Lawyer Satisfaction Blog

Law schools have failed their students and the public but college graduates continue to apply and attend without having the facts or information needed to make an informed decision.

I request that you read this post and, if appropriate, forward it to any college students considering going to law school as well as any of those, such as pre-law advisers, who advise such students.

This is a unique, almost chaotic, time in the legal profession.

Large law firms are reevaluating the way they do business as the economic downturn has resulted in their clients no longer being willing to pay for the training of associates. Many also want value pricing not hourly fees.

Small firms are being given a second look and becoming more attractive to lawyers. In that vein, the presentations I am making to bar associations, including one this past September for the New York State Bar Association Committee on Lawyers in Transition, are aimed at helping lawyers learn about small firms and how to find positions there.

Law schools are under attack from all quarters: including law firms asking that the law schools prepare their students to practice law; students who are paying so much and often believing that they are getting so little; the ABA for inadequate teaching methods and devoting too much time to academic research.

Lawyers are expressing great dissatisfaction in their large firm practices. The American Bar Foundation's After the JD study of 5000 associates from the year 2000 on found that 59% of the graduates of the top law schools working for large law firms planned to leave within two and a half years.

A significant aspect of what I refer to as the "funneling" of as high as 95% of the graduates at selective law schools to large law firms through on-campus interviewing is that as many as 50% of the students wanted careers serving the public and were diverted from those careers. As you are aware we still have a crisis in the country where 80% of the legal needs of the 45,000,000 least wealthy of us are not met by the legal profession.

Some articles point out that the high cost of law school is "justification' for law students to take high paying positions. Rarely examined is why that cost is so high.

Those involved in advising college students who plan to go to law school in the past have focused primarily on how to get into the schools rated the best by the USNews annual survey. The problem is that that survey is defective. For example, it does not have a criteria evaluating how well the law school prepares students for the practice of law. Its focus is on intangibles such as reputation and which law schools get the most graduates the fastest into the largest law firms.

What is needed is a group of students or prelaw advisers who will research and inform college students about the state of legal education today. The group might want to design a far-reaching project could evaluate law schools based on whether they teach the fundamental values and skills of the legal profession and other relevant criteria such as reasonable cost. One example of such an evaluation tool is at the end of Overcoming Law School Defects .

The articles on my website and blog contain much information, resources and warnings about the deficiencies of legal education for those considering doing so.

I also recommend you read what Chuck Newton just posted in this Third Wave Blog entitled Death to Big Law (Schools)?

Law schools simply cannot live off the hope that poor (literally), innocent students can borrow ever increasing amounts of money, almost on a whim, to satisfy the peculiar beguilement and distraction of law school insiders. It is having and will continue to have very severe financial consequences for its graduates; marked by intense dissatisfaction for the choice they made to attend law school in the first place.

I invite anyone interested in talking about any of these issues or in designing a law school evaluation project to post a comment here or contact me directly by email.

A proposal for a new public law school for Massachusetts, one of only 7 states in the country not to have a public law school, has generated an enormous amount of controversy with many saying that there is a need for a school with a reasonable tuition and others saying there is at this time no need for a school that would add more lawyers to an overcrowded field. Prominent among the opponents, shocking as that may not be, are the local law schools. What is shocking is that I find myself agreeing with the stand of the law schools.Over a week ago, I submnitted what follows as a proposed op-ed to the Boston Globe. I welcome your comments.

ANOTHER PERSPECTIVE ON THE PUBLIC LAW SCHOOL PROPOSAL

What's missing from the discussion about the need for a new public law school for Massachusetts is any consideration of the failure of the existing law schools to serve not only the educational needs of their students but also the legal needs of the public.

In 1980, Lloyd Cutler, Esq. (adviser to Presidents Carter and Clinton) remarked that 95% of lawyers' time is devoted to the wealthiest 1% of our society, the 25% most disadvantaged get 5% of their time and the remaining nearly 75% cannot afford and get virtually none of their time."

As Harvard Law School's Public Interest Adviser from 1984-89, I observed that at least 40% of the students hoped to represent individuals in personal plight matters. That school and other "selective" law schools, however, funneled as many as 95% of their graduates to large law firms by failing to prepare them to work in small law firms and by devoting staff time to the insidious on-campus interviewing placement program.

Little has changed. Diverting students from their career dreams has led to shattered self-confidence and rampant dissatisfaction within the legal profession as well as continued lack of access to the justice system for the public. So while we seem to have too many law schools in this state and this country, recent surveys indicate that only 20% of the legal needs of the 45,000,000 least wealthy in this country are met by the legal system.

The possibility that the new school might contribute to the state coffers is not a plus. The law school industry continues to ignore decades of calls that it provide quality legal education at a reasonable cost. For years, universities have been able to consider their law schools "cash cows". Law schools increase tuition to outrageous levels far beyond the rate of inflation with many questioning the value of what students (some borrowing up to $200,000 at a time when starting salaries are plummeting) get in return.

Last Friday's edition of the Harvard Law Record published a copy of an alumnus' response to a request for a contribution suggesting ".. you might concede that the Law School could ease financial strain on students without reducing the quality of the J.D. degree. One way would be to drop the third year or, or postpone it to mid-career."

Law professors teach large classes with little opportunity for students to show their understanding of a concept and be evaluated on that performance. Staff is hired to replace faculty who take less of a role in administrative duties such as career planning and devote time to academic research unrelated to effective student education.

During the current economic downturn, with large firm layoffs and job deferrals, one school's solution is to offer a masters degree, basically a fourth year of law school through which the student can finally learn to practice law. Most law schools, however, are content to promote alternative paths that students are unprepared to pursue, hoping for the return to "normalcy" when they can revive the funnel to the large law firms and thereby shore up their US News ranking.

If law schools fail to reform legal education to prepare their students to practice law at a reasonable cost and to serve the legal needs of the public, the legislature should enact a law reinstituting the former system by which lawyers became members of the bar - "reading the law". California, Vermont, Virginia, New York, Maine. Washington and Wyoming still have variations on this process whereby an applicant may take the bar exam after study under a judge or practicing attorney for an extended period of time. Such a law should also establish an office within the Executive Branch which would provide limited supplementary training to advise and support those pursuing this option.

We do not need another law school. We need to demand that the current ones uphold the fundamental values of the legal profession and devote their efforts to meeting the needs of their students and the public.

_____________________________________________________________
Ronald W. Fox, Esq. directs the Center for Professional Development in the Law and is the author of Lawful Pursuit: Careers in Public Interest Law
______________________________________________________________

AUGUST 9 1989 - HARVARD LAW SCHOOL

After graduating from Harvard Law School in 1963, I worked for a large law firm, served in the US Army JAG and worked in an insurance company. After two years as an associate for a sole practitioner, I founded two small law firms representing individuals and community groups and became one of the first lawyers in the country to offer divorce mediation. Concerned about the issue of the unmet legal needs of the public, I served on the boards of legal services programs, created referral programs for the Massachusetts Bar Association and the National Lawyers Guild, started an association of legal clinics, and served as president of a family mediation association.

In 1983 I returned to Harvard Law School as its public interest adviser. On August 9, 1989, my position was eliminated by a recently appointed dean of that law school. I have reprinted below some material related to the elimination of that position.

