It’s the case at any large law firm or big government legal office, or at least it used to be, that every new associate attorney is paired up with a more experienced senior attorney as part of a formal mentorship program. Mentors are supposed to help their mentees develop their legal skills, conform to firm culture, and, over time, build their own book of business.
Formal mentorship programs look good on paper. In reality, though, they are increasingly failing new lawyers.
I learned this week that my own former law firm mentor, with whom I was first paired back in 2014, passed away. Evidently she suffered from head and neck squamous cell carcinoma. I’m sorry to say that I did not learn of this until it was too late.
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Although we had a lot of good experiences over the years too, we had a bit of a falling out. I felt exploited. I became embittered. Eventually she parted ways with the firm that I continued to work at for several more years, and not amicably. Still, I wish I could have seen her before the end, maybe told her it was all water under the bridge, even if it would have been a white lie.
The thing is, I don’t think my generally negative experience with a formal law firm mentorship program was all that unique. Anecdotally, I don’t think I’ve seen even one instance of a fully thriving formal mentor-mentee relationship at a private law firm.
At least at first, many law firm mentees have to rely on their mentors for work. This gives the mentor massive power over the mentee. Yet, if the mentee fails to meet his or her billable hour requirement by the end of the year, even if it’s because he or she has been left to rot on the vine by the mentor for some perceived deficiency, it’s not like the mentor is going to step in and take the bullet for that.
Perhaps in eras past when people started at one firm and stayed their entire careers there was more incentive to invest in individuals. Now, with the mentor, mentee, or both almost sure to depart at some point for greener pastures, it’s understandably more difficult to commit.
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Today, pretty much the only thing that keeps a mentor focused on the mentee’s best interests is the mentor’s own magnanimity. How many partners at big law firms have you met who are truly unselfish?
Now, I’m sure plenty of partners at big law firms are reading this right now: You don’t have to send me emails extolling your good works. I’m not here to judge. Human nature is what it is. Just don’t try to look at me with a straight face and pretend that you’d sacrifice your year-end bonus to help out an associate randomly assigned to be your mentee six months ago.
Hard data about law firm mentorship programs is not easy to come by. Apparently, a survey from 2019 found that only 29% of Millennial attorney respondents said a formal mentor had played a significant or crucial role in their career (and I’d wager that quite a few within that 29% answered as they did only from having developed a Pavlovian response to any opportunity presented to kiss their mentor’s ass).
One neuroscientist who studies psychopathy found that “lawyer” ranked second only to “CEO” as the career containing the most psychopaths. Perhaps randomly pairing a naive 20-something just out of law school with someone who’s managed to rise high in this field is an inherently dodgy prospect.
Informal mentors are another story. I’ve a collection of informal mentees, who I just call friends, and I still get a call or a text from one of them almost daily. The key there is choice. After a little time, it’s not that hard for most people (MAGA diehards notwithstanding) to figure out whether a person really gives a damn about them.
At the end of the day, I don’t think formal mentor programs at large law firms are reparable, at least absent massive changes in the entire American legal system. If you’re reading about a law firm’s supposedly great mentorship program on their website, I would advise taking that with a huge grain of salt. Set your expectations accordingly.
As for my own former mentor, I hope wherever she is now, she’s at peace. Perhaps at this point it really all is water under the bridge.
Jonathan Wolf is a civil litigator and author of Your Debt-Free JD (affiliate link). He has taught legal writing, written for a wide variety of publications, and made it both his business and his pleasure to be financially and scientifically literate. Any views he expresses are probably pure gold, but are nonetheless solely his own and should not be attributed to any organization with which he is affiliated. He wouldn’t want to share the credit anyway. He can be reached at [email protected].