Law And More

In-house: $229K average 2008 compensation, including bonus [Source: Hildebrandt]

No wonder educated one-time strivers are embracing Eastern philosophy.  One of our favorites has been Buddhist nun Pema Chodron's "The Wisdom of No Escape."  Those are exactly the lessons current lawyers have to sort out.

Pre-Crash, the burnt-out, the ones who didn't make partner, and those who recognized they had a bent for organizational life could migrate to in-house jobs.  Historically the positions were there, they paid well, carried prestige and power within the corporation, and left time for a life.  That's not the situation any more.  For too many lawyers, it is no longer an option.

For THE CONNECTICUT LAW TRIBUNE, Douglas S. Malan interviewed a number of legal consulting and placement companies.  The news was dark about in-house. 

To begin with, as corporate continues belt-tightening, vacancies are being left unfilled and the work done by temporaries.  Unless a lawyer's experience matches the company's business being hired will be tough. At the same time more work is being pulled in-house.  This is no refuge from the legal rat race.

Secondly, the money is relatively lousy.  Hildebrandt International says that the average compensation, including bonus, in 2008 for in-house was $229,000.  That's a lot of responsibility for not much more than a first-year associate's base salary.

Third, the prestige and power are less as the role of investor relations and public affairs grow more important.  As Jones Day partner Mickey Pohl frequently puts it, companies now realize that legal is just part of a complex problem which also involves other business priorities.  Those might include maintaining the stock price and reputational capital.  The company can win the litigation and never regain its former dominance in a market.

And, fourth, the hours and pressure can often be right up there with those of lawyers earning a lot more in law firms. This has been relatively recent.  During the Rhode Island lead paint trial - whose beginning has its first anniversary today - in-house attorneys not directly involved with the litigation would discuss it with me.  Those conversations continued into "Thomas" and the RI Supreme Court review. Then there was abrupt silence.  There was no time for anything but doing their own jobs.

In short, in-house jobs are no option to what lawyers are fleeing or were pushed out of.  Chodron as well as most Buddhists would assess that "no escape" as a good thing.  It forces us to face those universal issues we have been able to duck through pursuing achievement one-dimensionally.  In 2003, that wisdom was also superimosed on me Download Geezerguts.  It broke open my talent.  My take on chasing success "The Fat Guy From Greenwich" will be published early winter.  Here are the first two chapters Download FGFGchapters1,2.  On November 6, I celebrate my sixth anniversary as a FOB [Friend of Bill.]  Being trapped in what is turned out to be okay.

Hey, Client: Did your law firm pass on any Phillies tickets?

Sensitive stuff.  The PHILADELPHIA BUSINESS JOURNAL, reports Jeff Blumenthal at PORTFOLIO, interviewed 22 large law firms about how they were using their Phillies tickets.  Only three talked on the record. 

Why the hush-hush?  One attorney opined, off the record, that clients who didn't receive any tickets would not be happy.  So, leave the situation ambiguous, as are most points of law.

Reflection: Perks, the lack of them or the alleged inequitable distribution of them make or break commercial relationships and create centuries-running feuds.

OSHA to Employers: Keep your employees safe

OSHA is one federal agency that can't be accused of being asleep at the wheel or perhaps a bit too cozy with business.

Yesterday, it slammed BP with an $87 million fine.  That was related to the 2005 death of 15 employees at its Texas refinery facility.

This message on employee safety will resonate.

Spooked by Conservatism

Creepy site on East Capitol Street in D.C.  It's the graveyard for presidential conservatives.  My hunch is that US Chamber of Commerce head Tom Donohue would love to have been included.

This news comes to you via Politico.com.

WASPy Leaders Straight From Central Casting - No Parts to Play in New Economy

What might have been a considerable asset to US Chamber leader Tom Donohue might have mutated into a serious liability.  That's his straight-from-central-casting WASPy persona, right down to the white mop of hair. That look might have had its last major role at the Astor Trial, with Tony Marshall and Headband Charlene.  Yeah, yeah, I know Donohue is from ethnic stock but WASPy is a mindset, not a genetic feature. 

Seemingly everywhere this patrician type is under attack.    The situation has escalated into a crisis.  We public relations pros tell our clients:  It the stuff doesn't stop, then you have to ask yourself what those doing the mau-mauing really want. Then you have to decide if you will give some or all of that demand.

Maybe what Donohue's growing opposition really want is for him to climb down from the old Zeus-like position of absolute power and join the rest of us.  The social media folks like Paul Chaney call that descent from the gods having a conversation. 

This complimentary ebook might save the soul of Donahue and his kindred spirits Download SavingSoulsJaneGenova.  It's had a more than a million downloads.  There are those who contend it saved their organizations and careers.

Drinker Biddle: Associate Lite didn't seem to work

We are suspicious when Drinker Biddle had announced what we might call the Associate Lite Plan.  For the first six months of their time with the company, newbie JDs would function and be treated as apprentices.  Think Abe Lincoln.  Because they were Associate Lites they would also be compensated at less than normal first-year associate compensation.  That Associate Lite number was a lite $105,000. Paying off those loans quickly wasn't going to happen. 

