What is the number one piece of career advice that you have received?
By Crystal Elaine Ellison • November 17, 2019 •Writers in Residence
In the wake of social media, it’s easy to get bogged down with someone else’s success making one feel inadequate, ineffective, under-accomplished or even unworthy. A successful woman once told me, never compare your success or lack thereof with someone else’s because the key to contentment is self-awareness of one’s own abilities. I believe this holds true not only in the legal profession, but with any profession. Whether you’re on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn or the like, scrolling through others stories, post or pictures can place you in a state of depression. Often times, people post innumerable content on social media…
How I Got Over My Fear of Asking for Things for Me: I Treated Myself Like My Own Client
By Claire E. Parsons • September 18, 2018 •Ms. JD, Writers in Residence, Careers, Firms and the Private Sector, Other Career Issues
Editor's Note: This post was previously published on September 18, 2018; however, this advice is quite helpful in ending 2019 on a successful note. In my practice, I routinely ask for—nay demand—things on behalf of my clients without a second thought: produce the documents, dismiss the complaint, find in my client’s favor, etc. But, when it was time for me to take a step forward in my own career, I was startled to see how hard it was to ask for things for me. To be honest, it felt downright unnatural. This had always been a problem for me. I…
Bar Classes, Clinics, Electives, & More
By Caambridge Horton • October 25, 2019 •Writers in Residence, Law School, Curriculum and Classroom Dynamics
Law school is an interesting experience, to say the least. While in law school, it feels as though time is moving at a glacial pace, but before you know it, the time has flown by, and you are closer to the finish line than you realized. With this being said, class selection is crucial because there are a plethora of classes to take in only a short amount of time. Three years seems like a long time until you realize that it is not nearly enough time to take all of the classes you are interested in and that are…
Something Blue: Bringing Blue-Collar Roots to the Legal Profession – An Interview with Devon Holmes
By Molly Timko • October 31, 2019 •Ms. JD, Writers in Residence, Careers, Law School
For this month's blog post, I am excited to feature my interview with Devon Holmes, Esq. Devon is a first generation legal professional from Hazard, Kentucky. Devon serves as an attorney for Social Security Administration's Office of Appellate Operations and she is passionate about public interest law. In this interview, Devon explains how growing up in Appalachia helped shape her career trajectory. She also shares thoughtful advice to first generation law students. Could you tell Ms. JD blog readers about your background and what prompted you to apply to law school? I was born in Hazard, Kentucky, a town in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. My parents were a…
The Mental Load: Don’t Fix What Isn’t Broken
By Amy Bowen • November 01, 2019 •Writers in Residence
As I write this blog post, I’ve just wrapped up my daughter’s fifth Halloween dressed as an owl – and she’s only seven years old. So basically, she has chosen to dress like an owl every year that she’s been capable of making her own costume decision. She’s not particularly obsessed with owls the other 364 days of the year, and it continues to surprise me that she sticks to her tried and true costume choice while her peers now delve into popular movie characters or seize the opportunity to don glittery makeup and colored hair. Yet my daughter, thus…
Why Young Lawyers Need Business Plans
By Susan Smith Blakely • October 31, 2019 •Careers, Other Career Issues
As a young lawyer, a business plan may be the farthest thing from your mind. Billing hours, making your numbers, trying not to look stupid to the partner and, well, just surviving in law practice in the early years are what occupy you. I understand and remember. But, don't dismiss having a business plan as some other-worldly exercise that is not worthy of your time. It is more than worthy. I have been preaching --- yes, preaching --- to young women lawyers about the importance of career plans for over a decade, and business plans are the same thing. All…
Multi-Tasking Self-Care and Professional Development: Podcasts
By Jenny Patten • October 31, 2019 •Ms. JD, Writers in Residence, Careers, Other Career Issues, Issues, Balancing Private and Professional Life
Like most working professionals, I spend a significant part of my morning and late afternoon commuting to and from the office. My 30-45 minutes to and from daycare drop-off and the office often are the only time that I have truly to myself, and for a number of years, I’ve spent that time listening to music, participating in work-related conference calls, or using the time to call a friend or family member to catch up. However, as work and family duties and responsibilities have gradually eroded the time I used to spend for myself, I realized that my commute may…-100x100.png)
Playing the Long Game
By Millennial Women (Lindsay, Melanie & Elise) • October 25, 2019 •Writers in Residence
It’s officially Fall! And you know what that means—football season! As we cheer on our favorite teams,* we thought it would be a perfect month to break out our sports analogies. This month, we’re focusing on playing the long game in terms of your career. We’re familiar with these concepts in sports, but they are also true when it comes to careers. What we mean by this is: looking at your career over a period of several years—maybe even a decade or two—instead of just looking six months to a year ahead. It’s tough sometimes, especially as relatively new or…
Taking Care of Your Future Self During an 80-Hour Week
By Marisa Tashman • October 23, 2019 •Ms. JD, Law School, Other Law School Issues, Issues, Balancing Private and Professional Life, Other Issues, Features, Superwomen JDs and What You Can Learn From Them
Like many young ambitious women in the wake of Sheryl Sandberg’s “Lean In” movement, I often have to make choices between two options that are both necessary: “sleep or work out?” “meditate or call my mom?” Beginning my career as a litigator at a large law firm in Los Angeles, I’ve been forced to make these choices all too often, eventually transforming into a thought-cycle of not being balanced enough, which inevitably transforms into being hopelessly imbalanced. Layer on psychosomatic GI issues, migraines, and an unexpected back injury, I turned to a wellness “industry” filled with preachers on becoming perfectly…