Allaying Your Employer's Fears

Survey Says!

Deal Makers of the Year

Rainmaker Extraordinaire

Stay or Leave?

A Bill of Rights for Your Career

You want to work part-time or telecommute, and--fearing decreased billable hours--your employer is less than thrilled with the idea. How can you convince a skeptical boss that your suggestion has merit?

One of these key workplace motivators might help, says Sheila Nielsen, a career counselor for attorneys:

1. You perk up the bottom line. You have clients too valuable for the firm to risk losing.

2. Fear of attrition. Your practice area is in high demand. They can't live without you.

3. Fear of losing client goodwill. You have clients who believe you are the only attorney on earth who can really understand them and help them with their legal problems.

4. Personal relationship. You have a special relationship to the powers that be.

5. Bad press. Women are leaving the firm in droves. It is embarrassing and bad for the firm's image and for business. Alternative arrangements are offered to keep women on board and happy.

6. Partner reliance. Your partner, who is powerful in the firm hierarchy, has come to rely on your assistance and cannot survive without you.

7. Long-range planning. You are fortunate to be working for a well-managed law firm. Key partners at your firm realize that to recruit and retain the best and the brightest lawyers, they need to offer flexible work-time arrangements.

8. Wild card motivator. The economy. When there is more work than capable lawyers available to handle it, lawyers become more valuable to the workplace.

For more on these arguments for flextime, access the Merrill's Illinois Legal Times database (ILLT) and type ti(flex-time). You will retrieve the article "Take Tales of Flex-Time with Grain of Salt, Dose of Reality."

Survey Says!
Partners Are Happy

What's life like for today's law firm partners? American Lawyer surveyed more than 600 across the country last year to find out. And the answer, it seems, is that they are as happy as clams.

"Young and old, men and women, New York and Los Angeles, litigator[s] and transactional lawyers--the partners are content," says the article's author, Aric Press. "They work painful hours--a median of 57 a week. They're pushed too hard by callous clients. Their work strains their family lives--but not 'seriously.' That's all part of the package and not remotely worrisome enough to dampen their enthusiasm for their careers and accomplishments."

Here are more survey findings:

• Percentage who are "extremely or generally" content with their practices: 83 percent.

• What they like best about their practices:

  About two-thirds say that it's the problem solving; slightly more than half point to the compensation.

  Men enjoy the business issues, while women talk more about "develop(ing) collegial relationship(s) with clients."

• What they don't like about their practices:
  About one-third say that there is too much work. Slightly more say that they don't like competing for new clients. And 29 percent complain that other lawyers "lack civility."

To read more about the survey and the people who took it, access the American Lawyer database (AMLAW) and type ti("good life"). You will retrieve the article "The Good Life: Partners at the Nation's Biggest Law Firms Are Pleased with Their Careers."

WHAT should you do if you end up working for John Q. Satan? To read one career counselor's suggestion, access the Merrill's Illinois Legal Times database (ILLT) and type ti(satan). You will retrieve the article "If You Work for John Q. Satan, Esq., Consider an Exorcism."

Deal Makers of the Year

Want to know more about the movers and shakers in corporate law? Check out the April edition of American Lawyer, which named 1998's biggest deal makers. Among those profiled are

• John Finley of New York's Simpson Thacher & Bartlett. "Over the past four years Finley has been Bronfman's [Edgar Bronfman Jr., CEO of The Seagram Company Ltd.] legal point man on a series of deals aimed at transforming Seagram into a modern entertainment conglomerate. The effort culminated in 1998 with the company's $10.4 billion acquisition of music giant Polygram N.V."

• Edward Herlihy of New York's Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz. "When most lawyers talk about a big year, they can point to one case or one deal as a highlight. Edward Herlihy can point to the whole reel. Riding a wave of consolidation in the banking industry, Herlihy ... posted numbers last year that no lawyer, and few law firms, came close to matching."

• Cathy Kaplan of New York's Brown & Wood. "Counseling clients everywhere from Buenos Aires to Beijing on complex securitizations, she's made it her mission to put asset-backed practice all over the world map. So far, so good. Last year she and her associates generated billions in cash for five different Japanese banks by issuing collateralized loan obligations (CLOs)--securities based on a portfolio of outstanding bank loans. She also had a hand (as underwriter's counsel) in a deal for Australia's Westpac Banking Corporation--the first publicly registered mortgage-backed deal for a non-U.S. issuer."

To read the profiles of last year's biggest deal makers, access the American Lawyer database (AMLAW) and type pr,ti(deal-maker) & da(1999).

Rainmaker Extraordinaire

The saying may be "Into every life a little rain shall fall," but these days, law firm partners hope it will pour.

Developing and expanding a prolific practice is crucial to success for partners. To help would-be and current partners develop this important skill, Peter Zeughauser, a law firm consultant and former general counsel, created a rainmaking strategy. The strategy includes these main steps:

• Develop a plan that is short and simple.
  
• Create a vision statement.
  
• Create a mission statement.
  
• Discover client needs. (Ground rules: ask clients what they need, listen to their answers and create a come-back opportunity.)
  
• Develop goals.
  
• Define strategies.
  
• Execute and stay flexible.

For the complete details on Zeughauser's rainmaking strategy, access the American Lawyer database (AMLAW) and type ti(rain-making & book). You will retrieve the article "Rainmaking by the Book."

Stay or Leave?

How are associates like cheese?

"They're best consumed between 18 months and four years," says Cameron Stracher, litigation counsel at CBS Broadcasting.

In one of her "Associate Life" columns for American Lawyer, Stracher advises associates who want a change to make a move while the going is good. The choices for new(er) associates are endless. She explains: "A small firm with the resources of a large firm. A large firm with the camaraderie of a small firm. A medium-sized firm with all the resources of a large firm but the camaraderie of a small firm. A firm with more resources than a Chandler blonde, but no camaraderie. A firm with no resources, but good coffee. Maybe you'll forgo the firm route entirely (it's so confusing!), settling for an in-house job where time isn't measured in byte-sized bits."

To read Stracher's discussion of headhunters, exit-strategies and other topics related to job hopping, access the American Lawyer database (AMLAW) and type ti(stay) & au(stracher). You will retrieve the article "Should You Stay or Should You Go?"

A Bill of Rights for Your Career

"Most people could use a bill of rights for their careers," says Sheila Nielson in another of her career-counseling articles. "The doctrine might read this way: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all working persons are endowed with certain unalienable rights and that among these is the right to a job that provides the following:

1. A satisfying mental diet;

2. Meaningful work in light of your view of the world;

3. Colleagues who appreciate you;

4. The ability to foster your personal goals in life."

To read the complete article, run this search in ILLT: ti(form & perfect). You'll retrieve "I, the Lawyer, in Order to Form a More Perfect Career."

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