Since that time I have provided career advice to lawyers and law students and consulted to law schools, law firms and bar associations. In addition I have advocated for the restructuring and reform of legal education.

From what I have observed over the last 20 years, though there has been much criticism of legal education and calls for reform (including the highly regard 1992 ABA MacCrate Report), the law schools have largely ignored them.

Are you as concerned as I am that during the current economic downturn, the law school industry is desperately trying to maintain the on-campus interviewing "funnel" to BigLaw despite the recent survey of 5000 associates finding that 59% of "top-ten" law school grads plan to leave BigLaw jobs within 2 years while other data indicates that 80% of the legal needs of the least wealthy 45,000,000 of us are unmet?
.
Do you think that there have been and will continue to be positive changes and improvements in the delivery of legal education?

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August 8, 1989

HARVARD LAW SCHOOL
Cambridge, Massachusetts 01938

OFFICE OF THE DEAN

Mr. Ronald Fox
Harvard Law School
Pound 310

Dear Ron

Many thanks for your recent gift to the Law School Fund. I appreciate your support of the School's annual giving program.

With best wishes

Sincerely,
/s/ Bob
Robert C. Clark
Dean

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August 14, 1989

MEMORANDUM
TO; The File
FROM: Ron Fox
RE: Meeting with Dean Robert Clark

On Wednesday, August 9, 1989, at 11:30 A.M., I met with Dean
Robert Clark. He told me that he had made some decisions about restructuring and that I was not likely to be pleased. June Thompson would no longer be in admissions and would be full time in placement and there was also going to be an appointment of a new director of counseling. He mentioned that he did not know what I did in my job, although he had seen one letter that I had written and he thought it was very good. He had decided that it was not cost effective to have a 8/10 position devoted solely to the 6 to 8 people who were interested in public interest, therefore, my position was being eliminated as well as the position of my assistant (Dana Bullwinkel] who is about to enter graduate school).

I asked him to clarify whether or not that meant that I had been fired. He said that that was putting it too bluntly: my position was being eliminated. He said that he did not know how long I had been working at the law school. I was not being told that I had to leave the next day. When the administrative dean, Simone Reagor, returns from vacation, I would talk to her about the details.

When I asked him whether he had mentioned that there was going to be a new position, new director of counseling, he said that was the case, and that it was a position for which I would not be considered. (It now appears that this new position was created by the half of Mark Byers, the career counselor for the law school, that was assigned to the Placement Office and the other half of his time that was assigned to the Counseling Office under the Dean of Student's Office and Mark has been told that he can apply for this job but that he should be looking elsewhere in the event he does not get it.)

I had prepared a memorandum for him and had attached to it some of the material I had written over the last year and a half on public interest career planning and placement problems and issues at the law school and my suggestions and proposals. I gave it to him and told him that if he wanted to discuss any aspect of the material, I would be prepared to do so.

I left the office about 11:37 A.M.

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14 March 1990

PUBLIC INTEREST LAW CAREER PLANNING CENTER
955 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139

Ronald W. Fox Tel: (617) 868-6669
Executive Director Fax: (617) 876-0203

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE STUDENTS OF HARVARD LAW SCHOOL

I first want to say that my six years spent directing the public interest career activities at Harvard Law School was the most positive, rewarding and satisfying professional experience I have had since leaving the law school in 1963. I talked, wrote to, and learned from, intelligent, talented, concerned, responsible, committed people - students, staff of the law school, alumni/ae, other lawyers, and career planning professionals at other law schools. I also publicly want to let you all know how much I appreciate your personal visits, kind words and public statements in my support. Your actions made a stressful time more comfortable and gave me the reason, strength, encouragement and confidence to found the Public Interest Law Career Planning Center which will assist law students and lawyers who want to pursue careers in public interest, human services and government.

I came to the law school to direct the public interest career and placement activities after 15 years working in private practice and with many non-profit organizations trying to increase the quality and quantity of legal services delivered to people with low and moderate income. It appeared to me that Harvard Law School believed that it had an obligation to make careers in public interest law a realistic option for its graduates. And, in fact, over the next three years I received approval to establish the IL Public Interest Career Workshop; was given funding to publish the Public Interest Directory; was given the time to assist in the development of "Opportunities in Public Interest Law"; was encouraged to solicit $300,000 from an alumnus, Kenneth Montgomery, `28, for a public interest summer grant program which he generously funded; was given the time to establish a Task Force on Public Interest Law of the National Association for Law Placement; and was afforded the opportunity to give advice and guidance to about 100 individuals in each class and many alumni/ae.

I was impressed by the depth of commitment to public interest within the student body. I talked to students, analyzed class lists and read surveys that confirmed my findings that 40% of each class were interested in pursuing public interest careers. A study of one class revealed that by the time of graduation, 40% of its members had attended public interest workshops and/or devoted substantial time to public interest law either during the summer or in a clinical course. I spent many hours listening to students and providing information to allay their fears and to counter pressures from peers, the law school, family, and society in general to take positions they did not want. In addition, I received frequent calls and visits from anguished alumni/ae wanting to leave jobs in large firms they found boring and/or in conflict with their values. Yet every year, upon graduation, over 90% of the class take positions with large law firms representing commercial institutions and others in the wealthiest 1% of the society that the legal profession serves well. At the same time the rest of the society, 247 million people, are either totally unable to afford legal services if they have a housing, health, employment, discrimination or family problem, or, if they are indigent, only able to have a lawyer at no cost to them for one out of every fourteen of these legal problems. I refer to this factual situation as the "Crisis in Public Interest Law."

Many of you presently at the school as well as those who have recently graduated recognized that much of fault for, and the responsibility for remedying, the lack of diversity of career choices of graduates of the law school lay within the law school itself. You questioned 1) the curriculum's reliance on commercial cases, 2) the high cost of attending the law school accompanied by approval of higher student debt 3) the second-class status of the clinical program, 4) the preference given to large firms in the hiring process by the allocation of a disproportionate amount of staff time and resources to a recruiting process dominated by these firms and held in the fall when few other legal institutions know their future legal hiring needs, and by the failure to examine in depth negative aspects of such firms, especially the many student complaints of discrimination and unfair treatment 5) the failure of the law school to challenge the "prevailing wisdom" generalizations based on flawed assumptions, such as "Work in large firms is intellectually stimulating and prestigious and one receives the best training there," "Grades are very important in obtaining any job," "There are no jobs in public interest and even if there were, most students can not afford to take them because of the amount of their debt," "The work in public interest areas is boring, routine, uncreative and unimportant", "There is no training in public interest jobs" and "It is important that you find a job and become an employee rather than going out and creating your own institution" 6) the failure to provide adequate staff and resources for students and alumni/ae looking for career advice 7) the indifference and lack of availability of most of the faculty for career and job advice.

In early 1988, I requested funds from June Thompson, the Director of Placement, for additional staff and resources needed to create a Career Development Division in the Placement Office. Because of her basic disagreement with me about the existence of a crisis and her belief that there was little need for career advice generally and public interest career counseling specifically, the request was rejected. In April, 1988, I submitted a proposal through the Dean's Office requesting that a Career Development Center outside of the Placement Office be established to offer guidance to students, staff, faculty, alumni and others on public interest and many other less accessible and less familiar careers. I know of no staff or faculty meetings called to review the proposal, to discuss career issues, to debate differences in orientation or to set goals and priorities. No written responses were ever sent about the proposal and in early August. 1988, I heard indirectly that a decision had been reached - nothing would be done.

