Long Term Success in With a Single Employer

If you go into any firm that has been around more than twenty or thirty years you will inevitably find a handful of attorneys who have been there from the very beginning of their careers.  These well adjusted souls will typically report to work each day at a similar time and have managed to be the only ones presumably left in the law firm after generation upon generation of attorney coming and going.

Many attorneys do last for decades in the same firm and there are characteristics which uniformly seem to characterize these sorts of attorneys.  While I am a legal recruiter, I do have a great deal of respect for attorneys who in this day and age are able to “stay put” at the same firm for a long period of time and remain at single firms throughout their careers.  None of this is to say there are not really good and solid reasons for leaving a law firm or other legal environment if the going gets impossible.  I am the first to admit that there are legal employment environments that can be intolerable for many.  Nevertheless, you need to keep in mind that if a legal employer has been around for 30+ years there is a chance the employer is doing something right.  Before leaving it is often wise to take inventory of yourself.

There are certain characteristics that tend to characterize attorneys who stick with the same legal employer for long lengths of time and also certain characteristics of this sort of employment situation.  These characteristics are discussed below:

1. Attorneys Who Remain With the Same Firm for Long Lengths of Time Are Generally Very Committed to Their Jobs

Many people were raised with the idea (or have the idea) that fidelity to an employer is something that is simply expected.  The unwritten rule is that if you are not treated horribly then there is really no reason you should ever end up leaving a job.

One of the saddest but also the most refreshing things I have seen as a legal recruiter is when I interview and meet with attorneys who have been with the same firm for 20 years or more and whose firms are going under-or who are in a position of being forced to look for other opportunities.  When attorneys like this look for a new position their rationale is most often that something profound has happened at the firm that is making their separation necessary.  These attorneys appear as if they are going through a divorce or have just had a death of someone they are very close to.  For these sorts of attorneys, leaving a position is something that would be unthinkable and only in the event of a massive trauma.

This sort of fidelity between employers and employees reminds me often of people who have been married 50 years or more.  There is a mutual respect that comes out of this and a thinking that both need one another.  I believe that this sort of thinking is really missing in this day and age.  While this may not seem related to careers, a statistic I once saw in a social science class showed that as divorce rates went up in society so did rates of drug abuse, suicide and other associated societal ills.  The bond between an employer and an employee is a powerful force that in its best form is much like the bond between a husband and wife with a very committed relationship.  Both sides respect and accept one another with certain conditions but for the most part unconditionally.

The attorney who is committed to their job is in many respects similar to someone who is committed to anything-there may be something else out there but they have decided to remain loyal.  This sort of attitude is a very healthy one I believe and can also make these sorts of attorneys very settled.  I know an attorney that was called by a rival firm and offered over $1,000,000 a year by this firm when he was making just barely above half of that.  He was not interested in the money and was more concerned with the bond he had with his current firm.  This is how it works when there is commitment on both ends.

2. Attorneys Who Remain With the Same Firm Are Not Interested in Office Gossip or Reasons Not to Succeed

In every organization there are typically people who are not succeeding at their jobs.  These people generally are not doing their work in a competent manner and are also often looking for ways to cut corners with their work.  Most organizations will generally call out this behavior and then speak with the employee. Some employees correct their behavior and others simply get mad at the organization.  Some employees may be mad at their organizations for no particular reason at all-or may be angry with a previous organization and simply transfer their anger to their most recent organization.  I remember a recruiter once telling me never to hire someone who had been fired from their last job.  People who have been fired from their last job will typically take out their anger on their next organization he told me.

With anger a part of every legal employment organization, you need to understand that there are always going to be people in the organization who have a lot of anger towards their employers.  These angry employees will start rumors, attempt to share their anger with others in the organization and often subtly (or not so subtly) forecast “gloom and doom” for their employer.  This is how rumor mills get started and these sorts of rumor mills are prevalent in every legal organization there is for the most part.

Attorney who remain with their employers generally do not participate in these rumor mills or even pay attention to them.  At certain times in an employer’s history there are likely to be calls of “crisis” of seemingly epidemic proportions as lots of people leave, for example.  At other times there will be other issues.  The overwhelming characteristic of attorneys who remain at firms for long periods of time is that they generally pay no attention to these rumor mills whatsoever.
3. Attorneys Who Remain With the Same Firm for Long Periods of Time Generally Are Not Interested in Being Grandstanders-They Are There to Do Their Jobs and Do Them Well

I once heard someone say that the most successful people are often the most screwed up.  I am not sure if this is true, but there is some wisdom in every saying like this.  Attorneys who are able to remain with the same employer for long periods of time are generally not concerned with “getting ahead” to the same extent as many other attorneys are.  Many attorneys who are extremely concerned with getting ahead will often leave saying they are looking for better opportunities because they are interested in immediate advancement.  In other cases attorneys will try and show up various attorneys in their firm.

