Law And More

Clouds Continue to Gather Over Tech Sector

Technology - Bloomberg Headlines, May 26, 2022

Microsoft to Slow Hiring in Windows, Office, Teams Groups

PayPal Begins Cutting Staff as Its Push to Reduce Costs Ramps Up

Opinion: Job Market Is Heading for a Soft Landing of Its Own

 

Embattled Payments Startup Bolt Is Cutting One-Third of Staff

Connect with Editor-in-Chief Jane Genova at janegenova374@gmail.com.

Controversy - Former Googler Patrick Shyu Goes for Broke (and how social networks have made mean-spirited cool)

The promotional power of controversy is well-known. But, what is also a pragmatic reality is that it is a marketing/public relations tool which has to be carefully managed.

Recently, as Insider reports, former Googler Patrick Shyu has, well, gone for broke in leveraging his use of controversy to get, retain, and grow subscribers for his YouTube Tech Lead Show.

On Twitter, in posts which he had since deleted, he gushed about how he used to tell females interviewing for coding positions at Google to go home and have babies. Yes, he contends to have actually said that, in real time. In addition, he had tweeted, also since deleted, why women shouldn't code. 

Here is Shyu's LinkedIn site, on which he has 61,285 followers.

Whether there will be an escalation of subscribers to his subscription service or a flight out - only time will tell. In the current ethos of mean-spirited everything many might be attracted to Shyi's world view and his crass way of putting it out there. Social networks have elevated what is mean-spirited to the new cool. 

When toxic Gawker collapsed my kind cheered. We hoped that was the end of that. However, it taught well other promoters how to push the envelope on mean to succeed. 

Connect with Editor-in-Chief Jane Genova at janegenova374@gmail.com. 

The Tragedy of the Snatched-Back Job Offer - It's Happening at Twitter & Meta, As It Had in Big Law during The Great Recession

"In preparation for the new gig, he [tech expert in Palo Alto] quit his job in the Bay Area, gave up his Palo Alto lease and arranged six months of temporary housing in Mexico City. That afternoon he got a call from Twitter HR." - Bloomberg, May 26, 2022.

The offer was snatched-back. Twitter indicated that reason was its "current situation." And, as we all know, that ranges from the uncertainty embedded in the Elon Musk offer to the ending of the tech boom.

That tech expert is stranded in a tech marketplace that was shrinking. It was unlikely that he would be able to land a comparable job, at least not quickly. 

Not long ago on LinkedIn a woman provided the chronicle of the same kind of professional tragedy. Just before she was to begin her job as a recruiter at Meta, the offer had gone poof. She has just signed a lease. Meta's prospects have been souring. Her own prospects in a job search probably aren't so hot.

All this brings back the grim play-outs of newly graduated JDs during The Great Recession. They had landed a job. Or so they jad thought. Then Big Law firms snatched them back.

At that time, the demand for junior lawyers had fallen off a cliff. Meanwhile, most had student loan debt that required about $700 a month then (now it would be much higher). Most had to do other kinds of work to make ends meet. And most of them never made it back to practicing law. When the recovery kicked in law firms were hiring the fresh crop of law firm graduates.

Editor-in-Chief of this blog Jane Genova (janegenova374@gmail.com) will provide pro-bono coaching on preparation of job search materials to those caught up in this tragedy. 

 

18 NYC Subway Homicides Since March 20 - Persuasive Argument for No RTO

"NYC subway slay is latest sad proof that working from home is safer" - Nicole Gelinas, New York Post, May 23, 2022

Goldman Sachs' employee Daniel Enriquez was the 18th subway homicide in a little over two months. He was on his way to work. As fear escalates about the New York City subway system - for some the only way to commute to a job or a freelance assignment - it seems to make sense to re-think RTO. 

Of course, it's possible to be on the subway to travel to a medical appointment or to attend a baby shower and be murdered. But without the daily commute for work the probability of that is lower.

Law firm Quinn Emanuel has permanent WFH. On its website it posts: Talent mandatory. Office optional. 

I have been WFH since 1987. To me being clustered together with all those people in an office had seemed inhumane. And the commute had added more stress.

Connect with Editor-in-Chief Jane Genova at janegenova374@gmail.com.

