Careers in Law
Hosted by Paula Foster Chambers
Edited by Eileen Muller Myrdahl
November 5-9, 2007

Introductions
    - Robert Spoo
    - Jill Yaziji
    - Ginny Noble
    - Will Moddelmog
About the introductions
Is law the more pragmatic career?
Must I go to law school for a career in law?
Is law school worth the time and money?
Tips for law school
How important are law school rankings?
How are PhDs viewed in the legal world?
Legal work for the federal government
Public policy work
Starting your own firm
Work in law libraries
Being a law professor
Family life – can you have any?
Close of discussion

INTRODUCTIONS

Robert Spoo
I am an attorney with the San Francisco law firm of Howard Rice Nemerovski Canady Falk & Rabkin, P.C.  I concentrate much of my practice on intellectual-property litigation and advice—especially in the area of copyrights.  My interest in the law was sparked more than ten years ago by the experiences I had as a tenured professor of English at the University of Tulsa.  After finishing my Ph.D. at Princeton University in the late 1980s with a dissertation on James Joyce’s Ulysses, I joined the University of Tulsa’s English Department as an assistant professor.  The University of Tulsa is noted for its major manuscript collections on James Joyce and for being the home, since 1963, of the James Joyce Quarterly, the scholarly journal of record on Joyce and his writings.  Soon after I arrived, I became Editor of the “JJQ,” as it is known.

 What I could not have predicted was how important issues of intellectual property and copyright would become to my career as an editor and publishing scholar.  While it might seem that copyrights in works of the “modernist” writers (Joyce, Virginia Woolf, T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound and Company) expired long ago, many of those copyrights are very much alive as a result of legislative extensions of copyright terms in the United States and abroad.  Some literary estates are generous about permitting scholars to make use of protected works.  Others are less encouraging.  The James Joyce Estate, as it turned out, looked askance on much of the scholarship being written about Joyce, and often refused copyright permission to use or quote from Joyce’s works.  Since my livelihood depended on being able to quote from the modernist masters, I decided I should learn something about copyright, fair use, and other arcane legal matters that impacted my career and that of other scholars.  I enrolled in the University of Tulsa’s College of Law as a part-time first-year student, and began a journey that at the time I did not know would take me out of the literature academy.  After completing my first year, I was accepted as a transfer student at the Yale Law School, from which I graduated with a J.D. in 2000.

After a clerkship on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and stints with law firms in New York and Oklahoma, I moved with my family to the Bay Area, where I now practice at Howard Rice.  While I am a general commercial litigator, I focus much of my practice on copyrights and trademarks, both litigation and advice.  Clients I have developed over the years include academics, libraries, writers’ associations, and scholarly journals that are in need of exactly the same kind of advice that led me to the law in the first place.  Even my background as a Joyce scholar has remained relevant: I and my law firm currently serve as co-counsel with the Stanford Center for Internet and Society for Stanford English Professor Carol Loeb Shloss, who in 2006 filed a lawsuit against the Estate of James Joyce in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.  Among other things, Professor Shloss sought a judicial declaration that material she intended to use, over the Estate’s objections, in a biography of Joyce’s daughter, Lucia, constituted fair use.  After a settlement was concluded that permitted Professor Shloss to publish all the material she sued for, the court ordered that the Estate pay her attorneys’ fees.  We are now in the process of litigating the appropriate amount of those fees.  In addition to all of this, I regularly speak and write about copyright and intellectual property in scholarly and professional venues—including James Joyce conferences. 

I feel as though I have the best of the two professional worlds I have inhabited: I am a practicing attorney whose work brings me into regular contact with the academy and the legal issues facing scholars, writers, universities, and libraries today.  Building that bridge has been important and satisfying for me.  Many of us who have considered leaving the academy have been ambivalent about the transition; there are aspects of the humanities that we are reluctant to leave behind.  For those individuals, I would strongly suggest that you consider an alternative career that allows you to maintain some of the interests and connections that drew you to the humanities in the first place.  As someone who has been fortunate enough to forge that link, I would be happy to share my thoughts and experiences with you.

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Jill Yaziji 

I am an attorney specializing in business and personal injury litigation in the Houston area.  I have also represented clients in California and Louisiana. 
 
I started my legal career seven years ago, after graduating from the University of Texas School of Law.  UT was also where I did my master’s and Ph.D. work in Comparative Literature.  My academic experience was great: I enjoyed reading and discussing great books, and I thrived as a student of literature in a wonderfully learned and highly diverse academic community.  Nonetheless, my transition to law from academia was, in a way, inevitable.  For me, it was not a question of “if” I would go to law school, but “when” and “where.”  I was (and still am) attracted to work that has direct and measurable consequences on people’s lives, and law epitomized this potential.  
 
After completing my Ph.D. work, I went to New York City, where I worked as an adjunct professor for a few years.  In 1997 I came back to Austin, TX to attend law school.  Upon graduating, I was recruited by a major Plaintiff’s firm in Houston, where I learned basic trial and advocacy skills.  I now have my own practice in downtown Houston.
 
There are certain similarities and differences between law and humanities.  As far as similarities go, as students of humanities, we’ve learned the power of words and the thrill of a good turn of phrase.  In law, you will come to practice these skills, but at a very different level than in academia.  Indeed, one of my greatest assets as a lawyer is my writing skills, which I had the opportunity to hone during my academic years.  I also benefited tremendously from in-depth textual analyses, which come in handy, especially if you practice oral advocacy or appellate briefing.  In those areas, you are usually called upon to articulate often quite-subtle distinctions between one fact pattern and another in an attempt to persuade a court not to follow a precedent that is harmful to your client, or to apply established law differently to your case.  I say “at a very different level” because you will have to bring the level of language down to a more practical, everyday language than the level that we are used to as academics, or you will risk losing your audience. 
 
Obviously, there are key differences between academia and law: legal practice is openly competitive, and in many situations, lawyers are expected to represent zealously two sides in a zero-sum game. 
 
I welcome any questions and am happy to share the highlights of my transition into law with you in order to facilitate your decision-making experience.
Nejd Jill Yaziji, Ph.D., Esq.
YAZIJI LAW FIRM
1001 Texas Avenue, Suite 1400
Houston, Texas 77002
Phone: 713.436.6664
Facsimile: 713.436.9287

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Ginny Noble
My career path has meandered over the last twenty years—I went to law school at Duke right after college, worked for the federal government (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission) for a while, started my own practice, went to graduate school in history at UNC while practicing law, didn’t get any academic jobs I wanted, and am now settled in a satisfying practice in Durham, NC.  Though I teach history courses occasionally at local universities (Duke, UNC), most of my time is spent practicing law. 
 
I got my Ph.D. in history because legal practice seemed too insulated from consideration of larger social structures.  An academic career in history, I thought, would be more intellectual.  As it turned out, though, the kinds of history jobs that were available involved very heavy teaching loads, and I didn’t think that I’d be able to do much research or writing.  That realization, combined with the fact that I very much like the area I live in, convinced me to give up the search for a job as a professor and just concentrate on my law practice. 
 
