Federal Government, Job Searches, Layoffs, Notes from the Breadline

Notes from the Breadline: Workingman's Blues

onJuly 15, 2009 at 11:42 AM

Ed. note: Welcome to the latest installment of “Notes from the Breadline,” a column by a laid-off lawyer in New York. Prior columns are collected here. You can reach Roxana St. Thomas by email (at roxanastthomas@gmail.com), follow her on Twitter, or find her on Facebook.
Searching for a job is often described as a marathon. “It’s not a sprint,” people will tell you knowingly, often adding that it “might take a few months.” When my own job search began, I heard this pearl of wisdom from countless recruiters, all of whom encouraged me to “be patient.” “Don’t worry,” they told me. “Something will come up.”
Several months on, I have determined that the marathon analogy may be a bit of an understatement. Sure: Giovanna found a job in short order, but for many of us, looking for work is more like an Iron Man, the Iditarod, a long ocean voyage, or a marathon followed by an extended push to the summit of a high peak. Carrying a heavy pack. I can imagine the captain’s log for such a journey. “Day 180,” it would read. “Morale is low. Rations are scarce. The cats are restless; I fear that a mutiny is not far off.”
Not long ago, I stopped by Lat’s office for a chat about this dismal state of affairs. “This isn’t getting any easier,” I said. “Does anyone find a job these days?”
“Think of it as a marathon, Roxana,” Lat said, stroking his chin wisely. He offered me a cup of coffee, which flows from a garden-sized fountain topped with a naked, burbling Cupid standing on one foot, in his office. Then he paused to consider my question. A moment later, it became clear to me that he could not think of anyone who had, in fact, found a job. “I get the picture,” I said glumly.
But a few days later, Lat delivered some encouraging news: he knew someone who had found a job. “It took a while,” he said of his acquaintance, “but he did it.” In fact, Lat explained, it had taken the acquaintance a remarkably long time to find work. Even more remarkable, however, was how long the man’s job search had taken, despite his impeccable credentials and extensive network of well-connected lawyers.
I decided to talk to the lucky fellow about his experience in – and getting out of – the breadline. Perhaps, I thought, he could inspire us, provide some insight, or (at the very least) make us feel better about our collective inability to find gainful employment. A few days later, I reached out to our new friend, who I’ll call “Max.” (He asked that his real name not be used.)
Read about Max’s job search, after the jump.

Max — who is now partner in the Washington, D.C. office of a national firm — told me that, notwithstanding ubiquitous indicia of economic doom, he was surprised to find himself in the breadline for several months earlier this year. Why, I wondered aloud, did prolonged unemployment catch him unprepared? Ostensibly, he seemed no different than countless other attorneys who have moved, suddenly and seamlessly, from secure jobs to the abyss of career uncertainty: he went to an exclusive private high school, attended an excellent college, and graduated from a top tier law school. For eight years, he worked at well-regarded law firms in the South, where he enjoyed a comfortable level of success. In the past, a pedigree like Max’s might have provided a modicum of job security. But, given the state of our profession, was his joblessness really so surprising?
Well, Max told me, he had been under the impression that he had an ace in the hole. For the last three years of the Bush administration, he explained, he had occupied a high-level position in a federal agency. He was at the top of his field, and had accumulated a level of expertise that few people could claim. “I just never thought it would be so hard,” he told me. “I was intimately familiar with a really significant body of law, in a hot practice area. I had been a decision-maker; I had drafted regulations. I thought that would count for more.” Instead, Max encountered one closed door after another. But that wasn’t the worst of it.
Our conversation about Max’s job search went something like this.
Max: First of all, for what it’s worth, the thing that struck me even more than the dearth of opportunity was the absolute lack of professionalism by the folks involved in the process. I had a headhunter, who came highly recommended, go completely AWOL after we discussed the firms to which he should send my info. Multiple firms simply failed to return my calls and e-mails — even after face-to-face meetings. Here I was, a high-level official from a federal agency, looking for employment in one of the only practice areas that was largely unaffected by the economy. I was talking to practice group heads at major national law firms, and I couldn’t get them to update me on the status of our discussions. I can’t imagine what other people must be going through.
Roxana St. Thomas: How did your job search begin?
Max: Well, I started looking in January. At first, I tried to cast a wide net – hitting up everyone I knew in the D.C. area who I could contact through my law school alumni network, reaching out to friends and colleagues, and working with a headhunter. But, as I mentioned, the headhunter was horrendous. I don’t know how else to describe it. After our initial conversation, when we talked about firms to which I should submit, I basically never heard from him again. I kept trying to follow up, with no success.