In April, 1989, after two very unsatisfactory meetings with June Thompson, I again renewed my request to the Dean's Office for the establishment of a Career Development Center. At about the same time I proposed the creation of a Center for the Delivery of Legal Services in the Public Interest which would coordinate research and activities on the "crisis" throughout the law school, including placement, career planning, the counselling center, financial aid, and the alumni/ae office. I inquired about the status of the proposals weekly. No staff or faculty meetings were ever called to review the proposals and I received no written response.

On July 1, Robert Clark became the dean and on August 9, 1989, two days after my return from vacation I was told to make an appointment to see him. At the meeting, after I introduced myself, he informed me that although he did not know what I did, he did know that it was not cost effective to have a four day a week position devoted to public interest when only six to eight people were affected so he was eliminating my position and that of my assistant, Dana Bullwinkel. He said that in our place a full-time staff assistant would be hired who would report to June Thompson and counsel students in all areas of the law, not just public interest.

The school lacks, and seriously needs, a well-supported, well-staffed, well-publicized, career development office and a public interest career center. I regret not having been given the opportunity to establish these offices but I remain optimistic. I believe that the law school will in the near future come to grips with the crisis. I do not think that it will ignore the imbalanced and inappropriate diversion of 90% of its graduates to the representation of 1% of the population. I do not think that it will want to be considered an irrelevant factor in the search for equality of access to the justice system. I am optimistic because so many of you spoke out this fall demanding more support, resources and guidance on the many varied public interest careers. I also want to express to all of you my deepest respect for the responsible actions you have taken in support of those who want to pursue legal services for those who need them the most. Because of your untiring efforts, your organizing, your factual and reasoned responses, your requests and demands, and your persistence, you have made many aware of the concerns of students and issues that had previously gone unrecognized. You have provided encouragement not only to students here but to students at other law schools and untold lawyers and college students considering a career in public interest law.

Your involvement is not only important, it is critical and necessary. Almost all of the significant progress that Harvard Law School has made and most of the programs that have been developed in the last fifteen years in the area of public interest career planning and placement have resulted from student demands. The creation of the public interest committee by the new dean with a broad mandate to review the role of public interest within the law school is a recent example. We are truly in the midst of a crisis which will not be resolved while you are in law school. How you respond to it in law school, however, may determine how you respond to it throughout your entire legal career. Your actions this fall have given many people reason to be optimistic. Continued best wishes in your efforts.

Sincerely,
/s/Ron
Ronald W. Fox

I had the opportunity and the privilege yesterday to make a presentation entitled "Think Small: Learning About and Locating Positions in Small Law Firms" for the New York State Bar Association. About 30 who registered were "live" in the "studio" at the law office of Lauren Wachtler, the chair of the Committee on Lawyers in Transition. An additional 175 registered for the webcast

THE VIDEO OF THIS 110 MINUTE WORKSHOP IS NOW ACCESSIBLE ON-LINE HERE..

BEFORE YOU BEGIN, HOWEVER, READ BELOW!

IF YOU DECIDE TO VIEW IT, I SUGGEST YOU DO THE FOLLOWING:
1. PAUSE THE VIDEO AS IT BEGINS;
2, CLICK THE ATTACHMENT ICON AFTER "HANDOUT #1 SUGGESTED READING ";
3. DO THE READING AND THE EXERCISES; AND THEN.
4, WATCH THE VIDEO

I initially talk about how we got to this point (my 50th year in the legal profession) where the vast majority of the public are unable to obtain the services of a lawyer and the vast majority of lawyers are dissatisfied. (I quote from the recent American Bar Foundation "After the JD" press release indicating that 59% of the associates from what they refer to as the "top ten law schools" intend to leave their present large firm employers within 2 years and that those in firms of greater than 250 lawyers are less satisfied than their counterparts in smaller firms.)

I state my belief that the culprit are the law schools which funnel their students to BigLaw through on-campus interviewing and ignore those unable to be interviewed and, in the process, neglect the legal needs of the public by failing to teach skills, values and career planning and charging outrageous amounts for tuition, far greater than the worth of the services delivered. My experience in the last 25 years leads me to conclude that lawyers who are unhappy because they are unable to find employment or dissatisfied at the law firm the law school "placed" them in, will invariably suffer from a lack of self-confidence, self-respect and self-worth.

The second part of the program begins with making lawyers aware of one of the four fundamental values of the legal profession - the commitment of a lawyer to take a position consistent with his or her professional goals and personal values. I then suggest how to go about finding a position in a small firm pointing out that 66% of all lawyers in private practice are in firms of 5 or less lawyers. I advise that they choose and area of law, find out who does it, make contact with some to promote and market yourself, keep doing something and eventually accept a position likely to provide career satisfaction.

I also suggest that, as they implement this process, they might want to look at themselves as independent contractors and, rather than limiting themselves to jobs as employees, look for opportunities to work part-time for one lawyer, then one or two others until they are full time partners, associates or solos.

The program raised a number of issues. Whether or not you view the webinar, I invite you to comment and share what you think about these or any related topics: the legal needs of the public; the need for major restructuring of legal education; OCI and the funnel; dissatisfaction of lawyers in BigLaw; the lack of self-confidence of lawyers generally; the opportunities in small firms.

I HOPE YOU FIND THIS PROGRAM HELPS YOU IN YOUR SEARCH FOR CAREER SATISFACTION..

Ron Fox .

On Wednesday, September 16, 2009, from noon to 2pm (EDT), I will be doing a live webcast for the New York State Bar Association Committee on Lawyers in Transition entitled Think Small! Learning About and Locating Positions in Small Law Firms

"For many years, if not decades, there has been an intense focus on large law firms as if they represent the entire legal profession. The lack of openings within large law firms makes this a most appropriate time for lawyers and law students to realize that there are nearly unlimited options in small law firms. There are jobs; there are positions; there are openings!"

For more information and to register for this free program go to this NYSBA website..

Many of you are aware of LawShucks which has become well known for keeping track of the number of lawyers and staff laid off from BigLaw. Recently someone began to post his/her thoughts under the title of The Laid Off Diary

As I read the articles, I recognized that the diarist, although likely not having the background and experience of a career planner, had distilled in the various articles the essence and fundamentals of the approach I employ in helping lawyers make a transition from dissatisfaction or unemployment to, hopefully, a satisfying position.

I took excerpts from many of the posts in the diary and, with the approval of Law Shucks and its diarist, present them here. I think you will find what follows worth reading.

EXCERPTS FROM THE LAID OFF DIARY

Apple
It's so easy to have taken the path we did. Major in some bullshit liberal arts degree, whack through the LSAT for a few hours, get into a good law school, study two weeks before each final for an OPEN BOOK final, be wined and dined for two summers, wear nice suits and have the little numbers in our bank account go up and up.... but through all of this, did most of us actually stop and think about what we WANT to do? what our GOAL is?

