Reinventing The Law Business: As A Junior Lawyer, Your Attitude Matters A Lot More Than You Think

Managing partner Bruce Stachenfeld tells a tale of two associates.

You got a job and you are starting out. Congratulations. Now what? There are tons of articles on this. So I thought I would throw my hat in this ring and give one point that I think is one of the most important things for a junior lawyer to focus on, and that is attitude. Of course, everyone knows that a positive attitude is a good thing; however, I don’t think it is widely known how incredibly important this is. Let me start by telling a story……

You just graduated Harvard Law School and you start your job, thinking it will be somewhat of a cross between L.A. Law (remember that TV show?) and The Firm (remember that movie?); however, your first project is spending the entire weekend copying six thousand documents and organizing them appropriately for a team of lawyers to provide an expedited review on Monday!

It is hard to imagine a worse assignment than that, isn’t it? However, I bet almost everyone reading this article has a war story of an actually worse assignment. So how do you handle this? Let’s assume that two different people are given the same assignment and see how they handle it, with the only difference being their respective attitudes. The first is a fellow named Toby and the second is another fellow named Tobias. As an aside, I will note that at our firm the name “Toby” is a metaphor we use for a hypothetical person; God help us if we ever hire someone named Toby (and no aspersion on anyone with that name is intended hereby).

The first guy, Toby, is upset about this assignment. He killed himself in law school and did so well, so he could copy documents on a weekend? It is demeaning. He is upset. He grumbles. He agrees to do the job, as he has no real choice, but he is clearly not happy about it. He lets his colleagues know that this job kind of sucks and is not what he thought it would be. He flirts with quitting, but it is too soon for that. He thinks that his next assignment “better” not be this bad or his supervisor hears about this obliquely, through the grapevine, and feels bad about it. The supervisor even apologizes to Toby and says this is not typical of the work at the firm and hopefully Toby won’t mind taking one for the team. Toby is mollified and does the job. It is not fun, but Toby and his team of paralegals toil away through the weekend.

The second lawyer, Tobias, handles the same assignment in a completely different way. Tobias says to himself, “Well, s**t rolls downhill, and I am at the bottom of the hill. I knew I would get some assignments like this. Let’s make the best of it.” Tobias makes clear to his supervisor that he is delighted to have the assignment and will do a great job on it. He asks if he might be permitted to order some really good Chinese food over the weekend for himself and the team of paralegals who will be working on it, since good food makes the work more fun. During the weekend, Tobias arranges for everyone to work together in a giant conference room. He also arranges for music, with each member of the team alternating between picking offbeat songs. And in addition to the Chinese food, Tobias throws a quickie ice cream party at midnight on Saturday night. The assignment certainly “sucks” overall; however, everyone on the job agrees that it was made as positive as it could be and everyone appreciated that effort and, hard to admit, some people on the team actually enjoyed it.

Monday morning rolls around. Both Toby and Tobias have done a perfect job. The documents are all set to go. Both get great reviews from their supervisors for doing such a great job. But what now happens in the future for Toby and Tobias, assuming only good and honorable human nature all around?

Next week another assignment comes in. This one is just as bad as the last one. Sorry – some bad luck here. The supervisors don’t even realize it but they don’t want to call Toby since they are at heart good people and don’t want to take the risk of seriously bumming him out. Maybe he will even quit! So the next assignment goes to Tobias, who actually seems to enjoy it – go figure?

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Over the coming months, more and more work starts going to Tobias. Tobias becomes a little more “experienced” than Toby, because Tobias has done more actual work and has gained the confidence of more of the supervisors. Everyone “wants” Tobias on their deals, because he is such a positive and happy force to have around. It isn’t that people don’t want Toby as well; it is just that they would prefer Tobias since he is so upbeat and positive that they just like having him around.

After a few months, Tobias has “great billable hours,” which is always a major plus in any law firm for an associate. Toby, however, finds that work starts to dry up. At first it is because they are afraid of offending him, but then it is because he is just behind Tobias. Everyone is busy and it is a lot easier to use Tobias, who just gets it done, than Toby, who will need to be brought up to speed.

Also after a few months, Tobias has a great deal more experience and expertise than Toby for the simple reason that he has done a lot more work, since everyone calls Tobias all the time and he always says “yes” eagerly.

Over time, the difference between Toby and Tobias becomes more and more pronounced, until in the end Tobias becomes a successful lawyer, and a partner at the firm, while Toby moves onward to another job.

Okay, this is a metaphor and I am deliberately exaggerating what is going on here — but you get my point, don’t you?

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Your attitude as a junior associate will almost certainly have a dramatic impact on your career for the simple reason that everyone wants a happy can-do fellow around and no one wants a complaining sad-sack around.

So my advice to junior lawyers is very simple:

You cannot control what happens to you every day. Your boss could yell at you. A client could mistreat you. You could be forced to work round the clock on boring assignments. Your office might be hot in the summer and cold in the winter. However, you can control your attitude towards these things. And if you have a positive attitude it is so much more likely that your career will go in a positive direction than if you have a negative attitude.

A positive attitude is very simply looking for the positives and latching onto them. Yes my boss is a jerk, but I am now best friends with three of my peers and we have a ton of fun together! And a negative attitude is the direct opposite; namely, looking for things wrong (and there are always things wrong) and fastening onto them like a leech.

I wish the best of luck to everyone coming out of law school and starting their careers!

P.S. My firm has launched a Tax Controversy Practice Group, which gathers our expertise in Tax, Litigation, Non-Profit and Real Estate to handle very difficult tax-related disputes. Some of the top lawyers in our firm are spearheading this group. For additional information on the practice, please click here.


Bruce Stachenfeld is the managing partner of Duval & Stachenfeld LLP, which is an approximately 70-lawyer law firm based in midtown Manhattan. The firm is known as “The Pure Play in Real Estate Law” because all of its practice areas are focused around real estate. With over 50 full-time real estate lawyers, the firm is one of the largest real estate law practices in New York City. You can contact Bruce by email at thehedgehoglawyer@gmail.com.