A friend from law school and I started our firm sixteen years ago.  The flexibility of being self-employed has been wonderful:  for one thing, it allowed me to get a Ph.D. in British history while working.  Both my history work and my legal practice focus on social policy.  I have a book coming out from Routledge next year about the post-war British welfare state, and in my law practice, I handle cases for people who are trying to get either social security disability benefits or veterans disability benefits.  I find that my academic training allows me to see social and ideological patterns in the law that I wouldn’t otherwise be aware of, and though I didn’t end up in an academic career, I am very glad that I went to graduate school.  I’ll be happy to answer any questions you have. 
 
Virginia Noble
McGill & Noble, Attorneys
Board Certified Specialists in Social Security Disability Law
3518 Westgate Drive
Suite 425
Durham, NC 27707
(919) 493-8876
FAX (919) 419-7149

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Will Moddelmog       
Having obtained my law degree before my Ph.D. in English, I did things a bit differently than most people. Still, I think of myself as an academic working in the legal profession, so I hope my experiences will be helpful nonetheless.
 
I was one of those people who apply to law school only because it seems to be the thing to do for academically-inclined English majors. I wasn’t at all convinced that I wanted to be a lawyer. When I got there, I found that the people who applied because they knew they wanted to be lawyers generally hated law school, and those who applied because they enjoyed academic challenges tended to appreciate it. I was one of the latter. Like any good law school, UCLA provided both a practical and a theoretical orientation to the law, and I think having an academic background would have been an advantage in understanding some of the more esoteric interests of the professors that, at the time, I found a bit mystifying.

After graduating from law school in 1988, I went straight into private practice at a large corporate law firm, where I worked for 2 years. I’ll leave it to other people on the panel to discuss their experiences in private practice, but suffice it to say that I did not like either the demanding hours or the kind of law I was practicing (transactional real estate work). Although I could have tried to find a better legal niche, I ultimately decided I’d rather be a student again. And I have to admit, I’m not sure I could have afforded to return to school were it not for the comfortable salary I earned during my stint in private practice, so I won’t complain too much about it.

Being a grad student is my true calling; unfortunately, the money is not so good. After getting my Ph.D. in English in 1997 and working as an adjunct, I finally got the tenure-track job I so coveted at the Newark, Ohio campus of Ohio State. However, I soon found that, although I enjoyed teaching literature, I did not like grading freshman composition essays as an assistant professor any more than I had liked it as an adjunct. I also did not relish the daily chore of trying to motivate otherwise unmotivated students, and I wanted to be closer to family in California. It was a tough decision to give it up and return to the law. Mostly, though, I think it has worked out well.

I have worked as an attorney at the Office of Legislative Counsel in Sacramento for almost 6 years. My job involves drafting bills and legal opinions for members of the California Legislature and generally serving as a nonpartisan legal advisor. Thus, I do a lot of writing, editing, research, and analysis, and confer with people (usually legislative staffers) frequently over the phone or in meetings. Many lawyers would find my job boring because it is so “academic,” which is precisely why I like it.

 That said, as with any legal position, there is a fair amount of drudgery. A good portion of my work involves drafting amendments to bills in which I am provided with changes that have already been decided upon. Although I look at the changes with a legal eye to determine the best way to express them and whether they raise any constitutional or other concerns, they are frequently innocuous and nonsubstantive, which means I serve as a mere scribe by transferring them into the published bill (anyone read Melville’s “Bartleby” lately?).

 Thankfully, the office also gets work that is quite challenging and incredibly diverse. Most of us work in multiple areas of the law, and I find I am constantly having to learn something new. One of my specialties now is gambling law—a subject that I had no inherent interest in but have discovered to be filled with unexpected pleasures, due largely to issues that have arisen since the advent of Indian casinos. Our office frequently addresses such evolving areas of the law in written legal opinions requested by legislators. We are asked to draft opinions on matters that range from the sublime to the ridiculous, but it is not uncommon for them to involve cutting-edge issues that have not yet had a chance to make it to the courts.

 A few other aspects of my job that I appreciate are the fairly regular hours (I have to put in overtime, but its nothing compared to private practice and I get compensating time off as a result), the collegial nature of the office, and the chance to get a behind-the-scenes look at the fairly entertaining world of California politics. Aspects that I do not appreciate are the low pay in comparison to private practice (although better than academia), the glacial pace at which eligibility for promotions moves within the civil service, and the bureaucratic culture that dominates this and most other state offices (in fairness, however, my office is making some efforts to change that).

 Unfortunately, I’m afraid it will be tougher for many of you to attend law school than it was for me, and to take a public sector job after graduating. Universities around the country are balancing their budgets on the backs of professional school students (UC has decided to charge about $40,000 a year for its law schools by 2010). Even if you can finance a law degree at those prices, paying off sizable student loans on a government attorney’s salary may pose quite a challenge.

 I’d be glad to take any questions you have about law school, private practice, state government jobs, or the applicablility of “Bartleby the Scrivener” to legal work in the 21st century.
 
Will Moddelmog
Deputy Legislative Counsel
925 L St., 7th Floor
Sacramento, CA  95814
tel. (916) 341-8007
fax (916) 341-8290
 

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About the introductions
Question
PQ:  I'm following this thread, but noticed that Jill has a PhD and a JD.  I'm curious: Jill, what program is your Phd?  What led you to pursue a JD?  I ask because I'm defending my PhD in a couple of weeks, but have been toying with the idea of a JD for a couple of years now.
 
YAZIJI: Sure.  My Ph.D. is in Comparative Literature (I think I mentioned this in the intro, which gives you a bit more about my general background).  The reason I went for the JD is that I felt that the nature of legal work has more measurable impact on people’s lives.  That was the reason for not sticking with an academic career.  That does not mean that academic knowledge is inconsequential or that great professors and teachers have less impact than lawyers.  Indeed, some of the most influential people in my life were my professors at UT.  But if you like to see results quickly, the mediated world of academe is not for you.  That was the case with me. 

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Is law the more pragmatic career?
Question
AB: I completed my undergraduate degree while working as a paralegal 3 years and approximately 6 months as a judicial assistant in Common Pleas court. I applied to law school, graduate school -English -(undergrad degree in English) and political science. I was accepted into law and grad school and choose to pursue a M.A. in English, Language and Literature - as a Graduate Teaching Assistant - tuition paid vs. serious debt for law school. I completed the M.A. in English in 2001; unfortunately I could not find work. Now I am self-employed as an Editor/Writer and applied to the PhD program at Ohio State University. I'm hesitant about pursuing a PhD because of all the difficulty I experienced during my M.A. I was wandering if it's time to give up the dream of being a professor of English. You discussed transitioning into a different career altogether, what advise would you give to someone who is considering yet another transition back into academia?  I guess, I didn't consider law school again, because of the cost involved and is it true that the market is over-saturated with students graduating with law degrees? I would appreciate your professional insight.