We all had a hunch that this was less in the interest of developing associates more efficiently and serving clients more effectively.  Instead this seemed to be a signal that Drinker Biddle might be trying to simply cut costs or needing to cut costs without sending out negative signals.

Today in Abovethelaw.com, Elie Mystal confirms our hunch.  Something was rotten in the state of business at Drinker Biddle.  Although the firm did not confirm it, a number of leakers report that 22 associates have been laid off.  Most of the cuts, says Mystal, were at the Chicago office.  The wild card here is that Drinker Biddle had a 68% offer rate to the summers of 2009.  Maybe it spotted some stars?  Maybe it wants to give Associate Lite more time?

For Halloween, in honor of all this ambiguity, JDs around America might dress as 3/4ths a Drinker Biddle Associate. 

MBAs not doing too hot either

Three months after graduation 16.5% of MBAs from the top 30 programs remained without a job.  Those who did get jobs were offered less.  In 2008, they got around $98,000.  This year it was $96,500. 

That's what Anne VanderMey reports in BUSINESS WEEK.  And since BLOOMBERG took over BW, VanderMey herself and many of her colleagues at BW might end up jobless in yet another glutted market: Business journalists.  The WALL STREET JOURNAL just shut down it Boston bureau, axing nine. 

One business program which fared better in job placement has been Olin's at Washington University, notes VanderMey.  Only 8% don't have jobs. That's because the program encouraged this year graduates to reframe their goal from a job on Wall Street to jobs in other fields such as biotech, BigPharma, and healthcare.   To do that they had to redefine the skills they could pitch to employers.  Lawyers might consider doing the same.

Goy Lawyer Glut: Jewish Lite

It isn't the religion we hunger for. 

In our suffering as the glut of every type of professional - lawyer, journalist, broker, and more - we are embracing or attempting to grab hold of the best of Jewish culture.  Call it Jewish Lite. 

We want the sense of community.  A Jewish client I advised last night lives on one street in Brooklyn, her sister on another, and her mother on her sister's street.  People around who care.  Not one but several people to hear us bellow in pain.  Then there's the comfort of the rituals like lighting a candle on Friday night, the comfort of the fatty foods, the comfort of dinners which never ever operate like dinner parties.  And in a world of growing ambiguity there are univeral truths.  I want them, only as a former Roman Catholic I won't accept them from the RC hierarchy. 

We will be seen slouching toward knowing more about Jewish culture and even adopting some of the practices.  I might start with fasting on Yom Kippur as I used to do in Lent.  And, from now I'd prefer close friends to call me Rebbecca Blackstone.

Old-line Politics: US Chamber's $20 Million Annual Spending for Promoting Free Enterprise

The underbelly of the US Chamber shootout with the White House, Apple, Nike, et al. is that it has the audacity to practice old-line politics.  That's the politics of wealth.  The US Chamber intends to spend $20 million a year for several years advocating free enterprise. 

The game isn't played that way any more.  First of all, it ain't politically correct when so many Americans are jobless or, worse, homeless.  Secondly, with digital technology the BigFoot money isn't needed.  Barack Obama and his merry digital band led by Chris Hughes proved that out in the presidential campaign. Less money has become more credibility.  In fact, less is more in plenty of areas of influence and power. 

As a result of that web experiment gone perfectly right, the new politics is binary: You use the web, therefore message cheaply and look like someone we might trust or You use conventional lobbying methods, spend a bundle, and look stupid and untrustworthy.  See, as Paul Chaney put it in his 2009 book "The Digital Handshake," social media is a mindset.  It's the embrace of values like listening, collaboration, sharing, sweat equity and the pile-on of creativity.  Everyone in the know knows that.  Those who don't know that are no longer in the know. 

That's exactly why a relatively unknown assemblyman in California [Irvine -R] is catching fire.  He's Chuck DeVore and he could be the only conservative who understands the mindset of social media.  Even if he never used YouTube, blogging and more again, he would still be the new kind of pull force in politics.  He's booked for the GOP primary for the U.S. Senate in California and could just make it all the way.  That victory would make the new politics the only kind. 

Just as predicted: Newbie JD salary at $60K, caste system

Some law-firm trend consultants have predicted that eventually starting salaries for even BigLaw would downsize to $60K to $75K.  Since that is at $145K to $160K, not many expected seeing that forecast playing out any time soon.  In addition, legal watchers anticipated the forming of caste systems within law firms.  Eventually, there will be the top tier of partners, a few star associates who had a shot at partnership, and at the bottom and most numerous would be contract attorneys, with no hope of upward mobility and no job security. The forecasters were very wrong about the timing.

At Kaye Scholer, one half of the first-year hires will be receiving $60K.  The incoming associates have been divided into two groups - or castes.  The group with the $60K compensation, reports Elie Mystal in Abovethelaw.com, are assigned to Kaye Scholer's Public Interest Group.  They will, just like Alicia on "The Good Wife" did for her first case, be handling pro bono work.  They will receive the same training and developmental opportunities as those in the other group.

The other group will be serving paid clients and receiving the normal first-year-associate's salary.

My prediction: Big trouble coming from the unexpected slashing of compensation and this caste system.