Falling Forward
We are all entrepreneurs of life in some sense trying to find the idea that is a home run... Sure, there are some formula one race car drivers that were groomed from the age of 4 or gymnasts whose parents sent them to gymnastics training at the age of 6 but not all of us had our paths laid out in front of us like that. Moreover, even laid out paths might end up like the roll over bar and be a bust even though it seemed like a golden fail proof idea. For some, BigLaw seemed like a pig-in-shit perfect path for them but at the end of the day, it might just be the shit without the pig (er...well, you get the idea). Sure, our endeavor into BigLaw was costly (student loans, time spent and brain cells killed studying for the bar, and self-esteem and dignity lost through working in BigLaw), but let's try to learn from this lesson, move on, and fall forward

Valuation Model
It's simple logic. If you sacrifice X for Y, make sure Y is more valuable than X. It might be that BigLaw is your dream job, it is what gets you going in the morning, and it is more important to you than family (I'd hate to be you). But if it's not, make sure you know that. Make sure during the valuation of your life and the things in it, your model correctly reflects the true value of your job. And don't just use the blue book value or the value that other people tell you it has, be honest with yourself and use the value that correctly reflects whether it is a mint condition Maybach 57 or a beat up rusty piece of shit with rips in the sticky nylon seats that smells oddly of cat piss and cotton candy.

Laying Seeds
But everything I'm doing now makes me think about these damn bean stalks. I've called every partner, senior associate, recruiter, or professional contact that I've made since I've been laid off. They've all tried to help and give me advice but nothing has come to fruition. I've been following leads, trying to branch out, making new contacts, etc. Sometimes when I see a job opportunity, I work myself up over it and get the feeling "this is the job! this is it! I'm made!" but I either don't get the job or it turns out to be b.s.

Benefit
I will admit that I was able to benefit from my time in the slammer doing hard legal labor, which consisted of 60-70 hours of busy boring and unchallenging work, and that I am much more competent than most people I meet. I won't claim that I'm more competent than my peers who worked in TinyLaw because they may have an expertise that I do not have because they worked in TinyLaw (e.g. a trial lawyer at a plaintiff's firm has much more trial experience than most BigLaw trial lawyer) but I do believe that I at least sound pretty damn sophisticated and it comes from 1) being able to talk out of my ass flawlessly, and 2) working on sophisticated deals in BigLaw.

Journey
When I first started writing to you, I did it because I was 1) fed up with BigLaw; 2) bored; 3) enjoy bitching and thought you'd like to hear about it; and 4) wanted to tell people about the "real" truth about BigLaw (or at least as I perceived it). But I've discovered that this has now become a diary of my journey and transformation as just another "lawyer" into... I'd like to cross over to business and do something creative but I have to admit, it's difficult not to just fall back into being a "lawyer" because that's what I know and that's how the world sees me. But now I have to break through that image and reinvent myself that is both in the legal world and in the business/entrepreneurial world. Will this diary be as moving as the Motorcycle Diaries? I don't presume to think I can move the world the same way Che has, but I hope I can at least shift my career and hopefully business people will stop thinking of us as boring losers. and besides, all I have is a scooter. The journey begins

Networking, Not Netwhoring
We know why networking is important-only 5-10% of jobs are advertised, it never hurts to have someone higher up pull strings for you, and blah blah blah But, it's HOW you network.

Let's Do Lunch
At associate development lunches at the firm, we were told to find a niche practice which most of the time resulted from happening upon an assignment that required us to do about 30 hours of mind numbing research on a boring or obscure part of the law and then being the "go to" person every time that issue came up. We were actually encouraged to seek out mind-numbing work and "fall" into that niche practice instead of CHOOSING a practice area or niche that made us tick. Not very encouraging. Shouldn't we first find out what makes us tick and then seek out a position or build one around what we are interested in? Are lawyers that afraid to go after what they want that they are willing to hang their hat on any random ass nail they happen to find sticking out of a wall and 30 years later, still hang on that same damn rusty nail?

Bid-ness Development
how am I getting all these CEOs and managing directors and founders to meet with me or invite me to lunch (and more than once) or coffee or to their offices or call me or give me a standing invite to lunch if I'm ever in their city? I can't teach you. Either you're social or you're not. Either your extroverted or you're not. Either you can sell yourself as someone interesting enough that someone will want to talk to you or you can't. Either you're creative on how to reach out to these people and get in front of them or you're not. But I can say that it gets easier as your Rolodex expands because then people start introducing you to their network.

AREA OF PRACTICE PREFERENCES

If you are a lawyer who is dissatisfied, underemployed or unemployed, or a law students looking to the future, you may want to consider your options in a wide range of areas in which lawyers practice and then explore some of them in more depth.

My suggestion is that you circle the practice areas that APPEAL to you. Note that I did NOT say in which ones you have experience or took classes in in law school or CLE courses. I just want you to indicate your interest in representing clients with issues or claims in specific areas of the law.

(I found this list here after clicking on "Choose from a List")

Adoptions;
Automobile Accidents;
Bankruptcy;
Breach of Contract;
Business Law;
Business Litigation;
Child Custody;
Child Support;
Civil Litigation;
Civil Rights;
Collaborative Family Law;
Collections;
Commercial Litigation;
Construction Law;
Consumer Fraud;
Consumer Law;
Contracts;
Corporate Law;
Criminal Law;
DUI/DWI;
Debtor and Creditor;
Discrimination;
Divorce;
Domestic Violence;
Drug Crimes;
Education Law;
Elder Law;
Employment Contracts;
Entertainment Law;
Estate Litigation;
Estate Planning;
Family Law;
Fathers Rights;
Felonies;
Foreclosures;
General Practice;
Guardianship and Conservatorship;
Head and Spinal Injuries;
Immigration;
Insurance;
Intellectual Property;
Labor and Employment;
Landlord and Tenant Law;
Legal Malpractice;
Libel, Slander and Defamation;
Litigation;
Medical Malpractice;
Medicare and Medicaid;
Motorcycle Accidents;
Nursing Home Litigation;
Patents;
Personal Injury;
Police Misconduct;
Products Liability;
Real Estate;
Residential Real Estate;
Sex Crimes;
Sexual Harassment;
Slip and Fall;
Social Security;
Social Security Disability;
Taxation;
Traffic Violations;
Trucking Accidents;
Trusts and Estates;
White Collar Crime;
Wills and Probate;
Workers Compensation;
Wrongful Death;
Wrongful Termination

 I met Debra Snider on Twitter in a conversation about women & large law firms.  That conversation led to a spirited email discussion, which we've broken down into four blog posts.

After a distinguished 21-year legal and business career, Debra became an author and speaker.  As a lawyer, she handled corporate and securities transactions for two large law firms and a real estate syndication company, then was Executive Vice President, General Counsel & Chief Administrative Officer at a $20 billion publicly held commercial finance company.  Thus, she has the perspective of someone who has been an associate at a large firm, an in-house staff lawyer with management responsibilities, a partner at a large law firm, and a client of many law firms, large and small.