Answer
SPOO:  I think the decision to transition back to the academy by entering a Ph.D. program is one that you have to think about carefully, just as going to law school is.  Having been out of the day-to-day academy for going on ten years, I don't know what the market is currently in any detail.  If it's like it was when I was teaching, then it could be a challenge getting a tenure-track job, though not impossible by any means.  One thing you should do is have some very candid conversations with faculty in any Ph.D. program you are considering.  Ohio State has a great program--I know a couple of English professors there--and I believe that faculty members would be frank.  As for law programs, yes, there are many law students on the market.  But for students coming from "good" law schools and/or those who have done very well in their J.D. programs, it is typically easier to find intriguing entry-level positions--public or private--than it is for Ph.D.s in comparable positions.  That has been my experience, at least. 

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Must I go to law school for a career in law?
Question
ED: I am hoping to inquire about "legal" (broadly defined) opportunities for PhDs (my PhD is in political science with an emphasis on constitutional law/history) who (like myself) are not in a personal and financial position to go to law school at this time and probably will never be. 
 
When I was in graduate school, our department was recruiting faculty members who at one point in their lives practiced law (and I assume hated it).  Apparently, political scientists who have JDs are in a better to teach constitutional law.  When I was still thinking about the academic job market, I asked one of our new JD/PhD faculty members if he thought I would be at a disadvantage because I did not have a JD - he said that it might since most people in my field have JDs (either earned before or after grad school). 
 
Now here I am a PhD (with no real desire to do the tenure thing) who is looking into the law field without a JD. 
 
Kind of ironic.

Answer
MODDELMOG: ED wondered about finding legal careers that don't require a J.D. There's the obvious one--being a paralegal--but that's not too exciting. Some state governments (not California's) employ people they call legal editors who assist the attorneys with drafting statutory language. There may be positions like that in legal publishing as well. Your con law background could get you into a job doing legal research with a public policy research group. Basically, though, you need the J.D. to do the most interesting work.

Question
XO : This question is for all of the guest speakers who have knowledge on this topic.  I am a graduate
student finishing up on a Master's degree incommunication Studies this month.  I have the desire to
pursue a PhD inCommunication Studies also.  I am one of those people who like to spread my talents
over to several areas.  I would like to know how my communications degree would be of help to the
legal world.  I would love the opportunity to work in the legal world without going to law school. (if
possible) Have any of you seen a demand for communication professionals in your field?

What is a path to take to become an expert witness in the courtroom?  My ultimate question is how to
transfer my communication knowledge to the legal world without going to law school?  I have an
undergraduate degree in Black Studies if that makes any difference in determining my qualifications.

Answer
SPOO: With regard to opportunities in the legal world for non-J.D.s with communications backgrounds: I have not researched this response, but many law firms,
especially larger ones, employ individuals, and sometimes whole departments, that act as "marketing
and communicationspersonnel" or have similar job titles.  These individuals assist thefirm and the
attorneys with issues relating to marketing, publicity,client contacts and development, and working
with the press and other media.  Communications skills are essential, but you will have to investigate
for yourself whether a communications degree is a key that can open this particular door.  Certainly, it
 could be an asset, whatever else might be required for specific hirings. 

Question
SB: Up until this point I had been “listening” to this discussion with a sort of detached interest as I knew I wasn’t interested in becoming a lawyer.  However, the discussion of law librarians and legal assistants has me intrigued.  While most PhDs have similar skills that would be valuable in those roles (writing, critical thinking, certain types of research) but as a social scientist I don’t have some of the specific knowledge that, say, a MLIS has.  My primary experience with those people in my field (Psychology) who are involved with the legal profession is with either expert witnesses or psychology undergrad majors who go on to get a JD. 

What sorts of opportunities are there for social scientist in the legal profession?  Are those different than those with degrees in the humanities or are they essentially the same?
 
On a more general level, what kinds of positions should we (all PhDs, not just social scientists) be looking for as we scan the job ads?  Would we have to come in on the ground floor, so to speak, and what kinds of entry level positions would be the best matches?  If there are positions that are less entry level that we would be suited for, how should we address our lack of experience (i.e., how to say “I’ve never worked in a law firm before but this is why I’m right for the job)?  I’m guessing a skill based resume would be a good choice in this sort of situation so what specific skills would cause a law firm to really sit up and notice?

Comment
TZ : I too have been just listening to the discussion and feel I might have something useful to contribute
to your question.

I got out of academia with the master's degree in Humanities (uncertain at that point if I wanted the
PhD.) My undergraduate degree is in English. I am working at a small Chicago civil rights/employment
plaintiffs' firm. My work bridges, legal researcher,paralegal, editor, librarian, and sometimes statistician because we are a small firm.

Because I have an aptitude for math and data I have often worked withour expert witness and there
are several social scientists who have prepared expert reports for us based on data we have received in
the discovery process or collected independently. There are also companies that specialize in doing
expert research for law firms but there are also experts who work as independent contractors.  Experts
come from a variety of fields all of ours have had PhDs, those may be in Math,Economics, Social
Science or Psychology.

I would say this. As an expert witness you would have to build your business (if you didn't work
through one of the companies that provide expert services) methodology etc. but you also get more
freedom than attorneys and a significant income if you build your business to a certain level.  I think
PhDs who have been in academia recently make good experts because they have a sense of peer
review and tend to be more careful. I also think a number of firms fail to really understand expert
reports because the jargon and theories behind the reports are not something for which they trained.

I think as a social scientist you would be qualified to work with data and prepare expert reports (not
unlike preparing an academic publication but with different, more limited goals in mind) in a way
that someone with a humanities degree would not be qualified. Many of our experts have maintained
some academic work while being experts so you might be able to find a satisfying balance that way.

You might try networking at one of the young lawyers meetings or at a conference in an area of law to
which your skills might be suited. You might also talk to one of the firms that does prepare expert
reports. Most of them will have consulting or economic research in the name.
I can suggest a few if you are interested.

I would strongly recommend to all though that a subordinate position(a non JD role) at most law firms
has the potential to be incredibly frustrating for someone with a PhD who is used to independent
research and a certain work ethic. It could be easy to feel like a lackey to attorneys or have an attorney
be threatened by a PhD. It really depends on the type of law firm the job and recognizing the skills
that you have to offer a firm, the personalities of the attorneys and being clear about what your
position at the firm is.

I have enjoyed a certain flexibility that I think is unusual in law firms for someone in my position and
have done much interesting work but I have also reached the limits of work that keeps me challenged
and interested on a daily basis and so I will be looking for something different in the next few years.   The up side is that I get a more normal schedule and don't have law school debt but it is also a trade
off.

I just wanted to offer the perspective from a non-JD because the options are very different.

