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How senior are you? In my experience, this is incredibly common and your thinking is consistent with the impostor syndrome most of us feel at some point or another. Law school doesn’t teach us to be super human. We all make mistakes. Try to figure out the reasons you’re making mistakes. Is it that you’re over worked? Are you procrastinating and then needing to rush? Are you simply burned out? That will help you decide what might help.
DGC1, I’m 6 YOE but recently changed industries. Used to have a more organized legal department (contract manager + paralegal) whereas now it is just me. To answer the root of the problem question: maybe a bit of everything?!
People may disagree but here my take: your job is to identify and mitigate risk for the business while helping the business achieve its goals. Sometimes workload and deadlines won’t allow for perfect work product. No one in the business cares about perfect work product. They care that you’re trustworthy, competent and quick. As long as you’re not missing key issues then you’re probably fine
The one thing I’ve learned in my 6 years is that everything takes longer then you think when you’re aiming for perfection. Even simple FYI emails suddenly take .3 when you’re at this level. And it’s a good thing! It’s better to be a little late and have good product. That said, the expectation is that you’ll sacrifice sleep time to get that extra proof reading done.
And if you are going to miss a deadline because you need time to review your work, make it a question to the senior: should I give this more time or just send as is? Sometimes the deadline is arbitrary and there’s room for another night of fixing.
The only thing not excusable is not proof reading bc you’re feeling lazy. Unless you’re on a super cost conscious client, they pay us big bucks to be careful, think things through, and otherwise avoid making mistakes
I love the outside attorneys that spend hours marking up my contract to show they know perfection (when most of the proposed changes have no legal significance). When in-house, you don’t the time or incentive to be perfect.
Yep! Too much work… not enough people…. too much work… AND demand to push it out yesterday.
it’s the system, not you. don’t question your “fit”.
The time crunch is really a killer 😭