Maximize Your Time in Law School

A friend of mine just started law school, and she asked me what I wished I’d known when I was a 1L that could have changed my law school experience for the better.

Here are the top three things I think you can do to maximize law school:

1. Invest time in making friends

Business school students know that networking is just as important a part of their business school experience as their classes. Though calling it “networking” makes you sound a little too premeditated about the whole process, the idea behind it is a good one that I don’t think law students give enough credit. Your peers in law school are going to be your future colleagues and connections. They’re going to be the people who can get you an interview for that great job 10 years down the road, the partners at the law firm who can hire your solo practice, or the general counsels at the company who hires your firm. In the short-term, they’re going to be the ones who lend you notes when you miss class, study with you, and talk you off the ledge when 1L grades come out. Put less time into solo study at the library and more time into bar reviews and other social activities. Maximize your time in an environment with other smart and interesting people by making lasting friendships and connections.

Advice from New York's top women attorneys

Advice for success from New York's top female attorneys

New York Magazine recently reached out to some of the most successful women lawyers practicing in New York City to solicit their advice for younger lawyers. The verdict? “In a nutshell, you have to be prepared to work very hard for very long hours” and “unless you really love the work, it won’t be worth that very high cost.” Exploring “how hard is hard,” the article references one partner who was using her Blackberry during labor, another who took “literally no time off” after giving birth three times, and others who forfeit sleep to work “around the clock when the situation demands it.” Though for many, “a work ethic bordering on obsession isn’t worth the price,” the women interviewed for the article “say the key is that they love what they do.”

In addition, to hard work, flexibility also played a role in the featured women’s successes. Valerie Ford Jacob, “one of only a few women to head a major United States law firm,” was able to bring her kids to work (and not secretly—they were playing soccer int eh hallways!). Another attorney cited the importance of “giving permission to men and women so they don’t feel furtive about the demands of family life.”

While flexibility is helpful, taking time off to raise your children is harmful. One woman noted that “unfortunately, if you take a year off, it’s equivalent to taking two or three years because technology changes, the market changes, the law changes . . . If you are really committed to your career, I really believe taking time off is going to hurt you.”

The Giggle Monster

In my continual search to find the newest advice for professional women, I randomly came across this old post at On Phara entitled Channeling Barbie: Career Advice for Professional Women, and then immediately googled John McKee, the guy who is cited heavily in the post. Just so you're oriented as to the messenger, I'll start with John McKee, self-styled as "one of America's leading executive coaches" and author of Business Woman Web: How to Use Gender Bias to Ensure Your Career Success. Red flags, anyone? In addition to advocating using gender bias rather than eradicating it, McKee answers the question "people ask [him] all the time, 'Why is a man writing a book about women in management?'" His answer? "We need more women leading more of our largest corporations in this country. For at least 10 reasons, it is important that men start helping to change the current and frankly unacceptable situation whereonly about 5% of these organizations have female CEOs." Though I whole-heartedly agree that men are a needed ingredient in improving the situation, I think a huge symptom of the problem is that his approach is to take the lead in bossing women around to the top of the corporate ladder with questionable advice that is pretty much summed up in his tagline.

Now for his insight, as quoted by On Pharma:

Don't "giggle." Why? McKee has "never heard a CEO giggle." Also, women "laugh 126 percent more often than men. And unfortunately, this laughter is not relegated to personal life." Um, apparently McKee doesn't realize lawyers work so much that work becomes part of their personal life. Also, why is it unfortunate to laugh in the workplace? These questions unanswered, McKee asserts that he has in fact "heard many women giggle a bit just after saying something, and it diminishes the impact of what they have said."

At this point, I'm wondering what the difference is between a laugh and a giggle.

Are Women Judges The Meanest?

