News from BCG Attorney Search

Spring 2008

BCG RECRUITER SPOTLIGHTS

Focus on the Midwest: Jamie Bailey

Q. Can you provide a quick overview of your recruiting practice?

A. I established BCG Attorney Search's Chicago office in 2001 and am the managing director of the Chicago office and the Midwest region, which includes Illinois, Minnesota, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Colorado. I handle associate and partner placements in top law firms throughout the Midwest region. In addition, I regularly make presentations at law firms and law schools.

Q. What did you do prior to becoming a legal recruiter at BCG Attorney Search?

A. Prior to becoming a legal recruiter at BCG, I worked for 20 years at a large Chicago law firm, Hopkins & Sutter (now Foley & Lardner), my last position being director of recruiting.

Q. Why did you become a legal recruiter?

A. I started my career as a legal recruiter in a large law firm, recruiting new associates and lateral attorneys. I very much enjoyed recruiting new associates and laterals and helping them through the hiring process because I felt that I was making a positive impact on their legal careers. I still maintain a number of the relationships that I established with the attorneys I recruited at the law firm. I made the transition to BCG Attorney Search because I believed that I would be able to continue to help attorneys fulfill their long-term career objectives.

Q. Why did you choose BCG Attorney Search?

A. I chose BCG Attorney Search because of its core values and the standard of representation it demands of its recruiters.

Q. What makes your style of recruiting unique?

A. I would describe myself as passionate about what I do and my candidates and tenacious and creative in my representation. I spend a lot of time interviewing my candidates so that I am sure I understand their objectives, the specific skills and qualifications that they will bring to a prospective firm, and the things that will distinguish them from other candidates with whom they may be competing for a position. By spending this time at the beginning of the search process, I believe I am able to provide candidates a broader range of opportunities and ultimately make the right fit. I am conscientious and concerned about my candidates' happiness for the long term and take very seriously the fact that I am impacting a very important aspect of my candidates' lives — their careers.

Q. What advice would you give attorneys who are thinking about using a legal recruiter?

A. Using a highly qualified legal recruiter brings added value to the search process. I would advise anyone considering using a legal recruiter to make sure they ask themselves the following questions regarding a recruiter with whom they are thinking of working to ensure they engage the best recruiter:

Is this recruiter's approach to the process ethical and professional?
Does this recruiter have the jobs and knowledge about the marketplace?
Does this recruiter have the relationships and connections to get me in the door at top-tier law firms?
Do law firms work with and think highly of this recruiter?
Does this recruiter listen? Does this recruiter have my best interest in mind or his or her own self-interest? Does this recruiter really care about what I am attempting to do with my career?
What is this recruiter going to add to the process? How does this person plan to represent me? What will he or she be providing to legal employers on my behalf?
What other resources will this recruiter provide me (e.g., articles, interview preparation, etc.)?

Q. Okay, let's get to know you a bit more on a personal level. What's your favorite T.V. show?

A. Life.

Q. Where did you grow up, and where do you live now?

A. I was born in Kentucky but grew up in the suburbs of Chicago. I now live in the River North neighborhood in downtown Chicago.

Q. What are your favorite drinks?

A. Green tea.

Q. What are your favorite foods?

A. Dark chocolate-covered nuts, Honeybell oranges, butternut squash ravioli, funnel cakes.

Q. What is playing on your iPod right now?

A. U2, U2, and U2.

Q. What is something your clients would not know about you?

A. That I can still shoot a basketball and make 3s and that I've completed three marathons.

Q. Anything else interesting going on in your life?

A. I'm renovating my loft, planning another hiking trip to Jackson Hole, and still trying to figure out a way to get to Everest Base Camp.

Focus on the Midwest: Laura Rusche, Esq.

Q. Can you provide a quick overview of your recruiting practice?

A. I represent partners, associates and counsel-level attorneys to international, national, regional and boutique law firms across the Midwest, including law firms in Chicago, Michigan, Minneapolis, Ohio, Wisconsin, Colorado and Utah. I focus on finding the best possible match for both the law firm and candidate. As part of this goal, I try to obtain a thorough understanding of each candidate's desires and goals, both personal and professional, in order to find the best fit for the candidate. As the same time, I make great efforts to build and maintain strong relationships with the law firms and to understand each of the firm's practice areas, so that I can provide the firms with the best possible candidates to meet their needs.

Q: Can you tell us a bit about your formal education and background prior to (becoming an attorney)?