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Is law school worth the time and money?
Question
BC: I've been interested in law school for a while--I actually turned down some offers back in 1995 to go to graduate school. I now work for a legal conference developer, so I guess I found work in the legal profession without going to law school, but....it still has a draw for me. So I'm wondering if the speakers can speak to the two things that hold me back: money and age.
 
William warned about the cost of law school. Can anyone expand on how much debt a new law school graduate can expect to have and, very importantly, what the debt means for one's choices after law school?
 
In regards to age, I'm 35 now and would be afraid of entering yet another profession in my 40's.  How difficult is it to enter the legal profession at that age or older?  How long does it take to firmly establish a career so that you can freely move from one type of practice to another? 

 Answers
MODDELMOG : BC wondered about the cost of law school and the problem of getting into the career later in life. I can't really comment on the amount of debt you'd have to incur, since that is dependent on too many variables. You can limit the amount of debt by working during law school and getting the J.D. part-time, but not every school has a part-time program. If you do run up serious debts, there are at least a couple of options. Some schools are instituting debt forgiveness programs for students that go into public interest careers (these programs may increase as law school becomes more expensive). Also, you can always do what I did, which is take the highest-paying job you can find right out of law school, live frugally, and pay down those debts. Then take a job you really want.
 
On the age issue, a lot of lawyers come to it as a second career. I don't think its seen as a big drawback, especially if you've done well in law school and done other things that indicate you're committed to the legal profession (serve on the law review, take a judicial clerkship, etc.). And the extra academic experience you bring to law school gives you an advantage over many of the other students.
 
 SPOO: I was in my early 40s when I graduated from law school.  I have not found it difficult to gain entry to the world of practicing law.  Employers, like law professors, often appreciate individuals who have the focus, breadth, and balance that an older person brings.  There is a demand for physical stamina in the law, and I find that as I get a bit older, that gets to be more of a challenge.  I don't know precisely what you mean about moving from one type of practice to another.  Typically, in private law firms at least, you move towards greater and greater specialization, because your depth in a particular area is what clients desire.  For maximum diversity of experience, you might want to become a general commercial litigator.  They are the "generalists" of the law--by necessity, since they are required to learn something about the many subjects they have to argue to a court. 

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Tips for law school
Question
SW : For someone contemplating going to law school (at 40) and becoming a working lawyer as a
second (post academic) career, what specific recommendations would you make in order to make the
most of law school and to make an effective transition to law? In other words, are there, say, five things you did or wish you had done in getting yourself launched in the law? Of course, individual
circumstances vary widely; I am wondering whether you can think of some things that worked well for
you or your colleagues.

Answers
SPOO:  I was roughly in your position when I went to law school.Some recommendations are obvious:
study hard, get good grades, get to know professors, and so forth.  One thing that paradoxically can
hamper a seasoned academic in the first year of law school is to "over-think"legal issues and treat them
 to the kind of painstakingly thorough, Arnoldian high seriousness that one lavished on the deep
subjects of one's previous career.  There's a place for such a mind-set in law school participation
on law review, moot court, clinical work-but when it comes to exam-taking and time-pressured
performance, you have to know and be able to apply rules quickly and in a way that might seem to
you be superficial.  This is "learning to think like a lawyer."  Academics or advanced degree types who
go off to law school sometimes perform less well in the first semester than they or anyone expected,
 and it'susually for the reason I just gave.  So learn to compartmentalize your intellectual serious in law
school, and know when to be deep and when not to be.  The same advice applies to studying for and
taking the bar exam after law school.

The only other thing I would suggest is to consider early on whether you might want to try for a judicial
clerkship after yougraduate.  You are probably saying to yourself, if I get out of lawschool at age
43-44, the last thing I will want to do is add another year of apprenticeship!  But think again.  Some
judges look for older, mature clerks, and the year you spend in a clerkship can accelerate your
later professional success, especially if you go into the private practice of law.  Many firms will pay you
more, or pay a "clerkship bonus," and sometimes they will credit you a year towards partnership
(meaning that, in that context, you haven't lost any ground).  One thing you need at almost any school
for a clerkship is one or two strong faculty recommenders.  So get to know faculty early, and let them
get to know you. 

MODDELMOG: I would just add one thing to Bob's sound advice for transitioning to the law.
Use law school to explore the full range of employment options available to law school graduates.
If you attend a well-regarded law school (be forewarned lawyers are very aware of school rankings),
There will be a lot of private firms interviewing on campus, and everyone willbe talking about the big
salaries. Unless you already know that's not what you want, you should explore that option by working
 for a summer or part of a summer for a private firm (a nice way to pick up somesubstantial cash).
But look at other possibilities as well--do anexternship with a judge, a federal agency, or a nonprofit
organization,talk to professors about their backgrounds, etc. Finding out about some of the less
standard options can be difficult, but its worth the effort (I think I would have benefitted by doing this
a bit more).

CHAMBERS: I can also chime in briefly on this.  A few years ago I worked as a grantwriter at a civil rights nonprofit
called MALDEF (Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund), where I was exposed to
non-profit lawyers and the work that they did.  The lawyers at MALDEF worked plenty hard, I
assure you, and probably did not get paid as well as those in private firms(attorney salaries ranged
from $65K for a regular attorney to $110K for theVP of Litigation), but they were passionate about
claiming and defending the civil rights of Latinos living in the US.  Correct me if I am wrong,speakers,
but I believe MALDEF is an example of what are called Public Interest law firms, or legal nonprofits. 
Other examples would include Southern Poverty Law Center, NAACP Legal Defense Fund, NRDC, and
many more. This type of organization is cause-driven rather than profit-driven, which
might appeal to some on this list.

Question
NI: I have a follow-up question regarding Paula's insightful comment on working with nonprofit organisations. I have a Masters in both Journalism and Criminology (plus 2.5 years of
practical experience in journalism), and will be getting my doctorate in Criminology soon. I am
interested in working with a non-profit organisation in the humanrights field. In terms of salary, do you
 think that I would be as much "worth"as a law school graduate with my PhD?  Also, do you happen to know what the average salary for non-laywers with NGOs in the human rights field is like  is it comparable
 to the one for regular attorneys mentioned by Paula ($65K)? I've been told by law school graduates
that the human rights field is a highly competitive one, but many law graduates discard this option and
instead pursue careers in private firms because of much higher salaries. I just wonderif the claim
of "low salaries" also holds for "big players" like Human Rights Watch, or any human rights related
NGO based in a big (and expensive) city like NYC.

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How important are law school rankings?
Question
QB :  Moddelmog, William wrote: > (be forewarned--lawyers are very aware of school rankings)

If I can ask another question that this comment raises: how important do you think it is to go to the
highest-ranked law school that you can? I ask partly because at this point in my life, after
criss-crossing the country for academic positions (4 cross-countrymoves in the last 8 years),
the last thing I want to do is uprootmyself and my family yet again. One of the two nearby schools is
ranked about 35th overall by US News & World, and top 5 in one of its specialties. Am I shooting
myself in the foot if I go there and don't up stakes to attend a top 10 law school
(assuming I'd even get in!), or can excellent performance counterbalance not being in a top-10
school? Or does it depend on what you want to do when aftergraduation? (I realize this is less
about Ph.D.s in law careers than about going to law school in general, but I thought I'd throw it out
there anyway.)

