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If you mean that I am prioritizing my young children over this job then yes, I agree.
If you hire a lawyer and pay him tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars to help you in often very important and stressful issues, would you want him to prioritize his children over his job? When you're at work, leave your home life behind or better yet, don't work.
Many want to work hard but they don't want to do work for their job all the time. They want to work hard for their job while they're at work, and put in effort for their friends and family outside of work.
Young people these days don’t want lawyers to be #1 in substance abuse and suicide.
If you can't handle the stress of your job, maybe get a different job.
Many senior partners worked before there were email and cell phones and therefore literally were incapable of being bothered on vacation, so they can eat rocks. We’ll never have that.
Exactly, and before these were portable people slept in the office. I started ten years ago and a friend was at a firm where first years were not allowed cell phones. He was forever running back to the office after dinner to check. Not something to wish for.
In my experience - and of course this is a generalization - those under 30 don't have the same work ethic, or commitment to the grind. And to be clear: I wouldn't have an issue with it, if not for the fact that they've chosen to enter a field that's known for long hours and a stressful environment, but then they think it should adapt to them instead of the other way around.
I also think "mental health" is an extremely over-used excuse nowadays, but I guess that's a topic for a different post.
That's the truth!
Are these the same people who yell at kids to get off their lawns?
Chief
Its not about working endless hours. Its about wanting to get paid ridiculous sums of money without having any skills. Sticking around for minimal amount of time without learning anything then jumping to the next job and expecting more ridiculous amounts of money. New attorneys just want to get rich without wanting to put in any effort to becoming good at practicing law. They think a law degree entitles them to earn a fortune. Doing well in law school doesnt automatically mean you will make a great lawyer. Once you graduate and pass the bar, thats when yhe real work starts and I think most new attorneys think thats just when party starts.
A5, actually, there are plenty of individuals out there that care deeply if you’re good at practicing law. But part of the problem is that for many lawyers (new grads and veteran attorneys), the “individuals” we tend to focus on are those we believe to be in highly profitable corporations, in elite universities, or with deep pockets that can help us advance professionally and financially.
Yet, many of the individuals that really care about how good you are in law do not check any of the aforementioned boxes (or qualifications). These individuals have low income or barely making it - yet have legal issues that are beyond their comprehension and/or competence to handle. They are coming into our courts pro se, trying to maneuver the legal system on their own. It’s painful to watch. Imagine if you took some time to help them with their cases! It’s something I do on a regular basis. Try it and watch what it does to your self value! I still say that obtaining a dismissal with prejudice for a client thrown into litigation through no fault of their own - is pure joy!
Mostly accurate. I wish there were more ways to make things more livable. But you combine not wanting to work on short notice, or late, or early, or too much, with wanting to be off completely on vacation (meaning you have to pick up slack for people when they are gone), and being able to go to yoga, and being able to not work if a pet is sick, with wanting to also not have too many people so there is a path to making hours, and want a nice, easy 45 billable hours every week exactly on your desired timeframe … and it just doesn’t work. Even if people are more willing to not make hours or get a bonus, then you get into firms needing to be profitable to keep the big rainmakers, and the big rainmakers want you to keep their clients happy. They go due to lack of profitability or you not jumping to make their clients happy and then the firm gets less prestigious and makes less money, and associates don’t like that either, not to mention it being more important substantively.
So the bottom line is that some people, at least, have to work really hard at least some of the time, and usually more than that, for this whole thing to work.
I’m in my 30’s but when my oldest turned 1 I had a realization that I didn’t want the life that the partners I worked for had. They were almost all divorced and miserable with no life outside of work. They either took zero vacation or worked during it. They were always in the office and when I asked to leave “early” to see my kids before bed they told me I could leave at 6:30 if possible.
I was an M&A midlevel and worked 8am to 7pm in the office most days, then commuted an hour home, put my kids to bed (if I made it in time), watched a single episode of TV while eating dinner with my wife, and then logged back in to bill until midnight. Regularly had calls after 10pm with partners, especially during signings/closings and fire drills. Once had to hop into the passenger seat to get on my laptop at 9pm while on a double date seeing drive through Christmas lights and missed all of them.
