Sideways [1]
I have been reading lateral recruiting sites for some time now. They confuse me. They worry me. They never, ever say enough and they almost always say way too much, especially for today's legal landscape.
First, most of them don't give you a clue as to whether they might be hiring anyone other than first-years. Law-firms perpetually hire first years and summer associates. Law-firms devote entire sets of web-pages to recruiting summers and first-years. Pages that depict those summers and first-years strolling through green parks and lying by cool fountains, while magically absorbing the mysteries of the law and law firms without ever once wanting to lock themselves in their offices and bang their heads against the wall. Law-firms plead with summers and first years to sign up in droves, some of them while they discreetly usher experienced associates and partners out the door.
Then there are laterals. The somewhat mysterious, not-much-talked-about class of lawyer that most firms seem to have mixed feelings about. Some firms offer nothing more than a brief paragraph directing all interested parties to send a resume and transcript to someone. Some firms make the attempt more inviting by including happy sound-bytes from laterals who have successfully integrated into the firm. The best ones include job postings, so we applicants have the encouragement of knowing there is really a job. The ones your Unemployed Lawyer truly can't understand are the one that begin something like this: While we at Law Firm X do most of our recruiting at the summer associate and first-year level, from time to time we have a particular need that our lawyers cannot fill. At times like these, we recruit well qualified lateral attorneys.
What are we supposed to think about that? They need us, but they really, really don't want us? They have to take us, but they know we'll never be as good as their lawyers raised in-house? That we will take the job, because we need the job, knowing that we will be looked upon with distaste and suspicion, perhaps hostility, until we can break in?
What is this thing about laterals? By definition, it is a sideways move. As a matter of fact, we can be pretty sure that the need for a lateral arose because one of the lauded, treasured, hand-raised associates has lateraled out of the firm, to escape from misery, to get more money, to get better position on the partner track, etc. Lateral moves occur all the time in the legal profession, but noone wants to think about them. Unless Jamie Sprayregen laterals out of Kirkland and Ellis to Goldman Sachs. And, then again, when he laterals back out of Goldman Sachs and into Kirkland and Ellis. Then the legal world is hummimg with speculation, hope, jealousy, satisfaction, you name it. When it's Jamie, the "L" word's not distasteful. It has been washed clean.
I mean no disrespect to Jamie. I like him well and respect his work tremendously. Hmmmmm, the speculators say, the Unemployed Lawyer knows Jamie. Does that narrow down identity? Nonsense. Everybody knows Jamie. My point is merely that when the lateral is a superstar, firms tend to look on him or her as an "acquisition", and forget that they have just hired, let's hear it now, a LATERAL.
Your Unemployed Lawyer once spent more than six months going back and forth about a job with a department head at a Big Law firm. This lawyer, by this year's count alone, has been at three different law firms. Prior to this year, he has worked for at least four other firms, one of them twice. Nevertheless, this pleasant, likeable, talented man sat in his office with me and expressed his grave misgivings about hiring laterals of any kind. He, who has lateraled his way through the legal world for the entire course of his career. What is he missing? What am I missing?
I fear that in today's climate, with so many of us floating around, we will find increasingly fewer lifeboats. There are simply increasingly fewer senior positions at law firms. Senior lawyers are expensive and clients don't like expensive. First- years are comparatively cheap (although still too expensive for clients), and contract attorneys are even cheaper. So beware, this year's first-years. Today, they tell you you're the future of the firm. In four years or so, you also will be too expensive and will be shown the door. However, without big changes, I'm afraid yours won't be a sideways move. It will be a Dead End[2].
________________________________________________________________________________
[1] Fox Searchlight Pictures, 2004, directed by Alexander Payne, starring Paul Giamatti, Thomas Hayden Church, Virginia Madsen, Sandra Oh.
[2] Samuel Goldwyn Company, 1937, directed by William Wyler, starring Humphrey Bogart, Joel McRae, Sylvia Sidney.
First, most of them don't give you a clue as to whether they might be hiring anyone other than first-years. Law-firms perpetually hire first years and summer associates. Law-firms devote entire sets of web-pages to recruiting summers and first-years. Pages that depict those summers and first-years strolling through green parks and lying by cool fountains, while magically absorbing the mysteries of the law and law firms without ever once wanting to lock themselves in their offices and bang their heads against the wall. Law-firms plead with summers and first years to sign up in droves, some of them while they discreetly usher experienced associates and partners out the door.
Then there are laterals. The somewhat mysterious, not-much-talked-about class of lawyer that most firms seem to have mixed feelings about. Some firms offer nothing more than a brief paragraph directing all interested parties to send a resume and transcript to someone. Some firms make the attempt more inviting by including happy sound-bytes from laterals who have successfully integrated into the firm. The best ones include job postings, so we applicants have the encouragement of knowing there is really a job. The ones your Unemployed Lawyer truly can't understand are the one that begin something like this: While we at Law Firm X do most of our recruiting at the summer associate and first-year level, from time to time we have a particular need that our lawyers cannot fill. At times like these, we recruit well qualified lateral attorneys.
What are we supposed to think about that? They need us, but they really, really don't want us? They have to take us, but they know we'll never be as good as their lawyers raised in-house? That we will take the job, because we need the job, knowing that we will be looked upon with distaste and suspicion, perhaps hostility, until we can break in?
What is this thing about laterals? By definition, it is a sideways move. As a matter of fact, we can be pretty sure that the need for a lateral arose because one of the lauded, treasured, hand-raised associates has lateraled out of the firm, to escape from misery, to get more money, to get better position on the partner track, etc. Lateral moves occur all the time in the legal profession, but noone wants to think about them. Unless Jamie Sprayregen laterals out of Kirkland and Ellis to Goldman Sachs. And, then again, when he laterals back out of Goldman Sachs and into Kirkland and Ellis. Then the legal world is hummimg with speculation, hope, jealousy, satisfaction, you name it. When it's Jamie, the "L" word's not distasteful. It has been washed clean.
I mean no disrespect to Jamie. I like him well and respect his work tremendously. Hmmmmm, the speculators say, the Unemployed Lawyer knows Jamie. Does that narrow down identity? Nonsense. Everybody knows Jamie. My point is merely that when the lateral is a superstar, firms tend to look on him or her as an "acquisition", and forget that they have just hired, let's hear it now, a LATERAL.
Your Unemployed Lawyer once spent more than six months going back and forth about a job with a department head at a Big Law firm. This lawyer, by this year's count alone, has been at three different law firms. Prior to this year, he has worked for at least four other firms, one of them twice. Nevertheless, this pleasant, likeable, talented man sat in his office with me and expressed his grave misgivings about hiring laterals of any kind. He, who has lateraled his way through the legal world for the entire course of his career. What is he missing? What am I missing?
I fear that in today's climate, with so many of us floating around, we will find increasingly fewer lifeboats. There are simply increasingly fewer senior positions at law firms. Senior lawyers are expensive and clients don't like expensive. First- years are comparatively cheap (although still too expensive for clients), and contract attorneys are even cheaper. So beware, this year's first-years. Today, they tell you you're the future of the firm. In four years or so, you also will be too expensive and will be shown the door. However, without big changes, I'm afraid yours won't be a sideways move. It will be a Dead End[2].
________________________________________________________________________________
[1] Fox Searchlight Pictures, 2004, directed by Alexander Payne, starring Paul Giamatti, Thomas Hayden Church, Virginia Madsen, Sandra Oh.
[2] Samuel Goldwyn Company, 1937, directed by William Wyler, starring Humphrey Bogart, Joel McRae, Sylvia Sidney.
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