Attorneys who remain at their firms for long periods of times are generally most interested in just doing their jobs.  They have faith in their organizations and that things will work out for them.  They are not loud and do not go out of their way to attract attention to themselves.  Their main concern is to simply do the best job possible.

What ends up happening to attorneys who remain focused on their work and not grandstanding is they end up getting ahead while other attorneys end up putting their foot in their mouth.  I remember when I first started practicing an attorney who was first in his class from a major law school and the Editor in Chief of his school’s law review.  Everyone thought this particular attorney was really on his toes and someone likely to have major success at the firm.  This attorney wrote articles on his spare time, argued with firm partners about the finer points of law (and was right when he argued).  While this attorney was very smart he thought he was so good that he ended up sabotaging his career in the long run when he called a newspaper to discuss a case he was working on and ended up being quoted on the front page of the Los Angeles Daily Journal.  The fallout from this incredible incident that the attorney left the law firm a month or two later and never worked for a large law firm again.

These sort of incidents aside, it is important to keep a moderately low profile in order to have long-term success in a law firm.  It is never wise to raise your swords and capture the limelight.  While someone can win a sword match for some time, they will eventually lose-and in a sword match (which your legal career could be compared to)-the loss is usually permanent.

4. Attorney Who Remain With Their Firms for Long Periods of Time Are Typically Do Good (But Not Necessarily ‘Brilliant’ Work)

An attorney who remains at their firm for long periods of time typically has learned to “pace themselves” and manages to do work on a day-to-day basis that is good but not necessarily extraordinary.  This does not matter.  I would estimate that the majority of the battle of being an excellent attorney is simply showing up.  Sure some people can do extraordinary work; however, the brightest flame is not always the longest burning flame.  The ability to consistently show up and do the work is the most important aspect of being a long-term performer in a law firm.

The smartest attorneys out there are often the ones who end up having the most problems in the practice of law.  Attorneys who can consistently show up for work and do an excellent job send the message to colleagues, clients and others that they have the ability to get the job done.  In the end it is all about getting the job done.

5. An Understanding of ‘Insiders’ and ‘Outsiders’ Typically Develops Between Attorneys Who Remain At Their Firms For Long Periods of Time

After an attorney has been with a law firm for an extended period of time and understanding develops between that attorney and others who have been at the firm a long period of time.  An institutional understanding also develops.  This understanding seems to say something to the effect of “people may come and go but we are the ones who are committed to this organization and we are the heart and soul of this place.”  A similar sort of understanding that develops is that “we owe each other because we have each demonstrated a commitment.”

Bonds form between people who have been part of the same organization for long periods of time.  These bonds are often invisible-but they are real bonds.  These bonds are powerful and make the organization and forces within it come to the defense of those who are committed to the organization during times of organizational change and reorganization.  These sorts of bonds are something that get stronger over time as an organization changes.  After some time attorney who have been with the firm for decades are simply treated as part of the very fabric of the firm and virtually unquestioned.

Conclusions

While it may seem odd for a recruiter to write a story in defense of attorneys who remain at their firms for long periods of time, remaining with a firm for a long period of time is something that is meaningful in this day and age. There are many characteristics that of attorneys who remain at their firms for long periods of time and these characteristics in my experience are usually found in most attorneys who demonstrate this level of stability.

A final factor is that in my experience attorneys who remain with firms for long periods of time are often less tormented than the average attorney.  By looking for reasons to like and respect their organization rather than find fault, they find themselves in organizations which ultimately welcome them.

Finally, it is always important to remember that if a law firm or other legal organization has been around for 20 years or more the chances are it is doing some things very right.  There will always be people who succeed in these organizations and, of course, always those who leave or fail.

Very very temporary?

I recently had a conversation with someone who didn’t want to add a contract position to their resume.  I am of the opinion that all positions, including contract positions, MUST be on the resume.  This lawyer disagreed.  She felt that because the position was brief, she hated it, and the work was so unlikely to create a future conflict it was unnecessary to put it on the resume.

I get what she’s saying–especially because a firm may view contract positions negatively, a short contract position seems like a likely candidate to fall off the resume.  Even so, I think it absolutely has to be on CV.  The truth is that partners and administrators at law firms will view it differently, but there are plenty of folks who will view the omission of ANY job, no matter how brief, as lying on one’s resume.  Certainly this is one side of the spectrum, but that’s the side I think it’s prudent to cater to.  If, during an interview, your conversation gets derailed explaining that you worked somewhere and then why you didn’t include it on the resume, I think it’s unlikely that the meeting will end on a positive note.  You’ve just caused a distraction–a distraction from the firm thinking about anything other than what a good job you’d do if they hired you.