Answers
NOBLE: I think it depends on what you want to do.  If you want to work for a large firm in a big city (which pay the highest salaries), going to the highest-ranked school you can is probably important.  However, if you go to a very good (but not top-10) school and are on law review (i.e. make good grades), you will still have a chance to work at the large firms (if that's what you want) and will definitely be able to work in government, small-medium firms, etc. 

MODDELMOG: Law schools can have regional reputations as well as national ones. If you know the city or region where you want to work, you don't necessarily need to attend Yale
to be considered for the good jobs. Its true, though, that national rankings matter for the more
high-powered firms and the more prestigious legal markets (New York, Washington D.C.,Chicago,
 etc.). I work in Sacramento, where the main regional law schools are UC Davis and McGeorge. If you
did well at either of those schools, you could get a good job with a private law firm here in town.
But if you wanted to work at Latham & Watkins in L.A. (a "prestige" firm), you might have trouble
getting in the door. Also, some of the more interesting public interest jobs are fairly competitive to
land, so going to a well-known school can help there too. A degree from a "top"school gives you the
most options, but its not critical, especially if you know what you want to do and focus your education
on gaining experience in that area.

SPOO: An implication of Will's excellent post is that while doing well at a good regional law school will
likely open many doors regionally, doing well or even moderately well at a "top" law school will tend to
open those same doors and many others across the country.  (I'm picturing aVenn diagram here.) 
I feel it's important to think as far into the future and as deeply into oneself as possible before one
makes a choice of law schools.  Many humanities PhDs and academics are "wired" by the nature of
job prospects (as I myself was) not to think far ahead (because why would you?) but rather to focus on
the immediate, incremental opportunity.  Choosing a law school allows you to shake free of that mind-set and at least let yourself contemplate the possibility that, hey, maybe my family and I would like to
move to the East/West Coast in a few years, or to Chicago or Tulsa.  The professional paradigm
shift requires a mental shift, for best results--even if you wind up concluding that a good regional law
school is the way to go.

Question
KL:  I keep seeing comments about the distinction between the top 10 law schools, and good law
schools and regional law schools.  Do the top ten correspond to the top RI schools, e.g., Yale, Harvard,
Cal, Duke, etc.?  (I don't actually know who all has a law school.)

 I live in southern California.  Would a Harvard degree be more powerful than a UC degree, like UCLA? 

Answer
MODDELMOG:Its hard to make categorical statements about the importance ofattending a highly
ranked law school. Its safe to say that if you want to work at a high powered Wall St. firm with the
 goal of eventually being appointed Attorney General or Chief Justice of the Supreme Court,you'd
better attend the most prestigious law school you can get into. On the opposite end of things, if you
plan on hanging out your own shingle as soon as you graduate, you probably want a school that's going
to provide you with the most practical legal education you can get,regardless of ranking. As with
humanities grad programs, people get too caught up in rankings, but that doesn't change the fact that
they do matter to some employers. Its a sad fact, but graduating at the top ofyour class at a school
that is only considered "decent" won't get you an interview at many "elite" firms. And it may make
 it somewhat more difficult to get an interview with one of the more sought-aftergovernment agencies
or public interest organizations as well. But that may be fine with you, since there is still an enormous
world of interesting legal work to be done in other contexts. If you have no ideawhat you want to
do in the law, I don't think you should foreclose possibilities by attending a school that would open
only a limited number of doors if you have a more expansive option. However, if you know you
 want to practice environmental law in Kansas City and there is an environmental program at a Kansas
City law school that is recognized as good by the local profession, that option would make sense.
Nationally-ranked law schools tend to operate a little more likegraduate programs than professional
ones--they are more theoretical, since their graduates may come from, and end up, anywhere in the
country. For that reason, they may appeal more to people who liked grad school. Locally-known schools may focus more on practical matters relating to that particular state or jurisdiction.

As a UCLA law school graduate, I may me biased, but a degree from UCLA will be valued anywhere in
L.A. or in the rest of California, as will a degree from U.C. Berkeley (Boalt Hall), as long as you've done
well. Both are well regarded nationally (Boalt would be ranked higherthan UCLA, though I have no
idea what recent rankings say). UC Davis and Hastings (in San Francisco) will also work well throughout
the state, though not for every firm, and your performance will have to be a little more exceptional
to be considered for some jobs. A degree from Harvard would get you noticed more outside of
California, and might cause California employers to be a little more forgiving with respect to
grades. But if people think you've just coasted through your Ivy Leaguelaw school, you're not likely to
have much luck anywhere (unless you're well-connected, of course, which always trumps ability).

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How are PhDs viewed in the legal world?
Question
QB:  Your last point brings up a related question - how do law schools, and then later,
law firms and other employers view people with Ph.D.s (ifit's at all possible to generalize)?
Do they view that background positively, or does it depend too much on the individual to say?

Answer
YAZIJI: How law schools and law firms view people with Ph.D. depends on the lawschool and the firm
that you might join after you get your JD.  It's been my experience that having a Ph.D. gives you cultural
and symbolic capital wherever you go.  If you are in a law firm where you are expected to brief
legal issues, your years of experience writing academic papers will most likely be viewed as a big
positive.  

SPOO: Just to add my perspective: My experience has been that law firms appreciate attorneys with
advanced degrees in areas other than the law. In addition to Jill's excellent point about "cultural and
symbolic capital," and depending on the firm, an advanced degree gives youspecial skills and knowledge
in an area that is likely to be relevant at times to your lawyering (legal work touching as it does on so
many diverse issues and problems).  A humanities background typically makesyou a superior writer
and sometimes a strong public speaker-veryimportant for legal work.  And an advanced degree
shows that you have grit, determination, intellectual and physical stamina, and the ability to rise
 to a challenge-all things that are valued by legal employers.

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Legal work for the federal government
Question
LS:  I had a quick question for Mr. Spoo and the other panelists.  I remember in your bio you wrote that
you graduated from YLS in your early 40s, clerked, and then went into (I assume) firm work.  The
question I had for you and others is how easy is it to transition from a "big law" firm to federal work.
 I am seriously considering applyingto law school once I finish my dissertation, but I realize that I
would have to go into debt.  I have very little tolerance for debt, and thus I assume I'd have to work in a
large firm for a number of years to pay off loans.  However, my ultimate goal would be to work
for the federal government.   The thing I am unclear about is how one transitions from firm work into
federal work.  Is this common?  Do certain firms have connections with Federal agencies to facilitate
such a transition?  Any information you could provide would be helpful.

