says about men: you don’t have to win them all, it just takes one!

Now is the time to start your job search!

We often talk about the most opportune time in a lawyer’s career to look for a new job (typically between years 2-6), but it’s also important to realize that there are certain times in the calendar year that are better for job searching than others. As it happens, we are just embarking on the best time of year for job searching right now!

As many people realize, law firms do a lot of hiring in the first quarter. Typically, attorneys get their annual bonuses paid out in January or February and then start looking for new positions. Of course, this means that the law firms start hiring at the same time in order to replace the attorneys who are leaving. Because these bonuses are not usually paid until that time frame and the holidays lead to a lot of vacation days, November and December are somewhat slow for lateral moves.

However, don’t let that slow down your search! If you start working on your job search now, in November, you are going to be best positioned for making the leap in Q1. I am starting to work with new candidates now and the timeline is perfect to allow us plenty of time to: talk about their background and what they’re hoping to find in a new position; compile a list of the ideal firms to target; collaborate on their “marketing materials” and how to best pitch them as a candidate; and to truly delve into finding the perfect position.

I also use this time to start reaching out to firms and discussing my active candidates in generic terms to start priming the pump for when I send them over in the New Year. And, sometimes, these anonymous efforts yield a new position before the current year has ended! So many people put their job search on hold because they are waiting for the next year that they don’t realize there are still jobs to be had now.

Regardless of whether you want a job right now or five months down the line when your bonus clears, now is definitely the time to start your search!

I got the new job I wanted, but how do I give notice?

Candidates look for new jobs for an assortment of reasons and sometimes the reason may be that they really dislike their current firm, sometimes it has nothing to do with that and they truly love their current employer. In either case, even the people who claim to be miserable at their current firm seem to get nervous when the time comes to give notice! Here are some general guidelines, though your recruiter can help you walk through your specific case since these details can change from firm to firm:

1. Do not give notice until your conflicts have cleared at your new job. That means waiting until after you’ve accepted the offer, sometimes several weeks, so don’t get ahead of yourself. If there is a snag with conflicts, which is rare but does happen, you will not want to have put your current job in jeopardy!
2. After conflicts clear, it is time to give notice. You should always offer two weeks of notice to transition your work and not burn any bridges. Some firms won’t have you stay that long, but that is what you should plan on. Your new employer will be expecting that, so don’t feel pressured to offer less.
3. The first person you speak with at your current job should be the head of your department. You should bring a brief letter of resignation to their office and thank them for the experience you’ve gotten while nicely saying that you will be leaving.
4. After informing the head of your department, word will likely spread fast. It is best for you to tell as many people as possible on your own, so I’d recommend stopping by the offices of partners you do a significant amount of work for first and then speak to other attorneys in your department. Remember, your new job may call these people as references just as a final precaution, so be sure to leave on the best terms possible.
5. When you have told most of the people you work closely with, you should make a call to your HR contact and let him/her know as well. You can email your letter of resignation to that person after your phone call for their records.

For specific ideas on what you can say and what your letter should look like, ask your recruiter for sample letters and wording. They can do a run through with you on your resignation speech as well. But first and foremost, make sure you have the process down! I hate to hear that a candidate put their own job in jeopardy or burned bridges at a firm because they didn’t know proper protocol.

Now that you know how to leave a job, it’s time to find a new one!

How Many Recruiters Do I Need

One of the most common obstacles that arise with candidates is that they are using multiple recruiters and my efforts therefore have far stricter parameters than I’d like. As a former candidate myself, I know that I used multiple recruiters because I thought it maximized my chances of getting a job—after all, if I have multiple professionals searching for me, certainly I’ll have greater odds of securing a new position, right? Wrong.

I’m not here to tell you that one size fits all and you should being exclusive with just one recruiter and never stray. What I am here to tell you is that you should consider the pros and cons to working with one recruiter vs. multiple recruiters and pick the best strategy for you. Here are some of the pros and cons of working with just one recruiter, in my opinion:

Pros:

• All your submissions are through one channel and there is never any confusion or crossed paths
• Your recruiter will reciprocate your loyalty and may lobby harder for you (whether it’s intentional or not) than for other candidates who are known to use multiple recruiters
• Your recruiter will know all the ins and outs of firms you like, don’t like and potential opportunities you’re being considered for and be able to provide higher quality matches and advice

Cons:

• You may worry that you aren’t canvassing enough ground
• If you are looking in multiple markets, they may not know one as well as the other (note: at BCG, we work with our colleagues in other markets you may be interested in and have them run your search in those markets to maximize our knowledge and connections)

While I understand that it may seem self-serving to advocate for only using a single recruiter, it actually can work to my detriment to recommend that. I’ve had multiple candidates call me and reveal that they’ve previously worked with another recruiter and most times I ask them to explain what that recruiter did and what the results have been up to that point. If it sounds like their recruiter is doing everything that I would do and making a good case for them, I suggest they stick with that recruiter and not add me to the mix.

In sum, if you’ve been utilizing multiple recruiters or are just getting started on your job search and aren’t sure how many to use, I’d suggest sticking with one recruiter for a set amount of time (e.g. 30 days) and then reevaluating to see if it’d be beneficial to expand your circle.