The Las Vegas Review Journal's "Judging the Judges" survey asked lawyers who practiced before Clark County District Court judges to rate the judges' courtesy. Of the attorneys surveyed, two-thirds were male. The results ranked female judges as significantly less courteous than their male counterparts with even the highest-ranked female judge still scoring lower in courtesy than "all but two of the male judges." According to "experts who study judges and the courts, attorneys and litigants favor a judge similar to them, whether in age, ethnic makeup or gender," which could explain why the primarily male survey base would be biased to find male judges more courteous than female ones. Legal Blog Watch posits that the dispairty "may just be that when a male judge acts sternly or impatiently, he's merely regarded as firm or strict, whereas a woman who conducts herself the same way is labeled as strident or obnoxious."

When I read these results, I couldn't help but wonder if women judges just have to work harder to get the respect that should come with their position automatically (but doesn't, unfortunately), and if the lawyers who may have needed "encouragment" by said female judges to give the judges the respect they deserve might be bitter in filling out the survey. I've had the experience of older male attorneys not taking me seriously on the job, and I've sometimes felt forced into taking a hard stance to stop what seems to me as a conversation where I'm being belittled or even verbally abused. I've had (more than once) a male attorney then accuse me of being the rude one, and each time, I've been very taken aback since, in my view, I was only responding to the caller yelling at me first (and in each case, I never raised my voice--it's funny how women just speaking firmly in a normal tone can be viewed as MORE rude than a man actually using a raised voice).

I've also been in courtrooms where male attorneys push around relatively new female judges (i.e. talking over them, arguing back with contemptuous "with all due respect, Your Honor" lines thrown in to offset their rudeness, and basically just refusing to accept the female judges' rulings as final). I can't claim to have watched an entire genesis of a new female judge turning hard to demand the respect she's not given automatically, but it doesn't take much of a stretch to imagine it happening. I also think women walk a very fine line in being taken seriously without being "bitchy" and that only certain personality types (the lucky snarky and funny ones among us) can do it successfully without resulting to firm behavior that will inevitably be interpreted as rude. In some ways, this "courtesy" measure by which these judges were judged could easily turn into a proxy for "bitchiness," and there are lots of reasons a man might view a woman in a position of power (like a judge) as "discourteous" regardless of how objectively courteous that judge is. Honestly, if I were the LV Review Journal, I would be wondering how to eliminate the bias from my survey since I think it's completely ridiculous to think that results so skewed are in any way a real measure of whether men or women judges are more courteous.

Is Tattling On Yourself Admirable or Stupid?

The other day, I made a mistake at work. It was the kind of mistake that my boss may or may not have ever noticed, the kind of mistake that doesn't have far-reaching consequences but is nonetheless wrong. Also important to note is that this was the kind of mistake that was already out there, and there was nothing anyone could do to change it or somehow make it less of an error. When I realized I'd made the mistake, I decided to email my boss right away and tell him what I'd done. He wrote back and acknowledged that I had indeed made a mistake but that he was glad I'd alerted him. But...was I wrong to turn myself in?

When I told some co-workers about the incident, one guy admitted he'd done the exact same thing...but hadn't alerted our boss and had never gotten called out for making the mistake. After reflecting on the different ways we'd handled the situation, I'm sure some of our different approaches can be attributed to our different personalities, but I also think gender played a role. In my experience, men--as a general rule--are less likely to publicly own up to mistakes while women are more likely to do so.

In the abstract, it is admirable that one would be honest and step up to admit wrongdoing, but in practice, can it hurt your career? For example, my boss now knows that I am fallible. I have screwed up and drawn his attention right to my error. My co-worker, on the other hand, made the exact same screw-up, but the boss never knew (that we know of). So, arguably my boss might think that my co-worker's abilities are superior to my own, even though we both did the same thing wrong. I wonder how much of professional competence is about bluster and fakery and how much an honest perspective on your own abilities and shortcomings can actually be a hinderance to moving ahead. After all, people who project competence get promoted--and perhaps projecting competence is less about actual competence and more about the appearance of said competence. Should I have twiddled my thumbs and whistled a carefree tune when I realized my error and just waited to deal with my boss when and if he came to me rather than going straight to him? I'm starting to think that the answer is yes.