Trump's Power - Everyone Is Measuring It

"President Trump and the MAGA movement are showing signs of moving in different directions. By no stretch of the imagination is Trump’s base deserting him. But nor are those voters willing to simply do his bidding." - Niall Stanage, The Hill, May 23, 2022

The focus has long shifted from the real or alleged perils presented by Donald Trump to how much power does he still have. The answer is two-fold:  (1) He still has more power than his critics anticipated and (2) He is losing the ability to unilaterally control the MAGA movement.

That leaves progressives in an urgent state of coming up with strategies to create their own kinds of power. In that the Democratic Party seems to have defaulted to New York City Mayor Eric Adams. As Politico reported, he is the new messaging machine. 

At the Democratic Congressional Committee he advocated applying his own motto: Get Stuff Done. Yes, take action. He also was bullish on storytelling. Part of that was forcing the GOP to come to terms with their own conflicting stories. Yes, they are for law and order but they back off from adequate funding of law enforcement. 

The buzz is that Adams could put himself out there for US President in 2024. What operates against that is the escalating troubles in his own city. Violence is the dominant ethos. In addition, COVID has returned. Meanwhile, remote work has sent the commercial real estate industry reeling. 

Trump has established almost a mystical force field for his points of view. Traditional politicos don't know how to neutralize it.

Connect with Editor-in-Chief Jane Genova at janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

The New York Times - When It Wasn't Winning It Was Almost Human

"Like a burning sun that never sets, the New York Times is forever there, forever reminding us of its presence, and forever neglecting to give adequate recognition to the rays of light emitted by lesser stars." - Jack Shafer, Politico, May 23, 2022

The New York Times was almost human when it wasn't winning. Remember that. Thought leaders were speculating that some foundation would take it over. At the time it wasn't getting the hang of digital and didn't seem really to understand that was a must-do. Meanwhile the rest of us were sweating about page views. Making a living depended on it. That's what we knew. 

That was then.

Now, as Shafer documents, that it's totally back it is again totally unlikable. Although I have paid subscriptions to a growing list of media outlets, I refuse to align myself with The New York Times.

The tone of The Times articles is one of ownership. Not accidentally readers get the feeling that this is the definitive word on topic X or topic Y. Maybe that's the game plan. Like the Roman Catholic Church, The New York Times seems to gaslight us that it is infallible. 

Most annonying, of course: Its long-termers like David Brooks verbalize as if they were sun gods. All the world is supposed to turn to those worlds with adulation. 

Maybe Shafer's observations, along with the growing number of nasty tweets, can break the spell. After all, Roman Catholism continues to lose global market share. At one time it had been one of the most powerful and during brands.

Connect with humber Editor-in-Chief Jane Genova at janegenova374@gmail.com.

 

Challenging Elon Musk's Supposed Digital Reach, Bot Concern

"More than 23.42% of billionaire Elon Musk's 93 million followers on Twitter are likely fake or spam accounts, according to a joint audit by two research groups [SparkToro and Followerwonk] ..." - Insider, May 18, 2022.

The methodology they used was to follow through on the investigation of 17 warning signals about followers who might not be "legit." That probe was based on an algorithm. If a follower turned up to align with a few of those warning signals the account was classified as "low quality" or even "fake."  That's where we are on that. 

Therefore, we got two questions for Musk:

One, how much is his actual digital reach? Is it an illusion of influence and power?

Two, given this reality of a large number of supposed "fake" followers how authentic is his concern about the operation of bots on Twitter? 

The Musk Brand seems to be crumbling. That includes being perceived as downright reckless by not conducting due diligence the weekend he made the proposal for taking over Twitter.

Connect with Editor-in-Chief Jane Genova at janegenova374@gmail.com.

The Matter of Mentoring - Bypassing All Those Excuses Why Junior Lawyers Have to RTO (add on summers)

The power structure, including the clients of law firms, have continually contended that RTO is necessary for junior lawyers because of the need for mentoring. Essentially the line of argument goes: It takes being in-person to absorb everything from strategy to the culture. That is, of course, the mentoring issue.

Now, RTO has bled into where summers will be in 2022. Most law firms have pulled them back into brick-and-mortar. Interestingly many of them knew exactly where to go for insight about the career-make or career-break question of what to wear. Reuters Legal reports on the subject.

In that coverage, Reuters Legal notes that those future interns have already sought information and guidance on the Subreddit for Big Law (www.reddit.com/r/biglaw).