Answer
SPOO: Unfortunately, I have little firsthand experience of the transition from private practice to federal
 work.  I know it happens often.  I've known colleagues to go back and forth between private firms
and, says, federal prosecutor work.  Many firms, especially larger ones,urge their younger litigators to
enter programs wherein they work as a federal or state prosecutor for six months or a year, thereby
gaining substantial trial experience.  My only remotely relevant experience ishaving taken a year
out from private practice to do a federal judicial clerkship.  The clerkship was enhanced by my previous
 legal experience and the higher federal salary given to someone who has had previous legal
experience.  I would try to talk to folks who have made the transition and get their perspectives. 

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Public policy work
Question
ED: What are the best places to look for public policy research groups?
Anyone can chime in here....

Answers
MODDELMOG: They would usually be connected with a university, though often they are privately funded. The one I'm most familiar with is the Public Policy Institute of California. Here is its Web link: http://www.ppic.org/main/home.asp

NOBLE:  Regarding public policy opportunities:  As William said, there are often public policy institutes attached to universities (e.g. Sanford Institute at Duke).  But there are also advocacy organizations that are involved with litigation and lobbying.  Many of these are in Washington and/or New York:  Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund, Planned Parenthood, NOW, etc.  Also think about wide-ranging think tanks, such as the Urban Institute or the Brookings Institute.

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Starting your own firm
Question
LH : I know that at least Ginny and Jill have their own law firms now -- can both of you comment
on the process of hanging out your own shingle?  How did you decide what area to focus in, how hard or easy was it to begin to get clients (and how did you do it), and what are the plusses and minuses of
having your own firm?  Did (and how did) law school prepare you for the business aspects of running a
small company?

Answer
YAZIJI: My client base is mostly from referrals from other attorneys or former clients who chose to leave with me when I left the firm.  The set of skills required to thrive as a principal of your firm is very different from that required to be an associate in a law firm.  With your own firm, your survival is dependent upon your ability to procure a steady base of clients and to evaluate cases accurately from the get-go, often with limited information from your clients.  The latter is especially important if you do contingency work, i.e. your attorney fees are contingent on 1-being able to settle a case; or 2-prevail in court if settlement fails.  If you are working on billable cases, you are getting paid an hourly rate, regardless of whether your client prevails.  I try to have both billable and contingency work in my practice so that I can have the steadiness of monthly income while being able to pursue worthwhile cases on a contingency basis.
 
Obviously, a big plus of having your own practice is being able to control your docket, and when and where you do the work.  I am often able to avoid Houston's horrendous rush hour traffic by leaving a little later in the morning and coming back a little earlier.  Hope this helps. 

NOBLE: Starting your own firm can be unnerving at the beginning because you can't be sure how much money is going to be coming in.  During the first couple of years, my partner and I did research and writing work (appellate briefs, etc.) for other (busier) attorneys to give ourselves a bit of reliable income.  Gradually, though, we built up our own practice.  From the beginning, we have handled primarily social security disability cases.  Though some of our clients are referred to us by former clients or other attorneys, most of our business is generated by advertising. 
 
Managing advertising, accounting, etc. are different parts of the "business" side of having your own firm.  I don't mind these kinds of tasks, but they can be time consuming.  And my law school (Duke), didn't give any training in this area, because most graduates go to large firms.   
The best thing about having your own practice is that you can do the kind of work you want to do.  Big firms were of no interest to me because I have broad political objections to the corporate interests served there.  I'm quite happy representing individuals who can't work and have been denied disability benefits.  But there are lots of kinds of "plaintiffs'" work available (usually in the small firm setting):  personal injury, civil rights, employment discrimination. 
One final note about plaintiffs' work--it's usually performed on a contingency basis, which just means you don't get paid unless you win.

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Work in law libraries
Question
VC: Most law firms probably have at least one law librarian. I'm interested in knowing more about how lawyers interact with your law librarians. What kind of questions would you ask your librarians for help? My understanding is law librarians in private firms usually do not have J.D. Do you feel comfortable for them to perform research for you? I asked these questions because I have a MLIS and am interested in the law librarianship, especially legal research. As a recent graduate in 2006, it seems hard to get into the field. I do have experiences working as contractors in law firm libraries and using legal research tools such as Lexis and Westlaw, but I guess comparatively, I am still considered inexperienced even if I meet most, if not all, the job requirements.

 If you've ever involved in the hiring process of law librarians or other legal staff, what kind of qualifications are you looking for? Do you value which schools the applicants graduated from as much as you do when hiring attorneys? Any other tips for getting into the field?

Answers
YAZIJI:  Legal assistant don’t have JD’s.  But they can and do perform legal searches.  The extent of my exposure to legal research as a law student was a short seminar that was graded on a pass/fail basis.  (I did become more familiar with these issues when I served on a law journal).  Having said this, I don’t know the formal requirements of a law librarian; legal searches require you to know the different index systems, the classifications of federal vs. state courts, civil vs. criminal, county vs. district and different levels of appellate review.  There is also a difference to be drawn between your function in helping a law student, say, locate a particular case in the library, and helping that student find a relevant case based on a particular set of facts.  The latter requires more substantive knowledge in the law than the former.  Yet, again, I don’t see why a non-JD, but experienced, librarian can’t do both.    
 
SPOO: I have been at several law firms, large and smallish, and my experience is that the backgrounds of law librarians are very various.  There is certainly little of the lock-step credentialing and advancement that seem to characterize librarianship in many universities.  At a 50-attorney firm in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the head librarian happened to have a JD, but he was also a young man without experience in practice when he began.  At a larger Bay Area firm, the head librarian might have a B.A. in the humanities together with a MLIS.  Some law librarians have an accounting background, because controlling and administering the costs of firmwide online research and managing a library budget are a central part of their job.  As I understand it, there is no "typical" educational or professional background for law librarians, except that many happen to have a background in the humanities, probably by elective affinity.
 
 Many libraries, especially at larger firms, have a staff that ranges from head librarians to research assistants to those whose job it is to update treatises and library holdings, reshelve books, and so on.  The levels of education and experience vary widely, of course.  A research assistant will not necessarily have either a JD or a library science degree.  He or she might be somebody whose aptitude and experience permit him or her to do fairly advanced research ("we need to find cases and treatise authority on such and such issue of punitive damages")--always under the supervision and guidance of an attorney, of course.  Library research assistants can be essential to clients for efficiency and cost-savings. 

CHAMBERS:  Bob said: “Some law librarians have an accounting background, because controlling and administering the costs of firmwide online research and managing a library budget are a central part of their job.”
 
I just want to briefly say that while I was a little bit afraid of numbers when I finished grad school, I grew to enjoy them and feel a lot more comfortable with things like budgets and accounting when I learned, through my own nonacademic work experience, that numbers, just like words, are highly rhetorical.  They have situation-specific meanings and implications that reflect not only on you but also potentially on others--and they way we express things numerically has a powerful effect on how our work is perceived and understood.  I eventually grew to love budgeting and numerical goal-setting because the more experience I gained, the more I understood what is realistic, what sorts of things might happen, and the special pleasure of "squirreling away" little pockets of surplus in order to provide a cushion that was visible only to me and my closest colleagues, thus enhancing our sense of togetherness and shared endeavor.
 