RST: What else did you do? Give me some examples.
Max: Oh, everything. I worked alumni contacts. I reached out through a listserv for lawyers that my high school maintains. I used Indeed.com. I went through my Chambers guide and picked out firms that had the kind of practice group I was looking for. But it was really disheartening. Sometimes, I would send emails to contacts at various firms, and the next day I’d see an article about how the same firms were laying off fifty people.
RST: What came of all the emails and calls?
Max: Usually, nothing came of it. I started discussions with a few firms, but for the most part, there was a complete, overwhelming lack of responsiveness from everyone involved. When you’re out of work, you spend the entire day checking email and looking for some glimmer of information about what’s going on. But even after I started meeting with people – and I’m talking about significant people and high-level meetings – I would often get five emails deep before anyone would return my calls. I guess it doesn’t sound like a lot, but I was shocked by the silence.
RST: Did you tell everyone you knew that you were looking for work?
Max: Initially, I reached out to specific people and contacts, but I didn’t announce it to everyone.
RST: Why not?
Max: It was something I was reluctant to do, probably because there was some level of shame about the whole situation. I’ve never been unemployed before, and I guess I thought of unemployment as something that you don’t share with other people. I think that, at first, there’s a transition period, during which you believe that it’s temporary. But then, when it drags on, you have to convince yourself that you’re still unemployed because of the economy. It took me a long time to get to the point where I could appreciate that it wasn’t my fault.
RST: How long did it take?
Max: It was a good month and half before I got to that point, and then I sent out a blast email announcing that I was looking.
RST: Was it liberating to finally send that email?
Max: Definitely; it was very freeing. At first, you don’t want people to know that you’re having trouble; you don’t want them to judge you. But what I’ve come to realize is that people want to help. After you send out a mass email in which you lay out your situation, it’s easier to start the conversation about your job search.
RST: What were those conversations like?
Max: A lot of times, they were totally off the wall. For example, I know someone who has a close friend who is in human resources at one of the big firms. I ended up talking to the HR person, but it was clear that there was nothing there, and nothing she could do for me. But you never know; sometimes people who can’t really help you know about another opportunity, or they can direct you to someone else.
RST: It sounds like your feelings about full disclosure changed pretty radically.
Max: Oh, absolutely. I think it’s really important to be open about the fact that you’re looking. I also think that you need to keep reminding the people you know that you’re on the market. [Max laughs.] Actually, I ended up using Facebook status updates to do that. I believe that most people want to help you, but that they don’t know how unless you tell them.
RST: Were you able to do that? I’m not sure I would be able to explain how someone could help me find a job.
Max: Well, for example, you can use Facebook to ask a large number of people whether they know anyone at a particular firm. But you’d also be surprised by how many people have good ideas that they would never think to mention but for your reminder. Someone might have a helpful suggestion about networking, or they might tell you about a resource, like the ACC [Association of Corporate Counsel] website, which has job listings.
RST: What else did you do to remind people that you were looking for work?
Max: I sent a lot of follow-up emails, but I studiously avoided follow-ups that reflected a chain of unanswered prior messages. Instead, I’d try to find a ‘hook’ of some kind – an article, a recent decision or development, something I could mention in a note. I think it’s important to be really “up” about the fact that you’re unemployed; you want to stay in people’s minds, but you need to find a way to do that, and to convey that you’re still looking, without bringing them down. You have to look for something that might be of interest to them; find a way to connect that isn’t focused on the fact that you haven’t heard from them (if that’s the case), and which conveys something of value — not just that you’re still unemployed.
RST: So, what kinds of jobs did you apply for in the course of your search?
Max: I applied for every kind of job you can imagine: in-house jobs, jobs from Indeed.com, jobs at big firms, small firms, boutiques, in general practice, in government relations … at one point, my wife and I even talked about “checking out,” finding someplace near a beach, working wherever we could, and living a different life. When you leave government, there’s an expectation that you’ll go to Big Law, but we weren’t wedded to that idea.
RST: Did you think about moving? I hear it’s a great option.
Max: I applied for jobs all over the country – Dallas, Chicago, Atlanta, New York, Nashville, to name a few places. The job market is bleak no matter where you go.
RST: What was your financial situation like? Were you prepared to be out of work for a while?
Max: It was pretty brutal. I did not expect to be out of work for more than six weeks; it simply never occurred to me that it would take as long as it did. And the firms I was talking to basically confirmed my incorrect view of things; they told me that they would have a decision in two to three weeks. When I accepted the position I have now, four or five months into my search, those firms still hadn’t reached a decision.
