Welcome To Fishbowl: The Popular App Where Lawyers Are Discussing The Industry Openly And Anonymously

Social is perhaps the last word anyone would use to describe the past year. While a work-from-home world might have done wonders for your dry cleaning bills, it eliminated most of the friendship and networking aspects of doing our jobs – which, for many, were the parts they enjoyed the most.

Fishbowl is here to fill that void. Fishbowl is the professional social network tailored to attorneys that allows you to safely connect with like-minded legal professionals and anonymously ask your peers questions about the things that are most important to you and your professional goals. It’s about having candid and honest conversations with colleagues and coworkers, even if you’re not physically in the same place. Already 40% of Biglaw attorneys from firms like Skadden, Kirkland & Ellis, Latham & Watkins, and Baker McKenzie are connecting on the app, with more small and solo firm attorneys joining the conversation every day.

Some have called it LinkedIn meets Glassdoor. Others have called it Reddit for professionals. Whatever you call it, though, it’s a different kind of social media than you’ve ever had in your professional life before. It’s also a refreshing change from other platforms that are focused on shameless self-promotion and cluttered with trolls – you can seek out the people you want to chat with and the topics you want to discuss, all while knowing you’re in a safe, professional space.

Discover Your Legal Safe Space

The Fishbowl social network is already being used by more than a million professionals across the world’s biggest companies and industries, and now it’s open to legal professionals. Signing up is free and you just need to verify your professional credentials with either your work email or through LinkedIn.

This also means that you know you’re only interacting with other verified professionals. Once you’re in, you can always choose your level of anonymity when you’re engaging with other Fishbowl users.

Fishbowl operates on channels known as bowls, and they run the gamut from specific practice areas to job networking to social issues. You can join bowls for your specific firm or company, your geographic area, your area of law, such as corporate transactional or litigation, and more.

Beyond the strictly professional groups, there are popular groups for things like Women in Law and Law Exit Opportunities. Want to know if you’re being paid the same salary as your colleagues or if you’re on par with others in terms of billable hours? Fishbowl is the safe place to ask. Want to connect with other women in the legal industry? There’s a bowl for that. Want to discuss your exit plan without anyone in your firm knowing? Fishbowl is the place for you.

The beauty of Fishbowl is that you can choose to be as anonymous as you want to be. You can post under your full name, or limit your post to your verified credentials – for example, associate in New York or attorney at Skadden. The anonymity factor is at least partly the reason Fishbowl has already seen high adoption rates across U.S. lawyers, particularly in Biglaw.

And it’s not just younger attorneys and new associates taking advantage of the platform – equity partners are taking part, too, and approximately 20% of Fishbowl’s legal users are law firm partners. When’s the last time you were able to have a completely candid conversation with a Biglaw partner about quitting your Biglaw job? Probably not any time in recent memory.

That makes Fishbowl a huge, untapped resource – this is your chance to get candid advice from colleagues and even partners at your own firm, anonymously if you so choose. And with the ability to join as many different bowls as you want, the possibilities are endless.

A Social Network Where You Can Get Actual Valuable Advice

The LinkedIn and Glassdoor comparisons are appropriate, but they don’t paint the entire picture of Fishbowl. LinkedIn provides professional connections and a platform for self-promotion, but there’s no real opportunity to have comfortable, candid conversations. And while Glassdoor incorporates the candid aspect, it’s essentially a static review site with no social element.

Fishbowl is the best of both worlds. Identity verification, coupled with the option to post with differing levels of anonymity, allows for truly robust and productive conversations. While there’s a designated channel where employers can post job openings, one of the more popular features is the exit opportunities bowl, where lawyers can network directly with other lawyers about job openings and general career change questions.

This is an invaluable opportunity to engage directly with others in the legal community who you know have been verified and are actually your peers. It’s also a safe place to ask questions that you might not feel comfortable asking on other platforms where your identity would tip your hat to your current employer about your potential career change plans.

Bringing the Social Element Back to Legal Work

Lawyers work hard (often too hard), but work isn’t only about practicing law. For many lawyers, the other people and the social interactions have been what keeps them going every day. Much of that social aspect, however, fell casualty to the pandemic. After a year of WFH, you’re not alone if you’re missing the personal interaction aspect of your job.

Zoom, Teams, and other video conferencing tools have probably taken over your life in the last year. While Zoom has replaced the conference room, Fishbowl is replacing the hallway outside the conference room – the place where you congregated and had friendly conversations that weren’t directly related to your day-to-day work.

Fishbowl lets you focus on the social side of your professional life again, whether that’s seeking job referrals, discussing general entrepreneurship, or even just sharing funny memes to break up your day. No matter what you’re discussing, you know you’re doing it with others who are going through the same thing. You can post in conversations in various bowls or send direct messages to others.

There are opportunities to interact on Fishbowl for every comfort level. From venting and sharing work stories to seeking valuable career advice, Fishbowl is truly one of the few safe places within the legal industry. You get to really connect with others in the field at a time when connection is particularly hard to come by.

In addition to bowls that are more general to the legal community as a whole, Fishbowl has bowls dedicated to specific companies or firms. For example, if you’re an associate at Jones Day, advice from others in the industry might be helpful, but maybe what you really want is advice from other associates and partners at Jones Day. Fishbowl is where you can get that, and you can do so anonymously. You know you’re getting insights from your coworkers who have been verified, but you don’t need to tip your hand by showing your identity. That’s invaluable advice that you won’t get anywhere else.

There are plenty of cross-industry bowls that are useful as well. Some popular ones include discussions on personal investment strategies, MBA applications, depression and anxiety, and even how to stay healthy while working from home.

There are so many things that go into a successful legal career beyond direct client work. Fishbowl is bringing back the ones we lost during the pandemic. Even as we start to return to the office, it will be a long time until the social aspect fully returns, and even then you’ll likely never feel comfortable being this candid within the four walls of your job.

Try it today and you just might find the connection you’ve been missing. There’s a bowl for everyone out there, and there’s no time like the present to find it.