I know it’s boring and conservative, this 100% disclosure and writing a resume to appeal to the most meticulous of hiring professional.  As time consuming as a job search can be, I promise it’s more time consuming to back-track over your rationale for omitting a job from your resume–and potentially will completely derail your efforts.

Sixth Year Associate in Good-Standing at Branch Office of Large Firm Wondering Whether He Should Consider Moving to a Firm with Better Opportunity for Partnership

I was recently speaking with a friend who is a sixth year corporate associate with a large firm in Los Angeles. This year the firm promoted only two associates to partner and neither one works in the Los Angeles office. My friend has consistently had very good reviews, and the Los Angeles partners have told him they will go to bat when he is up for partner. However, he believes the Los Angeles office does not have the pull and power it used to which is partly why the firm did not promote anyone from his office. While my friend is happy at the firm, he can not help but be concerned for his future and opportunity for advancement. He was wondering what he should do.

Sadly, the chances of making partner these days at a large firm are slim – even in a booming economy. There are many factors that come into play as to whether someone is promoted to partner, including likeability of candidate, potential of candidate to bring in business, political savvy of candidate, candidate’s practice area, hours candidate billed over the last 3+ years, and the economics of candidate’s firm. In the case of a large firm’s branch or satellite office, you also need to consider the office’s overall reputation within the firm. It is important to consider whether the partners in your office have the “pull” to help advance your career. If the firm has routinely promoted associates in your office to partner and this happens to be an “off” year due to the economy, then my best recommendation would be to stay put but explore other opportunities as a precaution.

If the Los Angeles office has not been self-sufficient and has relied on other offices for work for over two years, it would be wise for my friend to explore other options very seriously. As you get more senior, it will become more and more difficult to move to another firm without having an existing book of business. Now is the time to look into other opportunities. 2010 is already showing signs of being a stronger market for laterals.

You can expect a firm of ANY size to take at least two to three years before they even consider a lateral associate for partnership. There are NO guarantees. It is possible to be turned down for partnership, but then make partner at a later time. Of course you may be promoted to Of Counsel (if the firm has attorneys with such a title) and then promoted again to partner. At this stage in my friend’s career, ANY law firm – no matter what the size – is going to hire him with an eye toward partnership. The hiring process will take much longer than for more junior associates, and he will certainly be asked to provide a conflicts form and possibly a business or marketing plan. A firm is going to ask him questions about his existing experience but also about his relationships with firm clients. Ideally, any firm that hires him will hope he is able to bring in work and certainly will expect him to help generate more work from existing clients.

Many believe it is “easier” to make partner at a small or mid-sized firm. This assumption is usually true, but the factors that come into play in making partner at a large firm are the same factors that a small or mid-size firm considers. With more and more large firms focusing on their core or top 10 institutional clients, more and more of the “middle market” companies are being referred to the small and mid-size firms. Also, generally these firms have lower billing rates (although not always) making it is easier to bring in new clients who simply can not afford large firm billing rates.

It would behoove anyone in my friend’s position to speak with a seasoned recruiter who would offer advice for his/her particular situation. Work with someone who is honest and is going to look at the big picture. You need a recruiter who is not motivated by money but rather helping people and doing the right thing. Particularly if you are in good standing at your firm, like my friend, and not necessarily in a rush to leave, work with someone who is going to offer good advice based on what is best for your career and not the recruiter’s need to make a placement or fill a job opening. Of course, I would recommend BCG Attorney Search (www.bcgsearch.com) to find such a caliber of a recruiter!

Offer received from firm. Should you ask for moving expenses too?

I have always given a word of caution to lawyers in regards to negotiating the terms of an offer. Although your request may be perfectly reasonable, any time you attempt to negotiate the terms of an offer- you are at risk of the offer being retracted. Since this market is a tough one and there is a lot of stellar legal talent currently out on the market- you may not want to quibble with the firm over a small detail like moving expenses.

In a different market, it might have made sense to negotiate this point. In this market, where there are plenty of unemployed attorneys who would welcome any job offer- you may want to take the safe route and just accept the firm’s current package. If you decide to negotiate any points of your offer, please proceed with caution.