Debra is the author of the well-received novel A Merger of Equals, which is set in the business world.  She has also published two business books: The Productive Culture Blueprint (an American Bar Association Career Resource Center publication that offers a blueprint, complete with case study, checklists and other practical tools and tips, for building sustainable strategic productivity into the in-house law department and enduring, effective relationships with outside law firms); and Working Easier, an organizational design toolkit.  Debra's website is loaded with free career and other resources in addition to more information about her books, her background and her popular speaking topics.

 

Ron: I was not expecting this from you: "IMO training, opportunity, career development & networking far better in BigLaw, even with all its shortcomings."

 

I have been advising lawyers for 25 yrs. Many of them were making a transition from BigLaw. During that time I heard so many stories of dissatisfaction (long hours, boredom, abuse, no training, no feedback, no responsibility, no creativity) that it led me to believe there was NO value to the experience in BigLaw.  Do you think that in BigLaw over the last 10 years (and especially now) there has been (will be) training, opportunity, career development and networking?

 

Debra: I absolutely believe there is superior training, opportunity, career development and networking in large law firms.  There is a great deal that those firms can and should be doing differently for both themselves and their clients, but they continue to be the places offering the best concentration of sophisticated legal work and fine legal minds.

 

Ron:  I wonder how that can be verified.

 

Debra: I thought this was self-evident, but since you ask, I'll give you my thinking.  I believe that good lawyers are characterized by the kind of judgment and knowledge that comes from exposure to and experience with a variety of matters for a variety of clients in a variety of industries, all supervised in the early years and informed in later years by a variety of experienced lawyers, whether senior associates or partners.  The breadth of the experiences is as important as the depth.  A volume shop is - in my opinion and based on my experiences as a rookie, an associate, a partner, and a client - the best place to find and take advantage of the necessary variety.  There are no doubt fine legal minds working on sophisticated legal matters outside large law firms, but the concentration of these in the large law firm context offers the variety of exposure and experience that is essential to developing breadth, depth and judgment quickly.  (More on all this below.)

 

Ron: Do you truly believe that the generic graduate of BigLawSchool who has taken a position with BigLaw is exposed to a "variety of clients" and receives a "variety of practical experiences"? I don't think so!!

 

Debra:  Then you are mistaken or misinformed.  I'll repeat - that experience and exposure are there for the taking. If the generic graduate does not find them, he is not looking.  Why on earth would big law firms hire and pay outlandish salaries to newbies if they had no intent to use them?  It defies logic to suggest they are merely evil cabals designed to turn innocents from public interest practice for no good business reason.

 

In my opinion and based on my experiences, and given my belief that concentration and variety of matters are the hallmark of practical lawyer training, the evidence in favor of BigLaw as an obvious and proven place to gain the exposure necessary to become a good lawyer is overwhelming, both as a fact and in theory.  The easiest place to find concentration and variety is a volume shop that considers it a responsibility to hire, train, and make money from new lawyers, and is betting the health of its long-term business on doing so.  Do you honestly think garden-variety nonprofits have the money, the interest, the responsibility or the ability to hire and train lawyers? Or, for that matter, do solo practitioners as a rule?

 

Ron:  I usually point out to clients the website of a friend who used to be with Proskauer who, for the last 30 years in a firm of 4 lawyers handles complex litigation.  I have also read stories over the years about the excellent legal work performed by a small group of lawyers who have left BigLaw for autonomy, higher income, more flexibility, etc.

 

Debra: I have no problem with small or solo practice as the second phase of a career.  I, too, know many such practitioners and they are terrific - thanks, I believe, to what their BigLaw training and experience added to their innate intelligence and skills.  Remember that I was a General Counsel, as well as a BigLaw associate and partner, so my experience is based not only on my own training, but also on my work with outside firms as their client.  While big firms were the best choices for labor-intensive matters that required a lot of lower-cost associates and paralegals to get the job done effectively and efficiently, "refugee firms," as we called the smaller outfits comprised of former BigLaw partners, did an excellent job for us on various other, equally complex, but less labor-intensive matters.

 

Our original conversation, however, was about lawyers going into small or solo practices right out of law school.  I can't imagine any client willing to hire such a newbie solo practitioner, no matter how intelligent, for any matter of consequence - business or personal.  A small firm populated by recent grads would be equally incompetent.

 

Ron:  I have two reactions.  The first is that the small firms that were formed from those who left BigLaw might be places where the training and opportunities for growth might be better.  While you make a good point about the difficulties or starting out as a solo, these small firms might be a far better option than a BigLaw firm.

 

Debra: If the partners in these small firms were committed to training rookie lawyers, and the firms had both the necessary variety of work and the time and the money to allocate to training, they would be wonderful options.  Some of them may well be, although the ones I know of haven't considered this approach to be economically feasible from the standpoint of the firm.  They have operated in this regard the way my law department at Heller operated.  We realized it was neither cost-effective nor appropriate from a corporate financial point of view for us to allocate Heller resources (dollars and staff time) to training new lawyers when we could easily hire experienced ones who could not only hit the ground running, but also bring with them knowledge of other clients and businesses.

 

As far as I know, there is nothing stopping small law firms that want to take on the responsibility for training rookie lawyers from recruiting them out of law schools.  If you're right that law students are aching for alternatives to BigLaw, these firms ought to do very well at law schools, even if they do have to offer reduced salaries.

 

Ron: Second, there are a number of areas of law and representation which are not the province of BigLaw such as plaintiffs in personal injury matters, tenants and cases against large corporations. Lawyers who want to represent these clients have no option of working for BigLaw. Those with claims in these areas have no option of being represented by BigLaw. The lawyer will either start on his own or work with and for a small firm. There is no evidence that any BigLaw lawyer is more competent to handle a police misconduct case than Michael Avery who has for his career been a solo or small firm lawyer. I could with a little research name hundreds of competent capable lawyers who have started out on their own or with one or two others.

 

Debra:  I'm sure you can.  But would you have hired any of them to represent you or any other client on Day 1 out of law school?  Surely not.  Lawyers who want to represent clients in the kind of matters you enumerate above have to be trained somewhere. Unsupervised on the job training is unfair to clients and probably unethical.  The problem with solo and small practices - and I agree that this is a societal problem - is that they rarely have the interest or the wherewithal to train rookies.  BigLaw won't train rookies specifically in these matters, but it may still be a viable option for 2-3 years, in that it will offer rookies the exposure and experience necessary to become able to think and operate like lawyers - not to mention giving them the paychecks that will allow them to reduce their debt burden and make it easier for them to step out on their own when they feel ready.  And, moreover, why not let small, solo and public interest outfits benefit from BigLaw's training nickel?

 

Perhaps you feel differently, but I would never entrust an important personal matter to an untrained lawyer.  If I were to get divorced, I'd want you, not some kid who's handled only a few cases.  And I'm not looking only for depth of experience when I engage a lawyer; I'm also looking for breadth of experience.  For instance, I've had huge problems even with experienced lawyers on residential real estate matters.  The work these lawyers do has been routinized - which is good because it keeps costs low - but they only know how to do what they do all the time, and even then only if it fits the mold.  For the 1-2 out of 10 situations that presented an unusual issue or otherwise didn't fit the routine, they were lost.  Absolutely lost.  I had far more ability to puzzle out the solutions than they did even though they had vastly more residential real estate experience.