This observation would probably be relevant to all nonacademic careers, but as we have seen, there are plenty of numbers in the world of law (calculating billable hours, budgeting future expenses, trying to reduce expenses for the client's sake, etc.), so might as well address it here.  It's really not brain surgery; you will learn the most from experience, but I also found Accounting for Dummies to be very helpful.

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Being a law professor
Question
BC:  I was wondering if the panelists can speak to the option of working in legal academe.  Was becoming a full-time law professor something you thought about?  What about teaching part-time: how easy or hard is it to practice law and teach courses on the side?

Answer
SPOO : This is a brief, belated reply to your good question.  Yes, I thought long and hard about the legal academy and almost entered it after law school.  After all, I'd been a humanities professor for so long that the transition would be pretty smooth, I thought.  The possibility of becoming a law professor was also one of the reasons I chose Yale for law school: it is one of the schools that produce a large number of graduates who enter the legal academy.  In the end, I decided that I wanted to practice rather than teach law at this point in my career.  However, during the time I practiced law in Tulsa, Oklahoma, I was also an adjunct professor in both the law school and the English Department/Film Studies Program at the University of Tulsa, teaching copyright law, media and entertainment law, and law and literature--one of those courses a semester.  I find teaching refreshing, and it's hard for me to lose the desire for the classroom.  I've been practicing in the Bay Area for only about a year and have not been here long enough, I feel, to plunge into adjunct teaching yet.  But I hope to.  It's hard to balance the two, especially at first when you're creating the course.  But I think it can be rewarding.  Having taught so long, teaching is one of the ways I assimilate whatever I do, so I think it helps my practice as well. 

MODDELMOG: Like Bob, I've considered the legal academy from time to time. One reason I haven't pursued it is that, although I enjoyed law school, I'm not sure I would enjoy doing the kind of scholarship that law schools value. I'm really a humanities person, and legal scholarship tends to have more of a social science and public policy flavor. That's not to say that there is no room for legal scholars to emphasize language, history, or philosophy--even literature (I note that Bob taught a law and lit course), and people do publish and establish teaching careers in those areas (although often in conjunction with something more "practical"), but you would have to go against the grain a bit to establish yourself as that kind of legal scholar. One thing I like about practicing law is that, while it makes for interesting work, I can leave it behind at the end of the work day and spend time on more "literary" pursuits. Merging the two interests would be great, but my impression is that there would be limited room for that in most law schools.
 

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Family life – can you have any?
Question
UT:  I have a question for you all, following up on thethread about entering law as an older
 graduate, about how students with families fit into the big-picture culture of law school.

It's great to hear that most law firms are very receptive to older graduates. However, my question is
about getting through law school itself. Everyone I know who's been to law school has said it demands a
lot of time, and I imagine that the extracurricular work that seems to be a requirement for getting
interesting clerkships, jobs at the "top" firms etc., means even more hours at school on top of regular
study committments.

How in your experience do those kinds of time pressures affect older students with kids and the slew
of kid-related family committments that come with the territory? I remember that I was rather -- well,
totally -- clueless when I was in grad school about why a classmate in a group project, who had two kids,
couldn't get away easily for group study sessions after hours. Now that I have two young kids I'm
impressed the guy even managed to write his dissertation at all.

What are the unspoken assumptions among law students and faculty about the time (and hours)
students put in to their program? Have any of you experienced or observed subtle or not-so-subtle bias against or frustration with students with outside commitmentslike families? Do
different law schools have widely varying student bodies -- do some programs skew younger,
 for example?

Anecdotally, it seems that fitting in to law school means being prepared to spend of a lot of hours with
your classmates and that the socializing that takes place on weekends and evenings is important to
career prospects later on as well. (Of course my knowledge iscolored by knowing only people who went
through lawschool themselves without kids.)

FWIW I'm in the SF Bay Area. I have no plans to apply to any law programs right now but am curious
 about what the challenges at law school might be like down the line.

Answers
SPOO:  I attended two law schools, a regional one (University of Tulsa)for my first year, and Yale for my
 final two years after transferring. Tulsa's program had a lot of older students working towards a law
degree in the evenings after work.  Since there were so many, the culture was partly geared to
their needs and schedules.  I never felt that it was difficult to fit in, spend time with fellow students, get
 involved in study groups (though I tended to study by myself mostly).

At Yale, I was struck to see how many of the students were freshly or recently out of undergraduate  school.  The population tilted markedly toward youth, even among the MLS students.  I think that
because of the Yale culture-highly individual, self-motivated, not overtly grade driven (there are
no "grades")-it is easy for widely different types of people to fit in and find a niche and a rhythm.

So my experience at two very different schools was that olderstudents could fit in easily and were not
required to spend large amounts of time participating in study groups or other activities(unless
they committed to them).  I also felt no bias at either school against older students.  I think I felt the
age difference most keenly when it came to relating to professors informally, after class or at
social events.  Because of my age and background, I tended to interact with professors more or less on
an equal footing, as I did with former colleagues in my English Department.  I never sensed that there
was a problem with that, but occasionally I noticed that the traditional agedifferential between
faculty and students has its time-honored benefits.For one thing, it allows the  student to manifest a
certain kind of candid admiration for the professor--this side of worship--which is natural and
appropriate to an apprenticeship.  I think professors consciously or unconsciously expect that and
are comfortable with it.  I never wanted to try to simulate that sort of relationship, and at times
I felt I might be missing out on some of the benefits of youth.  Ah,youth!

When I went to Yale, I came with a wife and 6-month-old twingirls.  That was hard on Marjorie, and
 I will always be grateful for her efforts and sacrifice in that period, and today.  There is no doubt that
law school takes you away from family closeness to some degree, whether you are off with a study
 group or working late hours on law review, or whether you are off in your own room studying, having
asked not to be disturbed.  Because I tended to study by myself a lot at home, I was at least there
 in the midst of the family and could take breaks to spend time with the girls, sing to them and night, 
and so on. 

YAZIJI:  I attended University of Texas Law School, a top-tier school with impeccable reputation among
 judges and academics (its faculty is consistently ranked among the top five in the nation although its
overall ranking (around 15th) is unfortunately hampered by its professor-student ratio.  I was around 30
years of age when I went there, having gotten my Ph.D. beforehand.  Although this is not 'old', it is still
considerably older than your average 22-24year-old student who jumped from college to law school. 
Our entry class ofnearly 160 students (there were four classes altogether) had about 70% of the
students in their early twenties while the rest were in their early thirties or older.  Several of the
students in my class, including a study mate, had kids.  I would say that their performance and overall
experience varied greatly and by no means can be reduced to the age group to which they belonged. 
My study mate, who had three boys, thrived beautifully and went on to get a nice job after
graduation.  Conversely, there were students in their early 20s who were taken aback by the course
 load and study pressure. So, experiences vary and they are not just age or family related. 