Girls Being Girls: A Lot Less Steamy Than Boys Being Boys

Julia Baird's article, Girls Will Be Girls. Or Not. Why aren't more powerful public women caught up in sex scandals?, explores an interesting side of the gender power imbalance: why "are so few women in politics embroiled in tabloid tales?" There are few obvious female counterparts to the Eliot Spitzers and Jim McGreeveys (aka "Luv Guvs") of the political world. Of the "handful of minor scandals involving women in public office in America," the majority arise from "love affairs, not casual—or commercial—liaisons." The lack of "indiscretion" by female politicians leads to a call for more women to be elected to office. For example, former White House press secretary Dee Dee Myers, states: "I'm confident predicting there would be fewer sex scandals if women were in power … I don't think Hillary Clinton is going to be hitting on the intern."

Is it just that women dislike cigars and blowing four grand on casual affairs, or are the lack of female power peccadilloes telling of a deeper gender imbalance? For example, Baird notes that "while there are 86 women in Congress, and one in four state politicians is female, few are prominent enough to attract savage media scrutiny" in contrast to the men who fill the majority of elected positions. If it's not about the numbers (fewer powerful women, fewer high profile scandals), then maybe it's about the stigma. As Baird notes, "historically, women who stray have suffered more than men who do. Men are often forgiven more easily—their dalliances are considered a lapse, an uncontrollable urge." This stigma can have a higher cost for powerful women. When Edwina Currie, a British politician, disclosed her affair with a male politician, "only a third thought worse of him, half thought worse of her."

Over at Jezebel, another theory is put forward that "men don't find female power erotic": "female politicians don't have more affairs because men don't see them as more powerful, or find that power to be attractive. Young guys want nothing to do with Hillary Clinton because power and experience and age are not valued in women in our culture." The conclusion being that it isn't "a question of whether women cheat less or are better people; it's that a female politician would have less opportunity to cheat in the first place, as the men around her are unlikely to throw themselves at her."

It's interesting that you do see May-December couples with an attractive younger man and older woman, but most if not all of those couples involve a very beautiful woman (Ashton and Demi, Eva and Tony)--it's not like these guys are grabbing onto decrepit sugar mamas. On the other hand, there are still too many examples to list of rich, older, unattractive men with beautiful younger women (Donald and Melania, Anna Nicole and 90-year-old husband, etc.) I for one am not really in the market for a much younger man who wants to live off my fortune, so I don't much care if poweful women isn't an image that plays well while shopping for arm candy. But, on a deeper level, it is troubling that powerful women are sexual kryptonite and that women pay a higher social price for "being girls" in the way that boys like to be boys.

Is Long Hair Unprofessional?

I'm not alone in wondering whether chopping your hair off is a prerequisite for a woman's success. From politicians like Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Dole, and Nancy Pelosi to well-known litigators like Jamie Gorelich, Sheila Birnbaum, Amy Schulman, and Maureen Mahoney, short hair is the status quo. Does it have to be that way?

I like my long hair. I've always received compliments on it; I like having the option to curl it or straighten it or put it up; and, I admit it, my long hair makes me feel feminine and attractive. But, is it holding me back?

Susan Ehrlich Martin and Nancy Jurik wrote an interesting book, Doing Justice, Doing Gender, and a whole chapter is devoted to women in the legal profession. The authors note that "by controlling the professional context, men behave in ways that show that other men are taken seriously and accorded respect. Conversely, the way men talk about women and their appearance treats women as invisible, devalues them, and affects their ability to perform effectively." If this is true, then does it make sense that women might try to "blend in" by wearing pants suits and cutting off their hair? Martin and Jurik give the example that if "a judge allows the opposing attorney to label a woman attorney’s appearance a 'distraction,' it signals to others that it is acceptable to use a woman’s looks as the basis for objecting against other women attorneys." So, do successful women attorneys instinctively know that the way to get ahead is to detract from their appearance and is short hair part of that?