 

Honestly, I don't think we have much disagreement here.  A good, experienced, thoughtful lawyer is just that regardless of how he or she got there.  The issue we're discussing is how best (most effectively and efficiently) to get lawyers there.

 

Ron:  Let's go back to that.  I don't know what you mean when you say that BigLaw is THE place where lawyers develop "the necessary judgment, perspective and experience."  Many of my clients have given me a different picture of life as an associate and junior partner at BigLaw, one that allows for very little decision-making authority, no room for creativity, no autonomy, no meaningful responsibility.

 

Debra:  The necessary training is there for the taking at big law firms.  Perhaps we have a different definition of how lawyers are trained.  In my opinion, training does not start with creativity, autonomy or decision-making.  It's also not about seminars, writing programs and other continuations of impractical law school tactics, although those do sometimes exist (and are typically ridiculed by associates) at big law firms.

 

Training starts with exposure, experience and responsibility.  Any BigLaw associate who's told you he had no meaningful responsibility has no clue what meaningful responsibility is for a rookie.  Let me give you an example.  One of the tasks I had as a corporate and securities newbie was due diligence.  It was my responsibility, for example, to review and schedule a company's loan agreements.  It would certainly have been possible to treat this job as a secretarial one and simply put factoids like loan amount, maturity date, collateral and the like into the little boxes for them on the schedule.  Instead, I used the opportunity to see how loan agreements were constructed, how one differed from another depending on the lender or the collateral or the loan purpose, how the covenants and notice and indemnification provisions worked, etc.  I asked my colleagues questions about the why's behind all this paper and verbiage.  I used my brain and the brains around me to turn this work into the learning opportunity it surely was.

 

Two points here: first, the opportunity was mine to recognize and take, not someone else's to highlight for me; second, many, many of the senior associates and partners I worked with did, in fact, highlight learning opportunities and happily made themselves available to help me learn and grow.  I did the same for every associate I ever worked with.  Within a year or two of approaching my "secretarial due diligence" tasks this way, I had plenty of client contact, decision-making authority, autonomy and room for creativity.  I was by no means alone or unusual in this regard.

 

One of the problems refugees from big firms suffer is, I think, a lack of understanding about how one goes about succeeding in that environment.  One of my partners used to say, "If they need help, they're not good enough."  That's obviously overstated, but it is reflective of a general attitude, and too many of the post-1985 or so law grads I saw, both as Hiring Partner and as a deal lawyer in the Corporate Department, were oddly passive about their own careers.  They seemed to expect a rewarding career to be delivered to their desks.  They had trouble with the truth that a rewarding career is something we must each identify and pursue for ourself.

 

Large law firms do not coddle.  Someone seeking to succeed needs to understand that the rules of the game require taking initiative, figuring out what kind of work he or she wants to do & going after pertinent assignments, demonstrating genuine interest in learning the craft, getting involved in recruiting and pro bono and firm committees and business development and all the other indicia of a full range of involvement, and so forth.

 

 

This is for discouraged lawyers (be they unemployed, underemployed or simply dissatisfied) and law students(1Ls, 2Ls, and 3Ls).  

 

Today I read this post by The Unemployed Lawyer who is in the Seattle area. Here is the comment I added to her blog.

 

"I called the Washington State Bar Association and was told that there are 13,000 members from King County. Based on standard US demographics, that would likely mean that about 75%, or 9,750 are in private practice. Julie Salmon at the WSBA said that about 65% (or about 6500) are in firms of 10 or less. Again based on standard US demographics, 50% of the 6500 are sole practitioners, 35% are in firms 2-5 and 15% in firms of 6-10.  THAT MEANS THAT THERE ARE ABOUT 4000 SMALL FIRMS IN KING COUNTY AND MANY OF THEM NEED YOU.

 

I was then going to add that all you have to do is choose an area of practice, look at yourself either as Susan suggests as a sole practitioner or as an independent contractor, find out who practices in that area and promote and market yourself to them until someone gives you work for some hours, then someone else gives you work for some hours until you finally realize that you are a practicing attorney.

 

But then I read this thoughtful excellent post (what else is new) by Jordan Furlong at Law21, "Graduating into a recession" with solid career planning advice and highly recommend you do the same. 

 

I wish you success in your search."

 

This is an excerpt from the comment that I added to Jordan Furlong's post.

 

"I agree with Susan (Liebel Cartier) and will certainly recommend the article to all who are searching.

 

"I would also suggest that for current law students there is still time to learn the skills. First, while law schools traditionally do not prepare students to practice law, many do offer clinical and other experiential courses. Take them! Second, immediately take Jordan's advice and choose an area of law that interests you. Find out from Lawyers.com and your alumni/ae office who practices in this field in your geographic area. Next promote and market yourself to that group. Someone out there needs your help and will pay you to assist him or her during the summer and possibly during the academic year. With the experience and skills you have gained, you will have the confidence needed to go after part-time to full-time work after graduation."

 

It is critically important at this time when there has been a decline in recruiting by the large law firms who have dominated campus interviewing to deemphasize employer outreach.

A school unable to attract sufficient employer responses adds to the students' frustration. Their self-esteem is diminished since they are not being considered by the firms courted by the school, apparently the ones who have the school's stamp of approval. Some career planners believe they are not using their talents and time to their own best advantage and that of their students. One said that 85% of her resources are devoted to employer outreach from which only 15% of her students found positions.

The goal of employer outreach by career staff is the scheduling of on-campus interviewers to supply students with the knowledge of where the jobs are.  Where there are a substantial number of firms recruiting on campus, many accept jobs they are not suited for because their decision making process is flawed. They are unaware of the breadth of their options and the importance of balancing priorities such as work satisfaction and high income.

Law school support for the emphasis on placement may come from the desire for positive recognition in the USNews's annual "Placement Success Rank" category. This rewards the schools that bring in the most firms and have the most graduates taking the highest paying positions the quickest.

What is the value of this professional degree? It varies. According to the USNews, "To the student, the value of a professional degree often is determined by its worth on the job market." For some it is just that, a way to earn a decent income. For others, the value is a sense of self-worth and satisfaction from having many options, autonomy and significant responsibility, or the opportunity to do "something that matters" to them. Others believe it provides the opportunity to contribute to the common good, to help those who without their assistance might never have a lawyer or to play a small part in bringing about social justice and equal access to the legal system.

The focus on employer outreach obscures the fact that most openings are publicized at the time employers have an immediate opening, not months in advance. As a consequence many organizations students might want to work for will not make their openings known early in the school year, in September, or even December and, more likely, not until after graduation. Furthermore, the way in which they will be publicized will probably be by word-of-mouth since estimates are that less than 5% of all jobs are advertised in writing.

Employer outreach fails to reflect the breadth of legal demographics at some schools and at other simply fails to attract sufficient employers. It needs to be deemphasized and replaced by career planning based on outreach within the law school community. The primary focus would be on educating students about their options, career planning methods and how to search for openings using self-directed employer outreach.

Rather than telling students "There are few jobs and we will try to place you", law schools should move in the direction that will support them most appropriately and "There are so many options and opportunities and we will teach you how to search for the one that will be the most satisfying for you, the one most consistent with your professional goals and your personal values."