A: While I grew up in the Chicago area, I left the Midwest for New Hampshire to attend college at the University of New Hampshire, where I studied psychology and graduated in 1995. After returning to Chicago and working for a year with children and teenage wards of the state of Illinois, I returned to school at the University of Chicago, where I studied social work and obtained a Master's Degree in Social Work in 1998. While studying social work, I quickly realized that many of the clients with whom I worked had significant legal problems in addition to other life struggles, many of which, if solved would improve the quality of the client's life. It was for this reason that after graduating from the University of Chicago, I started law school at Loyola University Chicago School of Law. While in law school, I was a member of the law review and served as the Journal's Executive Editor of Student Articles before graduating cum laude in 2001.

Q: Where did you practice law after graduating from law school?(or what did you do prior to becoming a legal recruiter)

A: After graduating from law school, I joined the law firm of Gardner Carton & Douglas in Chicago (now known as Drinker Biddle Gardner Carton) where I focused on general commercial litigation. After two and a half years at Gardner, I moved to Neal Gerber & Eisenberg, where I continued to focus on litigation.

Q: Why did you become a legal recruiter?

A: While I enjoyed litigating for large, corporate clients, I longed for the one-on-one relationships that I had been exposed to as a social worker, and I wanted to join a profession where I could help individuals with some of the their most basic needs, like finding a job. I had always been attracted to legal recruiting because it would allow be to use both my social work and legal degrees to assist individuals with finding the best job for their skills and desires.

Q: Why did you choose BCG Attorney Search?

A: Once I decided to become a legal recruiter, I researched various legal recruiting firms across the country, and out of the many successful companies out there, BCG stuck out the most for its Core Value of providing attorneys the best representation and knowledge of firms while at the same time providing law firm clients the highest quality candidates. I was also impressed with the company's knowledge of the recruiting industry, the quality of their recruiters, and the comprehensive service the recruiters provide to both their candidates and law firm clients.

Q: What makes your style of recruiting unique?

A: While not necessarily unique, I focus on getting to know each candidate on both a personal and professional level so that I can best represent them. I believe that without the development of this relationship, legal recruiters run the high risk of placing candidates into law firms that do not meet the objectives of the candidate, and the likelihood of long-term fit between the law firm and candidate plummets. As a legal recruiter, I do not view a placement as successful if the attorney is not content to remain at the firm long term.

Q: What advice would you give attorneys who are thinking about using a legal recruiter?

A: Interview a number of different legal recruiters and go with the one with which you feel the most comfortable. A candidate must be able to be brutally honest and not afraid to express his or her opinion, so finding the person with whom he or she can best communicate is vital to the process. I also suggest that when interviewing legal recruiters, find out the extent of the legal recruiter's relationships with various law firms and the type of written work product the legal recruiter plans to submit to the various law firms. Comprehensive cover letters and well-written resumes are vital to a good submission.

Q: Ok, let's get to know you a bit more on a personal level. What's your favorite T.V. show?

A: The Office. No other show captures the humor of the corporate work atmosphere as accurately as that show.

Q: Where did you grow up and where do you live now?

A:. I grew up in a suburb outside Chicago, and I now live on the Northside of the City with my husband and two toddler boys.

Q: What are your favorite drinks?

A: There is nothing better than a cold Bud Light on a warm day.

Q: What are your favorite foods?

A: Chocolate, sushi and pizza, but most certainly not together.

Q: What is playing on your iPod right now?

A: U2, Pink Floyd and Coldplay.

Q: What is the one thing your clients would not know about you?

A: I spent the first 20 years of my life devoted to being a gymnast, and because I was born with no fear, I could do some pretty insane tricks. Unfortunately, now that I am an adult, the fear has caught up with me, and I prefer to keep both feet firmly planted on the ground.

Q: Anything else interesting going on in your life?

A: While it may not be all that interesting to others, since becoming a legal recruiter, I have, for the first time, experienced what its like to absolutely love one's career. I have no work dread on Sunday nights, and I look forward to going to work every day. It really doesn't get much better than this.

STATE OF THE MARKET REPORT,
By The BCG Recruiting Staff
A flurry of recent hiring activity�particularly a national need for real estate attorneys and the upswing in corporate work�has our recruiters excited about the changes that the legal market is currently experiencing. Learn which practice areas are hot and which are not as our recruiters across the nation report on the employment outlook in their areas.

Read more.

A View from the Other Side: My Life as an In-House Attorney
By Gloria Cannon, Esq.

Are you overworked? Tired of stressing about your billable requirements? Dissatisfied with the level of responsibility you are given or the quality of your deals? Miss having a life outside of the law firm? Not confident in the ability to make partner at your law firm? Been daydreaming lately about finding the perfect in-house position?