See Opportunities Where Others See Obstacles

If you are looking for a job then one of the most important things you can do is see opportunities where others see huge obstacles.  Most of the world sees huge obstacles to everything.  There are always obstacles to anyone and everyone doing the absolute best that can be done at something.  If you want to get the best possible job and go as far as possible in your career then you need to insure that you are not seeing obstacles and that every obstacle you see is, in fact, an opportunity.  When you look at the lives of people who have done exceptionally well in the law and in most fields you will generally find that they see opportunities where most of us see obstacles.

George McGovern was nominated by the Democratic convention in 1972 as a candidate to run against Richard Nixon.  In the midst of the convention, McGovern decided that he no longer wanted Senator Eagleton to be his vice-presidential running mate. At the time there were thousands of bumper stickers and pins that had been made up that said “McGovern-Eagleton”.  A young sixteen-year-old entrepreneur bought up approximately 5,000 of these buttons and stickers for around 5-cents each.  Within a short time the same entrepreneur sold individual buttons and stickers as historical memorabilia for as much as $25 each.  The person’s name?  Bill Gates.

People like Bill Gates have massive lessons to teach the world because they can see opportunities where others may simply see obstacles.  In order to do well in a job search you absolutely need to make sure you are looking out for where the opportunities are to succeed.

“I did not go to the right school”
This is ridiculous.  Most of the highest paid attorneys in the United States did not go to good schools either.  In fact, the very, very highest paid attorneys may have barely made it through law school.  What these attorneys did is they focused on their strengths and made the absolute most they could of them.

The law school you went to simply does not matter.  Yes, the law school you went to may hold some importance for the very highest paying law firms; however, for the most part your law school should be looked upon as a positive.

If you went to a terrible law school, find people who also went to this law school and connect with them.  Find the most successful attorneys and learn from them and ask them all sorts of questions about how they overcame the law school they went to.  Send them letters thanking them for the lessons they taught you.  Incorporate what they told you. Work hard to overcome what you may lack in an exceptional school pedigree by working on your personality, reading books about how to bring in business, making sure you work harder on your legal skills than someone else does.

Nothing is more common than people who go to a good law school and believe based on this that they can stop trying harder.  The best thing that ever happened to me personally was not getting into a certain ivy league school my father and a lot of my family went to.  This taught me right then and there that I could never rest on my laurels and needed to keep working and working.  Not getting into that school was probably the best thing that ever happened to me.  People who go to the best schools often believe they can simply rest on their laurels due to that one achievement.

If you did not go to the best school then realize that while those who may have gone to a better school may rest on their laurels you are going to keep working on yourself and getting better and better.  You will surpass them and when you do they will not even have seen you coming and you will not need to look back.

“I do not have the right experience”
Regardless of the experience you have, you have some experience doing something.  The experience excuse is crazy to me.  Everyone has experience!

Maybe you used to work in an oil field as a roughneck and put yourself through night law school.  You then could then use you knowledge and connection to oil workers to connect with people injured in accidents in oil fields and then represent them.

Regardless of your experience, there is some sort of experience you have that you can put to use to get the position you want.  You need to think of what you have done that is related to what you want to do. You need to connect with others in the law who have had similar experiences to you.

Perhaps, however, you truly do not have any experience which is relevant to what you want to do.  I doubt this-however, it is possible.  If this is the case then the way to look at this is to take the experience you do have as something that is a fantastic lesson that you need to find ways to get the experience you want to get the sort of position you want.  This may mean taking on a given responsibility in your current job, or seeking out new sorts of work.  Whatever you are seeking to do, you can get the experience.

For example, one of the most attractive things to potential employers is when someone is so serious about doing something that they have taken classes, volunteered, or done something extraordinary to the experience that they need in order to do a job.  People (naturally) want to assist those who are trying hard to advance.

“I live in the wrong part of the country”
Regardless of where you live in the United States there is tons of legal work to be done-and the sort of legal work you want to do.  The belief that you cannot get a job because of where you live is completely fallacious.

One of the most important abilities of anyone-in any profession—is the ability to create work.  Very good lawyers are experts at creating work for themselves and are constantly doing it and able to create this work.

Imagine, for example, you are in a small rural town and want to practice patent law.  You could find local inventors and get to know them and also ask them for referrals.  You could also put up a website.  You could write attorneys in other small law firms around the country for work.  The list of possibilities is endless.  In order to get the work you need you do need to find opportunities and you can find them wherever you are.

One of the secrets of selling anything is you need to put people in pain by identifying a need they may have that they did not know they had.  This is something you can do quite easily once you adopt the mindset of seeing the sorts of work people are likely to need done.  If you see an inventor discussing something he is working on you could go up to him and say “Are you crazy?  You need to patent this before you talk about it!”  A solid and good attorney is always creating demand and finding ways to get work no matter where they are.