That subreddit resource could make so many of the pontifications about the need to be in the physical office to really understand what's going on sound quite foolish. After all, Quinn Emanuel has already instituted a permanent WFH. And in the UK, in a RollonFriday survey, clients of law firms indicate that they essentially have no objections to the lawyers operating remotely. 

On that subreddit there are both knowledge and caring. The point of view isn't that of the partners who filter the whatever through their own needs and preferences and those of the law firm.

Recently on the subreddit a two-year corporate associate requested input on a possible career move in-house. The advice which came came in covered all bases - objectively. There was no agenda. 

The associate put it out there:

"I’ve got an offer to move in house wia media company as a junior attorney. Sounds like it would be a cool job doing what I like to do, but am I moving out of big law too soon? I feel like I’m just barely starting to grasp the ins and outs of M&A work and I’m worried I might be missing out on valuable firm experience that I wouldn’t otherwise get, and that my options going forward will be more limited by moving in house now."

One detailed thoughtful comment summed up the situation as this: You already have BigLaw on your resume. You learn a lot during the first two years as an associate. Less so in the next two years as compared to what can be learned in-house. So, the timing is right for a move.

TWO WARNINGS

However in the aggregrate of comments, there had been a two-part warning to the associate. Yes, energy had been put into the analysis.

1) Do due dilgence on the new opportunity that you will learn enough to be able to market yourself to the next in-house job. In this there is the assumption that the first in-house job represents just a start in that game. However, it is noted that lucrative career paths can be followed by staying with one in-house department.

2) It is unlikely that those departing from private practice will be able to return from in-house. 

Other issues dealt with on the subreddit range from how to orchestrate a lateral to the realities if parenting is possible on the path to partnership.

In addition, there is the possibility that the mentoring process will sour. Many do, as I explain in the career book I published "The Critical First Years of Your Professional Life." Very soon the mentee can outgrow the mentor. The typical pattern is that the mentor's career had peaked. There is resentment of the rise of the new star. Retaliation is not atypical. Instrusiveness is common. It took me several years to shake off my mentor from my early career years in corporate.

Connect with Editor-in-Chief Jane Genova at janegenova374@gmail.com. She is available to law firms and their vendors for communications assignments. Complimentary consultation. No selling. 

Labor Dept Looks Very Smart About Crypto Caution in Retirement Plans - But Those of Us Over-50 Even in Traditional Investments Also Are Reeling

"Crypto markets lost more than $270 billion just weeks after the department’s Employee Benefits Security Administration issued strongly worded guidance (CAR No. 2022-01) all but banning retirement plans from offering crypto assets." - Bloomberg Law, May 17, 2022

During the crash even stablecoins lost their ability to peg 1 to 1 to the dollar. 

Now the caution of the Labor Dept looks very smart. It had classified crypto in terms of investing for retirement as "speculative and volatile." And it had warned fund managers that it would probe the inclusion of crypto in retirement accounts. 

This, of course, is at a time when retirement accounts in general are taking a hit even when carefully and traditionally balanced with stocks and bonds. The whole idea of creating, preserving, and growing wealth for retirement is undergoing a paradigm shift.

Should we over-50 be in alternate investments - that is, if we have the funds to enter that territory? Also, we are focusing on those really safe harbors such as certificates of deposit. 

Could retirement- that is the old-fashioned notion of no longer working for income - become restricted to those who had enough money to do alternate or were just lucky? 

I have no plan to retire ever. But we know the joke about planning. Humans do that and the gods laugh.  I am focused on retirement investing as a way to make ends meet should my health go kaput. 

Connect with Editor-in-Chief Jane Genova janegenova374@gmail.com. 

Tesla's Associate GC Angela Chadwick Goes to Alphabet Unit

"Tesla Inc.‘s associate general counsel [Angela Chadwick] for global compliance has quit to join Alphabet Inc.’s drone delivery business [Wing Aviation] while Elon Musk ponders a takeover of Twitter Inc." - Bloomberg Law, May 17, 2022.

Musk's Tesla is known for what could be called a "lawyer problem." As Bloomberg Law also points out:

"Chadwick left Tesla after the company ushered in its third top lawyer in three years—and sixth since late 2018—with the promotion of David Searle to acting head of legal."

Meanwhile, as Reuters Legal reports, Musk could encounter legal problems if he tries to re-negotiate or pull out of the Twitter deal. 

Connect with Editor-in-Chief Jane Genova at janegenova374@gmail.com.