Does Sexism Still Exist?

The word on the street seems to be that if you think you're the victim of sexism, you are either paranoid or looking for excuses for a non-gender-related failing. I myself am guilty of blaming sexism--when I blogged about a male colleague who changed one of my recommendations at work behind my back, I bitterly recounted the story to friends with the added conclusion: "he never would have done that if I were a male colleague." But, maybe he would have. How can I really be sure? Likewise, Jessie posted on a new law review article that indicates how little progress has been made in the last 20 years in equalizing pay and partner positions between women and men in firms. Is the cause sexism? Is it women's own choices to opt out of the profession? Are those choices based on a sexist society? What does that even mean? Again, how can we know for sure?

I drive myself crazy thinking in circles, and I am left wondering how we can ferret out (and exterminate) sexism when it's often so deeply undercover in our workplaces or whether sexism is already dead. Hillary's campaign for the White House has really brought this issue home. Did sexism damage her campaign or not? I read an interesting article today by Chris Reed about all the completely gender-neutral reasons (except, perhaps, for Obama's ability to generate more excitement than Clinton, which may have something to do with a sexist tendency to value men's points more than women's) that Hillary's campaign faltered. I read this article, and I nodded to myself that these points logically explained why voters would reject Hillary regardless of her gender. However, just because there are gender-neutral explanations for why something is so, it doesn't necessarily mean that those logical, neutral reasons actually had a causal relationship with the outcome. For example, just because we can logically explain why women would be less likely to make partner because of their own personal choice to take time off to raise families, it doesn't mean that this neutral, logical reason is the actual cause of women's less than stellar represenation as firm partners.

Though we don't often have an insight into the behind-the-scenes thoughts of our work colleagues, we do have a lot of insight into the behind-the-scenes thoughts of at least some voters. For example, we've all probably heard about the Hillary nutcracker, complete with spikes between the legs; the video "How It Will Feel if Hillary Gets Elected", which features a woman kicking a man repeatedly in his most sensitive area (the assumption being that a woman in power is somehow emasculating to men); or the variety of anti-Hillary t-shirts, with mottos like "Hillary's a c*nt" or "Hillary is not a c*nt, a c*nt is useful" or "Face it bitch you're fu**ed" with a dog with Obama's face mounting a dog with Hillary's face. These are only a few examples. I'm not even a Hillary supporter, and I felt sick and insulted and defiled reading these t-shirts as they seemed to denigrate all women and not just one presidential candidate. By point of comparison, the exact same website featured anti-Obama t-shirts with slogans much more specific to his own qualities as a candidate like "The Audacity of Inexperience" and "Barack OBummer" and "Empty Suit." It is nearly impossible to read these t-shirts in a way that says something derrogatory about all men whereas the anti-Hillary t-shirts make points using stereotypes about women in general. If sexism were dead, why would it be funny to watch a video of a woman kicking a man in the balls in relation to a woman running for president? Why would everyone get a good laugh from displaying a nutcracker in the shape of a female presidential candidate? I'm not saying that Hillary's problems are due entirely to sexism, but I have no doubt that this campaign has brought sexism out of its dark closet. It's out there, ladies, and it's ignorant to think that we as lawyers aren't affected by it in our jobs the same way that Hillary is affected by it in hers.

The Green Monster: When Your Significant Other Is a Lawyer

The Washington Post has an interesting article on social psychologist Abraham Tesser's research on "how close friends and intimate partners who are engaged in similar work or activities compare themselves with one another." I can't even count all the couples I knew from law school who met in Torts, dated through Fed Courts, and were married (or engaged) by commencement. Now out in the working world, I see a rather significant number of married or engaged couples who met on the job, which makes sense given how much lawyers work--meeting other lawyers is easier than meeting a non-lawyer, and meeting people is the first step on the long road to a long-term commitment.

Tesser's research got me thinking, though. When you date someone in your career field, what can you expect?

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