"It seems like reaching out to partners isn't likely to yield much. On the other hand, reaching out to recruiters seems difficult because you're just another applicant in thousands of resumes. And I feel like most recruiters would not be interested in someone trying to chat with them to get an informational interview. What does a successful aggressive job search consist of? I feel so deflating when nothing comes of it."
For the most successful aggressive job search, you should take a look at all of my previous webinars. My advice is honestly that you can stick out with a lot of resumes coming into a firm, but again recruiters are not interested in someone trying to chat with them. Networking is going places and putting yourself in situations where you're likely to meet people that can hire you. That's basically what networking is. The more you network, the better off you're going to be, and that can help you. If you're applying, for example, to a college or a law school, you are just a number. If you're able to get in front of people and get to know them and you are likely to get a job. And, you can do that. That's what people that are driven do, they look for ways to do it. It's the same thing: the partners that end up getting a lot of business figure out a way to be in the location with the people they want as their clients and get meetings with them.
That's what networking is about. The most successful networkers will do that. Now, I realize that not everybody is able to network, and that's something that you may not be able to do. My advice that I try to give to everyone and I've been promoting my whole career. If you don't want to do in-person networking, you don't want to call, you're not putting in all the effort, the only other way to really increase your reach is by applying to as many places as possible. There are firms everywhere.
You can work anywhere you want to work. There are opportunities in Santa Fe, New Mexico, or Taos, New Mexico. There are opportunities in Maui, Hawaii, but you need to apply to as many places as possible and then have good reasons for doing that. That's the biggest clue that I know of. I've been doing this for over 20 years, and I've thought about this 1000 different ways. And I think that networking is a very good way. If you can meet people, then you can break through. I think that works.
I've hired people before that have walked into my office to hand me an application, so they've been interested in working for me. I think that actually can work. The more eager you seem, the more people are willing to take chances on you. The only other suggestion that I would give you is that the more places that you apply to, that's, in my opinion, the most important thing. Because, if you think about it, let's just say you want to work in Aspen, Colorado. And I've actually placed people in Aspen, Colorado. Anybody that's ever spent time in Aspen certainly wouldn't think that there are law firms there, but there are tons of them. And then there are hospitals where you can work. All hospitals have attorneys in them. There are opportunities in every possible place you can work at.
And typically, having a connection there is better. Being from a place, the firm is doing a certain type of work you do. There are so many opportunities out there; it makes me sick. There are tons of opportunities with government offices, with companies that hire people. You just have to be able to find it. And that's what good researchers do. Good researchers research things and make sure that they get the results they want. I'll tell you one quick story.
I worked for an attorney once that was fairly low key and he had never lost a case. He made me research things, these exhaustive, like long memos about nothing, just about the history of a certain rule of state civil procedure or something. I would work on these memos and putting in 80 hour weeks. The thing that always happens is the deeper and the harder you look at something, the more you will find a solution. He would always win cases and wind matters by finding solutions before things ever got to trial because he would research things better than the other people. Your success as an attorney is based on your ability to find opportunities.
The more places you can research and find, the better off you'll do. That was a lesson that stood out to me because this guy had some of the worst clients, but he would always win. When I say worse, I mean people that were accused of doing fairly bad things, whether they were companies or individuals, and he always won. He won because he looked harder at the facts and everything when other people wouldn't. Most people, when they're looking for a job, are just looking at the surface, and they're not looking beneath the surface. They're not looking at enough opportunities, and they're not researching, and they're not getting the word out there enough. Your job is to market yourself. When you're looking for a job, it's a test. What would you expect if you were accused of murder? Would you want the criminal attorney talking to every single person that could possibly help you or just a few of the most obvious people? Or would you want them researching every possible angle that could get you off? Or just the one that seemed the most obvious that everybody else was researching. That's what a good attorney does. Good attorneys will look exhaustively at everything. That's what you need to do. If you want to get a job, you need to look exhaustively at every possible opportunity and question everything. That's what the best people do.