So I'm getting out of the rat race

Naive to think all these "wills and closing" jobs are there for the taking.

 

Just have to hang your shingle.

 

Remember when journalists used to say they can easily slide into a PR job?

 

I met an attorney who did real estate closings, took over his father's practice. Flat out said it was just a business, nothing to do with the law. Try to allow non-attorneys do closings, however, and they fight tooth and nail to maintain their monopoly.

 

I recall you posting about career change and such. I don't recall it framed as joining the rat race.
Does not mean you didn't present it as such, only that I don't recall that.

 

They think they know and understand that side of communications, but the vast majority have little knowledge or understanding at all.

 

There are a lot of reasons. "A pretty nice living" isn't quite the same as a starting salary of $185K (I think that's what it is up to now), plus five-figure bonus at the end of the year, plus hefty raises each year, plus a shot at a really lucrative partnership down the road, plus a resume-builder in case you want to leave for something like an in-house job at a corporation or government work.

Some of it is straight-up prestige-whoring. I have little in common with most of the people I work with, as far as their upbringing goes. This is how their life has been plotted from early on. You go to the best high school. Then to the best college. Then to the best law school. Then to the best firm. And onward. It's practically like breathing to them.

Also, it wouldn't be fair if I didn't note that a not-insignificant number of people just love the game, love the work. The cases are interesting, even if the day-to-day mechanics of litigation are tedious as hell, especially on the bottom of the totem pole. There are a lot of dollars at stake.

 

Many of the people that are partners now also came up at time when litigation was a lot different than it is now--e.g., no e-discovery, cases actually going to trial, companies giving all their business (even small stuff) to big firms so that asssociates got more experience earlier on.

 

I can't find the 30 Rock clip in question, so y'all will just have to make do with my quote and read this in Jason Sudeikis's landlord's voice: "Mommy is looking very strong tonight."

 

When I came in, the head of the antitrust group - a nice enough guy, though nearing retirement - wanted absolutely nothing to do with the four of us who were brought in at the time. He has expressed some regret about this since then, especially since so many people from that group (it has since been folded into a larger group) have fled. So we never had any real champions within the firm, and were kind of left to drift from day one. My first year was spent doing pro bono work, which is fun, but those cases never went away, and the guy I was working for ended up being an exclusively pro bono guy here, then left the firm entirely. My second year was spent on a non-corporate internal investigation that was cool as hell, but bore little resemblance to the work done here. Plus, the partner, a corner-office Titan here, hated what we initially turned in and read us the riot act. (Not my fault - I was working for someone else. The pro bono guy again.)

So there were two years, pretty much wasted. At some point after that, I started doing work for people outside my group, and the East Coast guy was the kind of 24/7 task master I am incapable of working for at this stage of my life, with two young children and a lengthy commute.

In other words, I essentially fell between the cracks. It happens here.