creating a more fulfilling legal career
Kevin O’Keefe and Carolyn Elefant , among other bloggers, recently posted about this New York Times piece on the diminishing lure of the law. I read the article when it first ran and liked it a lot. But, the news it imparted was not earth shattering by any stretch.
For years, theorists, academics and others have been decoding and commenting on the root causes of lawyer discontent and attrition. When legal sanity launched in 2004, one of its main objectives was to highlight their work and related efforts to remedy an ailing legal profession. Since then, coverage here has included posts on:
The lingering question for law firms and practitioners alike is how to bring more creativity to the everyday practice of law. The first step, of course, is to acknowledge the creativity deficit and the problems deriving from it. From there, firms could take it to the people and ask their lawyers what kind of creative outlets and opportunities they’d like to have on the job. Beyond getting this direct input, firms could demonstrate their commitment to creativity through policy and marketing initiatives.
For some inspiration, firms can look to resources like this article on creativity and success (emphasizing the “simple and wonderful truth that all people have the capacity to be creative”) and this terrific marketing-lateral recruiting campaign from Chicago’s Ungaretti & Harris.
For years, theorists, academics and others have been decoding and commenting on the root causes of lawyer discontent and attrition. When legal sanity launched in 2004, one of its main objectives was to highlight their work and related efforts to remedy an ailing legal profession. Since then, coverage here has included posts on:
- the antidote for lawyer discontent
- the economics of lawyer depletion
- connecting points for employee engagement
- wake up calls for lawyers and law firms
- toxic law firms
The lingering question for law firms and practitioners alike is how to bring more creativity to the everyday practice of law. The first step, of course, is to acknowledge the creativity deficit and the problems deriving from it. From there, firms could take it to the people and ask their lawyers what kind of creative outlets and opportunities they’d like to have on the job. Beyond getting this direct input, firms could demonstrate their commitment to creativity through policy and marketing initiatives.
For some inspiration, firms can look to resources like this article on creativity and success (emphasizing the “simple and wonderful truth that all people have the capacity to be creative”) and this terrific marketing-lateral recruiting campaign from Chicago’s Ungaretti & Harris.
Letter to the Editor:
Reverse Mentoring
I suggest The Florida Bar implement a mandatory reverse-mentoring program. Pursuant to this program, all middle-aged lawyers would be required to have a mentor for one year. The pool of mentors would be chosen from those lawyers with less than five years experience.
As a solo practitioner litigator, I am in the trenches doing state court litigation daily. Almost without exception, the unethical behavior ? "Rambo" discovery tactics; scheduling hearings purposely without clearing the date with opposing counsel as a tactic; abusive behavior at mediations and on the phone; flatly telling lies and misrepresentations about fact and law to the court; the obsessive focus on money and the related wrongheaded idea that the profession was designed such that all lawyers should expect to be wealthy ? described in the December 15 article, "Professionalism's new focus: Change lawyers' bad behavior," is perpetrated by middle-aged and older lawyers. The rare exceptions come from those unfortunate young lawyers who have had the misfortune to be hired by these unethical older lawyers, who train the young lawyers to behave like them.
The Bar should require these older, misbehaving lawyers to be mentored by young law graduates who still maintain their idealism, a memory of the true nature of how and why law should he practiced ? which is indeed taught in law schools today ? and who have not yet been corrupted by the way law is currently practiced by many of the older lawyers.
I started to become frustrated when I began to read the article, but as I read on, I noticed that the commission acknowledges several times that the problem is indeed the older lawyers, not the younger generation. For example, the commission acknowledges that what is now being proposed is punishing conduct that "10 years ago wouldn't have been considered unethical." But these older lawyers who learned to practice this way, with impunity, constitute the pool of potential mentors for young lawyers under the mentoring proposal that is being considered. The commission further acknowledges, essentially, that the older generation is "lost" and all we can do now is hope the younger generation does not turn out so bad. ("I think experience has taught us if we expect to correct that inappropriate behavior by addressing the older lawyers, we are going to lose out and lose out badly, because they are not subject to, shall we say, advice. If we go to the law schools, we can eradicate one of the sources of the infection. The new lawyers coming in would not be replacing the old lawyers with the same kind of behaviors. . . . We would be infusing the Bar with lawyers who are more responsible than the average lawyer today. They would be smarter. . . . We must recognize that we are not going to be able to do all the things we would like to do with existing lawyers. But we certainly can mold the new population.")
But again, it is the older, bad-behaving folks who constitute the pool of potential mentors under the proposal. And a related problem is that we ethical lawyers trying to earn a living practicing law right now must continue to be victimized by the bad behavior and sometimes downright unethical tactics being employed by the old guard who "are not subject to, shall we say, advice." The state court system lets them get away with it. Unfortunately, therefore, the plan to ensure the younger generation will be better faces a very uphill battle.
Jeff Donner
Miami