In a small town this could be traveling to other towns and giving talks.  This could be speaking with local organization.  There are tons of ways that people can get business.  You simply need to insure that you are making the most of each opportunity you have to get the work you want.  It does not matter where you are-you can do anything if you try hard enough.

“I do not have the right personality to fit in”
Then change your personality-or better yet, do not change your personality.

I remember listening to a lawyer talk about business generation once and hearing him say that the biggest nerd in Los Angeles was also the biggest business generator.  That is to day: Just be who you are-it is probably good enough.

Everyone fits in wherever they are because there are a variety of people everywhere.  You need to look for reasons why you fit in.

“I have a learning disability”
Incredibly, I heard an attorney say this once and use this as a reason for not succeeding.  You know what this guy did?  He found a job representing foreigners who did not speak English and they never caught on that he was not the sharpest tack around.  This guy is having more fun and making more money than the majority of attorneys out there.  And while the work he is doing is not that difficult, he is charging a fair price for it and doing good work.

“My grades were not good enough in law school”
Who cares.  I know someone who got a “C-” average at a mediocre law school who got a clerkship with a Federal Appellate Judge and also got a job at a firm routinely ranked as one of the top 10 most prestigious firms in the United States.  The judge and firm never asked for her grades!  Then I placed the same girl at an AmLaw 20 firm and the firm that hired her never asked for her grades either.  To answer your suspicions, this girl was no “knockout”.  She just got lucky.  You can too.  Lots of attorneys do.  The secret is applying to as many jobs as possible and looking the part.  In this girl’s case she had written herself onto the law review at her school and was also elected managing editor.

“The Best Recruiters Will Not Work With Me” Who cares.  I do not have as an exciting life as a rock star.  There are lots of things you could have that you do not.  If the best recruiters will not work with you then find a job on your own.  There are some easy places you can find opportunities when you are seeking for a job regardless of whether or not you use a recruiter:

LawCrossing.  Yes, I am the founder of LawCrossing.  Yes, LawCrossing costs money each month.  Nevertheless, LawCrossing does have over 250 people working for it looking for jobs for you each day.  It has a multimillion dollar database that searches every legal employer’s website daily and the people at LawCrossing also do a ton of this work manually as well.  LawCrossing also searches literally thousands of newspapers around the United States each day in search of jobs.  LawCrossing is an excellent way to put hundreds of people to work for you finding opportunities.  The fact that many people do not want to pay the nominal amount this service charges is fine. Those are the same people who are not competing with LawCrossing members for jobs!

Legal Authority.  Yes, I am also the Founder of Legal Authority.  I happen to really believe in the service and am quite passionate about it.  Legal Authority is probably the most effective method of finding a position out there.  With Legal Authority you can literally apply to all of the firms of a size you choose and in a interested in practicing litigation in Aurora, Illinois with a firm of less than 10 attorneys you can apply to all of these firms at one time.  The benefit of practice area you choose in an area you specify.  For example, if you are using a service like this is huge because you will find firms with a need that might not even be advertising.  In addition, as part of the Legal Authority service you will have your resume and cover letter professionally done.  This can make a huge difference when you are applying for jobs

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Regardless of how you are doing your job search, if you are looking for a position the very last thing you should do is limit the number of places you are applying to.  The more places you are applying to the more opportunities you are likely to get.  You need to look for a position in a comprehensive and far-reaching way.  The more places you apply to the better chance you will have of getting another position. In addition, the employer you are applying to may put you in touch with someone else who does have excellent opportunities.  Insure you are applying to many places at once.

“My resume stinks”  Then make your resume better.  Buy a book about attorney resumes such as one I wrote (Attorney Resume Secrets Revealed available from my company Attorney Research Group (www.attorneyresearchgroup.com)) and make your resume perfect.  Better yet, hire a professional resume service such as Attorney Resume (www.attorneyresume.com) to do your resume (yes, this is also a company I founded).  Set professionals to work on your resume and make your resume outstanding.  You owe it to yourself to get a fantastic resume completed.

Regardless of whether you hire a company like Attorney Resume or work on your resume yourself, you need to get the most professional resume possible done.  A professional can help you bring out your strengths.

Conclusions
The best possible thing you can do with your career is start seeing opportunities where the rest of the world is seeing obstacles.  Even obstacles should be something that you see as actual opportunities.  Do not let the world get you down-take action and improve and go where you want to go.

I firmly believe that you can accomplish whatever you set out to do and to be.  I believe in you and have dedicated my life to providing you with the inspiration and career tools to get to where you want to go.  Take your career to the next level and become who you want to become. Never let any perceived obstacle hold you back.  You deserve better than that.