 

QUOTES FROM THE REINVENTION OF WORK by MATTHEW FOX 

 

         Spirit means life, and both life and livelihood are about living in depth, living with meaning, purpose, joy and a sense of contributing to the greater community. A spirituality of work is about bringing life and livelihood back together again. Page 2

 

         All work worthy of being called spiritual and worthy of being called human is in some way prophetic work. It contributes to the growth of justice and compassion in the world; it contributes to social transformation, not for its own sake but for the sake of increasing justice. Page 13

 

         If we are not being served truth and justice as regular fare at work, then no matter how well we are fed materially, we will starve spiritually. Or work must make way for the heart, that is, for truth and justice to play an ever-increasing role in our professional lives. Page 26

 

         How do we prepare young people for the future world of work? ... We should prepare them to be able to distinguish between good work and bad work and encourage them not to accept the latter. That is to say, they should be encouraged to reject meaningless, boring, stultifying, or nerve-wracking work in which a (person) is made the servant of a machine or a system. They should be taught that work is the joy of life and is needed for our development, but that meaningless work is an abomination. Page 30, quoting E. F. Schumacher, Good Work, 118,119

 

         We must become truly critical of the systems that keep so many out of touch with justice and economic fairness. Healthy work lies at the heart of the remedy for this failed promise. Page 45

 

         Wherever there are people, there are needs to be met and thus work to be done. Page 59

 

         Here we come face-to-face with the mystery of vocation, or calling...we find our calling by our natural inclinations, by that which we enjoy doing, are equipped to do, and feel joy in doing.....In our times, we workers are being called to reexamine out work: how we do it; whom it is helping or hurting; what it is we do; and what we might be doing if we were to let go of our present work and follow a deeper calling. Page 103

 

          I think most of us are looking for a calling, not a job. Most of us, like the assembly line worker, have jobs that are too small for our spirit. Jobs are not big enough for people....Paul when he says that truly the only sin in life is our refusal to do the work we have been called to do. Page 104

 

          All our work worlds, from so-called blue collar to professional, have been tainted by the limits of our civilization's philosophy of work....We can be sure that a paradigm shift will occur whenever the necessities of life are beyond the reach of most citizens. This is happening in our culture today. Health care, education, law, business, economics, politics, and religion are not reaching the people who need them the most. .. We can realize that we are not isolated in our work dreams, that we are not alone in our deepest desires to make our professional life again and be true to their deepest moral and spiritual potentials. The word community, after all, means "to work on a common task together." Page 135

 

          The task needed in every profession, and indeed by every citizen today, is to return wisdom to our work. We do this by returning to the essential meaning of our profession - a meaning that originally had to do with serving others......Is it controversial to suggest that our professions have in great part lost their enchantment? How happy are people at their work? The dean of a law school recently confessed that only 6 percent of his graduates will find a job in law this year. Is the real reason that we do not need more lawyers? Might it be instead that we do not need more of the kind of lawyers practicing the kind of law that we are accustomed to? We do need laws to defend the environment, to defend our children, to defend the poor instead of lobbying for the powerful. Perhaps the crisis lies in the kind of work our society is offering its workers. Page 137

 

          All the professions, no matter how far they may have strayed from their original purpose, were rooted at their origins in the inner life of the community. They began as expressions of the spiritual and corporal works of compassion that the prophets wrote about. We can redeem the professions by returning to the best hopes they hold out for serving others. .. We can be in our professions without being of them, that is, without selling our souls to them. Indeed, that is how we must operate if our work worlds are to help solve the problems of our advanced industrial society.  Page 138

 

           Justice making and other types of healing are forms or compassion because we all live in human societies that yearn for healing from many kinds of injustice.  Page 174

 

           Individuals have values but are often told on coming to work to leave their values at the door. Page 231

 

           The growing desire that workers have to be in control over their own livelihoods, and to be able to create a harmony between their values and their working lives. Page 235

 

           The problem is that our civilization has settled for such a narrow and restrictive definition of work that we are trying to pour human energy into a skinny little funnel that in turn pours into a puny little machine called "industry" or jobs available......those who have jobs are so squeezed in the process of getting them that when they do finally arrive at the workplace they have lost their sense of wonder and amazement and their capacity for grief. Their inner life has been squeezed out of them; their work is too small. They have no energy to create good work and thereby help others join the work world and thus participate in the Great Work. Page 301

 

 

I recently read an on-line article from a London newspaper that Baker & McKenzie cut six New York associates in an office of 140 lawyers including 60 partners as part of a range of cost-cutting measures introduced in response to market conditions. The article used the English term saying the firm had announced "redundancies", a definition for which is "having lost your job because the employer no longer needs you."

Baker & McKenzie, of course, is not alone. Layoffs of associates have been announced at Foley Hoag in Boston, Parker Poe in Charlotte and Blank Rome in Philadelphia and seem likely at Kirkland and Ellis in Chicago.

Somehow being "redundant" seems to say it with more of a kick in the pants than simply being laid off.  

Imagine becoming redundant?

You went to a law school that's hard to get into and did so well in your interviews during the beginning of your second year that you got a summer position at one of these firms. While there in the summer, you worked hard (or not) and were fortunate enough to get an offer to join the firm upon graduation.

You have been there for what - 3 years - and you are now "redundant"? Who says? How was that decision made? Were you on the committee that decided that six associates should be cut? Were you on the committee that decided that YOU should be cut?

Was there any discussion in the firm about having all partners and associates in the "law firm "family" take a small hit so that your position could be saved?

Were you given an opportunity to have training in another area of law and move to another department or office?

Is there an associates' union at the firm - one that has the right to bargain on all issues related to work conditions for associates including pay, hours, abusive partners, and becoming redundant? Are you aware of an associates' union at any other firm?

What were you told about your being redundant? Were you told that it had anything to do with your job performance? If so, was that inconsistent with your prior reviews?

Did you take clinical courses during law school? Are you prepared to go into private practice on your own or in a firm of less than 5 lawyers? Have you ever worked at such a firm? Do you know the range of legal options you have?

Since few openings are advertised or are known by headhunters, do you know how to go about making a decision about what you want to do and how to market yourself in order to find such a position?

Having advised and provided career planning for lawyers for 25 years, I can safely say that the worst effect of being laid off is beginning to believe the "redundant" label and deciding that no one needs you.

Rest assured, you have options and you ARE needed!!

 

President Barack Obama
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington DC 20500
January 1, 2011

 

Dear President Obama,

We all knew it was coming!

 

On December 3, 2008, an article appeared in CNNMoney.com "Verdict is in: Legal job market tightens" The article said "Employment opportunities for legal professionals have traditionally been plentiful - and lucrative. But as the economy has dried up, so too have those jobs.... (This) is a job market that is contracting for the first time in recent history....(R)ecent graduates not only face experienced competition for limited jobs but also hefty student loan bills. 'Recent grads are going to have a hard time'".

The lead story of the December 10, 2008, Boston Globe "Harvard Curtails Tenure Searches" began, "Harvard University officials said yesterday that they will postpone nearly all searches for tenure-track professors in the school's largest academic body, a sobering indication of how the economic crisis has hit the world's wealthiest university."