RST: Did you go on a lot of interviews?
Max: Not really. Maybe ten or eleven over four months, and some of those were callbacks.
RST: What were they like?
Max: I had good interviews, and I remember being very excited because I thought they had gone well. Everyplace I interviewed wanted to “stay in touch,” but at the end of the day they couldn’t predict well enough what their finances would be like, so things stalled. It was a sobering look at the economic condition of big law firms. On one hand, firms are very reluctant to bring in a partner who doesn’t have a book of business. On the other hand, I had a great background and, for lack of a better description, a significant Rolodex. The amazing thing was that, if you broke down the compensation I was looking for in terms of the maximum exposure to each partner, it was a pretty miniscule amount of money – maybe $1,500 apiece. Hypothetically, how risk averse does a firm have to be in order to stop taking risks altogether? But that was the level of fiscal discipline I saw everywhere.
RST: So, how did you get the job you have now?
Max: My “in,” so to speak, was someone who had worked at the same federal agency. That connection facilitated my conversations with the firm I ended up joining.
RST: Tell me about the emotional trajectory of your job search. What was that like?
Max: The whole process was infuriating. I remember thinking, “I sent you four emails. You can’t respond to any of them?” It was pretty horrible. But, you know, I had a lot of time to think, and what I finally realized is that lawyers are inherently wussies. Sometimes they have no news because no one has made a decision, but no one wants to tell you. When I formally withdrew from consideration at some of these firms, they told me that they were still “hoping that something would break.” How would I have known that? Since no one had bothered to respond to my repeated inquiries, I had assumed we were done. They don’t want to talk to you, though, because they’re afraid you’re going to force them to say yes or no … and they just don’t know.
RST: Were you ever afraid that, if you kept pushing, you would force them to say no because they weren’t able to say yes?
Max: Yes. You can’t help but wonder how many times you can email someone before they say no just to get you to stop. And what can you do? I would rather have no answer than have them answer no just because they need more time.
RST: How often did you check your e-mail?
Max: Hard to say, but probably once every 5-10 minutes when I wasn’t out and about. After being BlackBerry free for about a month (if that), I broke down and bought an iPhone because I couldn’t stand being unplugged from my e-mail.
RST: What else did you do during the time you were searching for work? Did it feel as though you could enjoy things you might otherwise not have time for, or was it too stressful to feel like “time off”?
Max: I have a four-year-old daughter and an 8-month-old son. I got to spend more time with them than ever would have been possible had I been working, and it was great to have that bonding time. We took the kids to Disneyland – BlackBerry-free! I played more golf than I ever have before. I worked out constantly — sometimes twice a day. It was great, but the uncertainty of what the future held made it stressful. Even when you are “sure” that you have done everything you can to find a job, your mind convinces you that you should be doing more. Particularly when you are about to tee off.
RST: Overall, was your experience humbling?
Max: Maybe a little bit humbling. In the months leading up to the end of the Administration, I can’t even remember how many people told me to call them when I was done, that I would be “set” once I got back in the private sector, that I would be fighting off the suitors for my talent (and credentials). I guess a little part of me believed that, and the layoff certainly brought me back down to earth.
RST: Do you think it changed your perspective?
Max: I’ve always been a hard worker, so I’m not sure that my perspective has changed in that regard, but I’m certainly more convinced than ever that hard work is necessary to succeed. To the extent that the experience “changed” anything, I would say that it made me more aware of the fact that, despite how much I might have going on, the questions or issues that other people bring to my attention might very well be the most important thing on their plate. Understanding this fact is helpful, particularly when the issue in question is not remotely the most important thing on my plate. I guess what I’m saying is: when I called or e-mailed about the status of my employment discussions, there was nothing more important in my life. The folks I was contacting had class actions, trials, depositions, etc. going on, so my call/e-mail was not necessarily significant to them. It would have been nice to get an acknowledgement that my request was important to me. I know that I will never ignore another job inquiry again.
RST: How did you keep your spirits up during the search?
Max: It’s hard not to keep your spirits up when you are spending basically every waking hour with your awesome kids … and they are awesome.
RST: Finally, how do you like your new job?
Max: I love it. The people are great, and it’s a perfect fit.
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Roxana St. Thomas is a laid-off lawyer living in New York. You can reach her by email (at roxanastthomas@gmail.com), follow her on Twitter, or find her on Facebook.
Earlier: Prior installments of Notes from the Breadline