It’s All About the Interview

As a recruiter, my main focus is all about getting candidates to one place: the interview. This means speaking about their needs, assisting with their resumes, drafting a compelling cover letter on their behalf, advocating to the places to which we’ve submitted them and then fully preparing them with a mock interview. After that point, most of my job is done. After all, I can’t go into the interview and answer the questions for them! (Although sometimes I wish I could)

Yes, there are some things I do after an interview to help a candidate land their dream job, but so much of the decision rests upon a candidate’s shoulders once it gets to that phase. I recently had a friend link to an article that Forbes did about the interview process and it proposes that there are really just three key interview questions:

1. Can you do the job?
2. Will you love the job?
3. Can we tolerate working with you?

Overall, I’d have to agree with this summary. A prospective employer already has your resume and can see a basic picture of what you’ve done in the past. They’ve also likely seen your transcript and gotten personal feedback from your recruiter, if you are working with one. So, if they ask you in for an interview, they generally know that there is a high likelihood they’d like to hire you.

As you prepare for an interview, keep those three questions in mind and try to incorporate them into your answers to other questions. Obviously, most employers won’t ask any of those three questions outright, so it’s up to you to convince them that you can do the job even though you’re technically answering a question about your biggest weakness (everyone’s favorite interview question). And follow it up with reassuring them how much they’ll love working with you as you are smiling broadly and capturing their attention with an appropriate humorous story or two.

What it really comes down to is simple: they want someone who can do the work well, who will do it without complaint (and, gasp, maybe even an occasional smile), and who they don’t mind being stuck in the office with on a Saturday afternoon. Use this information to your advantage and lock down an offer every time you interview! Read the full article from Forbes here: http://www.forbes.com/sites/georgebradt/2011/04/27/top-executive-recruiters-agree-there-are-only-three-key-job-interview-questions/.

Understanding Social Media and Using it to Boost Your Career

In today’s world of modern technology, even our social interactions and presence has crossed over to the digital world. Instead of calling someone to wish them a happy birthday, or even more outlandish, sending them a birthday card via the U.S. Postal Service, we now post a happy birthday message on their Facebook wall. And old colleagues we may have once been too intimidated by to even say hello in the hallway are now approachable as we send them a “connect” request through LinkedIn. As Drew Barrymore’s character in “He’s Just Not That Into You” lamented, there are so many social media outlets available now that just keeping up with your different accounts is nearly impossible! As you begin your job search, or just aim to keep yourself on an upward trajectory with your current employer, there are some rules of the game to play by with regard to your social media accounts.

To read the rest of the article, please visit: http://www.bcgsearch.com/article/61436/Understanding-Social-Media-and-Using-it-to-Boost-Your-Career/

The Importance of Keeping an Interview

I recently have had candidates ask me etiquette questions about going to a previously scheduled interview after new circumstances arise. The issue can be anything from no longer being interested in the firm to having a busy week at work to having received an offer from another firm. In ninety percent of the circumstances, my advice remains the same: keep the interview, show up, be your usual charming self and try to get an offer! There are several reasons for this advice, but let me at least expand upon a few.

1.            The legal community is smaller than you think. You never know where your career will take you, which partner will join your current firm, who you’ll need a favor from in the future, who opposing counsel may be, etc. You want everyone in that small legal community to have the most favorable impression of you possible and not think that you are flaky or uncommitted or a litany of other potentially false impressions.

2.            You never know what you may find. Though you may initially think a certain firm isn’t the best fit for you because of something you heard, or something you read, or for some other reason, you really never know how you will mesh with a specific group of people in a particular office. You owe it to yourself to show up, check it out and see how it works for you.

3.            You have to look out for yourself. Even if you went on an interview at another firm and even received an offer, you don’t know if something will arise during your conflict check or if some other unforeseen circumstance will result in you not actually working for that firm. In the meantime, you should continue to interview and get offers from the firms that you are interested in so that you have a choice to make and can make it after getting first-person experience at each firm.

Those are just a few reasons why it’s important to keep an interview after you’ve accepted it, but every situation is different. If you have concerns or a circumstance arises, call your recruiter and discuss the situation so they can fill you in on all of your choices and their thoughts and experience with the issue. At the end of the day, you are both trying to find you the best job possible so work together as a team!

Listen up Ladies: Evaluating and Rethinking What’s Important to You

I recently read an article on Forbes about the tendency for professional women of my generation to burn out of their careers by age 30. Seeing as how attorneys spend three years getting their JD and typically don’t receive that degree any earlier than age 25, that only leaves five years of practice before burning out! I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t sound like a very good return on investment to me. As a recruiter, the most common reason candidates contact me is because they don’t like their current job and they want to find a job that they will like, which makes perfect sense to me. Everyone should like their job, given how much of their time and identity it consumes. But, for women especially, career goals and aspirations can change with time as your life at 35 is likely different than it was at 25.

As you consider whether you need to look elsewhere for career satisfaction, make sure you take both an objective and subjective approach to evaluating new opportunities. Though this advice can be helpful for both men and women, the aforementioned article got me thinking about how a woman in her early to mid-years of law practice should think about her career.

1. What do you enjoy the most about your practice? What do you enjoy the least? Is there a way to maximize what you like and minimize what you dislike by joining a more widely or narrowly defined practice group?
2. Do you prefer working for several different people or having one main point of contact? If it’s only one point of contact, is there a particular gender or work style you respond best to?
3. At this point, is compensation or lifestyle more important? What do you think your answer will be in five years? Try to create a hypothetical sliding scale of how many hours you’d be willing to sacrifice per week/month for a corresponding amount of money.
4. Does your current employer have women in power/leadership positions? Have these women been able to work flexible schedules or taken time off after having children? If so, are these women able to serve as mentors to you?

Of course, these are just a few questions to get you started as you consider whether you should change jobs before you reach that burn-out level. Regardless, it’s important to be proactive in your assessment of your current career and where you would like to it go in the future, so start taking stock now!

The original article I referenced can be found here: http://www.forbes.com/sites/larissafaw/2011/11/11/why-millennial-women-are-burning-out-at-work-by-30/