Yes, you are expected to study hard-every day, including weekends.  And,naturally, you and your
partner and kids will bear the brunt of this demanding schedule.  Still, not all law school is like that. 
In fact, they used to tell us that "in the first year they scare you to death; in the second year they
work you to death, and in the third year, they BORE you to death."  Truly, each year is different and I
felt a lot better about things after the first year.  In the second year, you start taking courses of your
choice and you have gotten used to the pressures and your time allocation is better.  In fact, in the
second year I was working part-time as a clerk, andstarted paying my loans as early as that time,
 which was a big relief initself.  The third year was truly boring--because you are anxious to go out
and start practicing, and your time frees up a lot.   I was almost 4-monthpregnant when I graduated
from law school--may be further proof that thethird year was more merciful than the first two! 
So, the first year is the most demanding and if you survive that, your overall experience will be
manageable. 

Question
PK:  I have a question that some of you havetangentially touched on in discussions of age and
the potential difficulties of pursuing both a Ph.D. and a law degree. I'm curious to know how this path
has affected each of your personal lives, particularly your choices in terms of marriage (if you are),
family and location. I know that  Ph.D. somewhat restricts mobility in terms of having a choice of
where to teach, while a law degree is seen as somewhat more flexible. I'm only in my first year of
graduate school, but am interested in pursuing a law degree afterwards; however, I wonder if it will be
at odds with my personal goals of establishing a family, home, etc. Any thoughts on this?

Answers
JAZIJI: This is a very good question and one that is best analyzed before you embark on long and expensive career choices.  You are right that a legal degree is more flexible ... and I would
add lawyers tend to be more in demand (andbetter compensated) than academics-subject,
of course, to market forces in both fields.  Yet, a lawyer moving from one state to another will have to
take the bar in each state where she wishes to practice.  Also, attorney work is demanding, requiring
long hours in the office (a minimum requirement in midsize to big firms in the Houston area is 2000
billable hours annually), and keeping up with strenuous deadlines.  By the same token,
there's a lot of thrill to legal work; but sadly, it sometimes comes at the expense of our personal lives. 
Keeping in mind what is important to you is crucial to your ability to strike a balance between your
career and personal life. 

MODDELMOG: My experience in a private law firm was as Jill described. Privatelitigation (and also
 transactional work, like contract negotiation and drafting) is driven by client needs and fairly inflexible
deadlines. You have to be prepared to work late and on weekends, often without priornotice. It is
different in state government. We don't get compensated like private attorneys, so the tradeoff is to
make it more of a "lifestyle" job. A lot of people in my office came from private firms because they
wanted a more family-friendly schedule. I am married with twin 7 year old boys, so this is a
tradeoff I'm willing to make. The deadlines I deal with tend to be flexible. When they aren't, I may have
to work late or on a weekend. Usually, however, I have advance notice of when the heavy work is
coming (those times often occur around regular legislative deadlines, which are known in advance), so I
can plan ahead for them. State offices also tend to emphasize the availability ofpart-time and
flexible schedules. Location, of course, is not as flexible. I happen to like where I live and work, but if I
wanted to move to another part of the state, I'd probably have to seek a position with a private firm.
And as Jill points out, moving out-of-state can mean taking a bar exam again - not something people
tend to relish.

Question
BC: A lawyer I talked to once said that if you multiply annual billable hours by 2 and *divide* that by 52, you'll get the rough number of hours you'd be working per week, you'll get the rough number of hours you'd be working per week.  For 2000 billable hours that translates to about 77 hours per week.  Do others agree that this is how much time lawyers put in at most firms?  And speaking of big firms, can the panelists speak to why working at these firms proves to be so painful for many lawyers? 

Answers
YAZIJI: I don’t think it’s quite that many hours.  But, in order to “bill” a minimum of 2000 hours annually, figure that you have to put in 55 or 60 hours per week, regularly.  You can’t bill every hour that you are in the office, but you can bill any time that you work on a case: If you are talking to a client on the phone while commuting to work, that’s billable hours; same thing if you’re on a flight to attend a deposition in one case and are emailing on your blackberry regarding another case.  That’s billable hours for both these cases. 

SPOO:  I have found that family issues are important whatever career choice one makes.  As an academic, your choice of geographic location is likely to be limited to a few openings.  As an attorney, depending on the law school you attend and how well you do, you probably will have more options.  Attorneys who work in private firms are typically paid better than humanities faculty at comparable career stages, but private attorneys work hard for clients and usually do not have much unstructured, creative, "me" time.  I thought I was busy as an active, publishing academic, and I was, but in a very different way from the way I am now.  As a professor, I devoted large amounts of time to writing and to teaching, but you "own" more of that time than you usually do as a private attorney.  This is why I find so refreshing the opportunities I have as an attorney to write and speak on subjects that interest me.  I mentioned in my Introduction that I've managed to work in an area of the law--intellectual property--that allows me to wed my present career with my former one as an English professor.  The ability to connect with my past, to keep in touch with former colleagues and fellow scholars, to speak at literature conferences and write for scholarly journals about copyright issues (of great interest to academics these days)--all this helps me to preserve some of that sense of relative freedom that is one of the great things about the academic life.
 
My wife, who is an artist, is amazingly understanding of the time I sometimes have to spend at the law office--sometimes it's a strain, of course.  On the other hand, the fact that we were able to move to the Bay Area--something we probably could not have done easily when I was a professor--has been very gratifying to her as an artist.  Other things that weigh in the balance include the typically superior health benefits, family leave policies, and other "intangibles" that are provided by many private law firms.
 
Also, the "2000 hour" requirement is not a fixture at every law firm.  This depends greatly on the size of the firm and its geographic location, among other things.  I have worked at a large firm in New York (450 attorneys), a smallish firm in Tulsa, Oklahoma (50 attorneys), and currently at a moderate-sized firm in San Francisco (120 attorneys).  Every firm has a different culture with different expectations.  Law students typically have the opportunity to investigate carefully before choosing a firm they would like to be at. 

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Close of discussion

CHAMBERS:  Well, it's Friday, so it's time to close the discussion and thank our four speakers.  I must say, this was a particularly interesting discussion.  Speakers, subscribers, everybody did a super job of asking great questions and giving great answers.  On behalf of the entire subscribership, I would like to thank to our four wonderful speakers, Bob, Jill, Will and Ginny.  They shared generously of their time, knowledge and experience.  Thanks as well to those of you who asked questions.  Way to go, everyone!

It is not certain when the next Guest Speaker Discussion will take place, but I will let you know as soon as things gel.  Until then, go ahead to use the list to discuss nonacademic careers.  Kudos to all subscribers for making WRK4US such a great community.