 

What followed was: a sharp decrease in the number of applications for admission to law schools in the fall of 2009; dissolution and failures of hundreds of large law firms; an increase in the number of bankruptcies filed by law school graduates of the classes of 2006, 2007 and 2008. By October, 2010, deans of most of the ABA accredited law schools in the country, accompanied by thousands of their most prominent alumni/ae descended upon the nation's capitol to plead for a $3 billion bailout to save their industry. In their impassioned testimony they urged Congress to act, pointing out how the failure of the law school industry could have widespread negative repercussions throughout the country:

   Large law firms who represented the biggest corporations in the world would have to lay off thousands if the law schools were unable to "funnel" unwilling law students to their firms;
   Large corporations would suffer: i.e., a large corporation producing Hummers unable to retain lawyers to plead the case against higher fuel efficiency standards; coal companies unable to obtain permits for strip-mining; tobacco companies unable to prevent the distribution of material warning about the dangers of smoking; oil companies unable to lobby to "drill, drill, drill";
   Law schools, with their graduates unable to repay the extraordinary amount of the loans that they have incurred, would have to reduce salaries of professors and lay off thousands of staff; and
   Even the universities to which the law schools are a department would suffer as the law schools, affectionately referred to as "cash cows", no longer infuse the colleges with needed subsidies. Some universities would, in order to survive, have to extend the winter recess from October 12 to April 14 in order to continue to pay professors their full salaries.

Congress also heard from others, however, who emphasized how out-of-touch the management of the law school industry is and how they industry has failed for decades to produce a product needed or desired by the American public. One witness read this 1980 quote from Lloyd Cutler (legal adviser to Presidents Carter and Clinton: "The rich who pay our (lawyer) fees are less than 1% of our fellow citizens, but they get at least 95% of our time. The disadvantaged we serve for nothing are perhaps 20-25% of the population and get at most 5% of our time. The remaining 75% cannot afford to consult us and get virtually none of our time." And provided statistics from the National Association of Law Placement which indicated that at most of the "select" law schools (that doesn't mean they are good, just that they are hard to get into) until recently, upwards of 95% of their graduates took jobs with large law firms.

Others from non-select law schools testified that their vision was to emulate the select law schools and find all their graduates jobs in large firms so that they could make a lot of money and pay back the loans taken to attend law school and donate lots of money to pay the high salaries of the professors who devote most of their time to making appearances on TV and writing arcane papers.

A member of a consumer group reported that responses from law schools indicated that not one of the law schools had surveyed its students as they registered at their school or at any time during the first year to find out who they wanted to represent (individuals, small businesses, public interest organizations, large corporations) and how many want to start their own firms rather than being an employee at a large law firm.

Another witness was a member of the highly regarded committee that released the MacCrate Report (the chair of the committee was Robert MacCrate, former President of the American Bar Association 1987-88). The MacCrate report found that there were ten fundamental skills needed by a lawyer to competently practice law and the law schools only taught two (and did that poorly.) It also compiled a list of four fundamental values of the legal profession required to be taught by law schools. One of them is: "Striving to Promote Justice, Fairness and Morality. ... As a member of a profession that bears special responsibilities for the quality of justice, a lawyer should be committed to the values of: 2.1 Promoting Justice, Fairness and Morality in One's Own Daily Practice; 2.2 Contributing to the Profession's Fulfillment of its Responsibility to ensure that adequate legal services are provided to those who cannot afford to pay for them; 2.3 Contributing to the profession's fulfillment of its responsibility to enhance the capacity of law and legal institutions to do justice."

As the ABA began to take serious action to implement the recommendations of the MacCrate Report, a law school dean who was a leader in the opposition became a leader of the ABA and the MacCrate Report was relegated to what is commonly referred to as the "dustbin of history".

A second year student recalled reading the annual rating of law schools in the US News & World Report to decide which was the best law school. Only recently did she realize that the criteria used by the magazine were useless in that not one evaluated law schools based on the extent to which they provided the skills and values needed to practice law competently.

 

Recent graduates testified about: not being taught the value of promoting justice in any course except that "silly" professional responsibility course that the law school was required to have but everyone knew was irrelevant;" not being taught how to practice law; the on-campus interview program and the negative effect it had on them and their classmates; not knowing what their options are for practicing law or anything about the demographics of the legal profession, thinking that everyone practiced in large law firms, not knowing that 66% of the profession practices in firms of 5 lawyers and that over 50% are sole practitioners; never having been exposed to career planning (what are your interests, your vision, your goals, your options, your preference, how to promote and market yourself); how their experience in law school had destroyed their self-confidence, their self-esteem and their sense of self-worth;
with tears in their eyes, how they hated the boring meaningless work they were doing in the large law firm; being over their heads in debt; being so dissatisfied with their career path but having no idea of what to do except apply along with thousands of others to the few advertised jobs; and wistfully recalling they had gone to law school so that they could continue to assist women and children as they had done while in college.

Videos compiled by over one hundred consumer organizations were shown. In each one of them individuals from all walks of life testified about how they were unable to find a lawyer to represent them in a wide variety of cases including sickness caused by pollution, evictions from homes being foreclosed, insurance claims for hurricane damage, discrimination against gays, discrimination in employment of women, injuries to veterans, abused children, claims for injury from toys, denial of insurance, inadequate public education, access to public buildings for the disabled and abuse of the elderly.

I appreciated the opportunity I had to testify before the committee first quoting my warning from an article I posted on FindLaw about fifteen years ago entitled "Looking for Law in All the Wrong Places: Choosing the Best Law School":

Continue reading "Request of Ronald W. Fox to be Appointed Law School Industry Czar" »

Recently I posted My Request to Be Appointed Law School Industry Czar on another blog but have now transferred it here and suggest you read it. As of today I have two supporters in my campaign.  I sense the beginning of a grassroots movement in favor of my selection. 

 

If you have read the request, you know I am convinced that law schools have failed their students, their lawyer/graduates and the public over the last decades by not teaching their students the skills and values they need to practice law, not informing them about their wide range of options, and not providing career guidance instead simply offering on-campus interviews. These failings, when combined with tuition much too high for the services provided, results in thousands of law students being "funneled" to BIGLAW  where they do not want to be, and thousands of others floundering with no vision of what to do with their degree.

 

What follows is predictable - an extraordinarily high percentage of lawyers expressing their dissatisfaction with their jobs and careers while millions of members of the public with serious legal issues have no recourse to lawyers and the legal system.

 

This country is facing so many critical issues in the areas of housing, healthcare, employment, the environment, education, the economy, and foreign "entanglements". The public desperately needs the legal help that lawyers can, and want to, provide.

  

Not unlike the basis for the presentations and speeches being made by President-Elect Obama, I am taking steps to insure that when appointed, I will be able to, as he says, "hit the ground running"and the legal community will be prepared to join me in implementing reforms of law school education. .

 

So, as a self-proclaimed leading candidate for Law School Industry Czar, I will soon issue Ukase I which I will promulgate the day I am appointed. As you may be aware, the Czars had absolute authority which enabled them to issue arbitrary rulings called ukases.Also while it may be incompatible with Russian culture to use Roman numerals, I believe that the use of such symbols will give them the status of the Super Bowl.