Went in house the week after my kids’ 1st birthday and actually conceived my 3rd child that weekend. Now I work barely 9-5. Have over a month of time off a year. No evenings or weekends. Make about $300k. WFH 3 days per week. Love my job. See my wife and kids so much. Never going back to a firm.
Believe it or not, I had two 1 year olds! Then a 3rd.
Absolutely. And then they turn around and try to sell houses they bought in 1970 for $100k (in today’s dollars) to those “lazy” young people for 1.5 million, who of course can’t afford it because of their poor work ethic and coffee habits.
Pro
The people who are senior partners now were likely among the hardest working junior associates in their day. There’s a lot of survivor bias here.
I also get the sense that “working” in the pre-e-mail/early email days involved a lot more time that couldn’t be billed today. The tasks we’re doing require more cognitive effort on the whole.
I had a partner tell me that we are soft because we get upset at being berated whereas he had books thrown at him by angry partners when he was an associate. So, apparently, we’re supposed to take any treatment these days as long as we’re not being physically assaulted in the workplace.
To answer your question: No, we’re not slacking or working less hard. We just have the gall to have (very minor) boundaries. The bar is in hell.
The book throwing may be very true. I once saw a partner throw a book at an associate.
You mean the Americanus Boomerus is not the most hardworking species to have ever graced this earth? It’s all been a lie?!
Not an attorney but I see a great deal of people who don’t want to work.
Every generation says this. It's nothing new. "Kids these days don't work hard and don't respect their elders."
P2, re: the bar - that’s concerning. As it is, I believe that many attorneys graduating from law school these days are ill prepared for the real world of legal practice. Don’t get me wrong! Taking the bar was not my joy, but if the state is now going to hand out licenses like candy, I believe that law practice will be less appreciated by the attorneys and public at large.
Who wants to work hard?
Anyway, I’m not young but what I’ve learners over the years is that you should be working smarter, not harder.
I’ve also seen loyal people laid off without a second thought from law firms and partners treat associates like they’re completely disposable. The majority of attorneys are also not in biglaw and are paid garbage wages for terrible hours too. It’s not worth killing yourself for a firm that will fire you the second hours drop and who probably isn’t paying you all that well for 24/7 availability anyway.
I don’t mind working but I have no desire to be a partner and am going in-house soon.
Can’t wait!
I see it as being less about working “hard” in a generic sense, and more about keeping up with your teams / not letting others pick up your slack. I see a significant number of people who are comfortable setting all kinds of boundaries to make sure their life priorities don’t suffer, with no apparent regard to the burden that that puts on others on their teams. Whether or not that’s indicative of a generational trend, I leave to others to determine, but it’s a behavior that I find unacceptable.
This! We had a first year that almost took comfort in knowing things would get done no matter what (because folks more senior, with more skin in the game, wouldn’t drop the ball)
I think part of the problem is that some have a different definition of working hard. Your generation matters. How you were raised and the expectations you had in the 1990’s and early to mid- 2000’s regarding legal work matters.
Today, with AI technology and other legal tech tools available at your fingertips to assist in making your workload lighter, some people don’t understand that working hard may include more human effort. So for example, if a client wants to ask questions about their case, I, as the attorney take the time speak with the client personally versus letting AI or an automated system answer their questions.
@A7 No I am not. If I was I’d expect to have the finances to outsource a lot more. Admittedly my schedule is much easier than big law so I’m not complaining; I know I would never want that big law life. But law can be demanding regardless of where you practice. I have those long days but not nearly as often as a big law person would for sure.
When young attorneys complain about coming into the office to work, I question their commitment.
Oh no a person does not want to waste multiple hours a day commuting to come into person for a job that could be done even more effectively and entirely virtually, however will they ever succeed without all this wasted time that they must spend being near me or I will judge them so harshly. I must make sure every letter is also delivered by a pigeon carrier and e-mails are banned because they show a lack of physical commitment