01.12 - Four Types of Attorneys
[00:00:00] Today's webinar's about the four different types of attorneys inside of law firms. And, this is a traditional thing that, you know, in terms of how people have judged different types of attorneys and the type of people that they're likely to be inside of law firms.
But one of the more important components that I just wanted to bring up about this before we get started, is that in every profession there's things that you should be doing and things that you shouldn't be doing and what that means essentially. That, you're going to be good at doing certain things and not good at doing others.
And so one example that I like to give is if you took a, like a famous rapper or and said that person should instead be a a dentist or a mathematician like that doesn't necessarily make a lot of sense. People should be doing always, should be doing jobs that, that really gravitate towards their skills.
And and so inside of law firms, there's typically going to be different types of skills that [00:01:00] you may have the, you may be good at. And and every employer really can always accommodate those different types of skills and things that you might be good at. So it's very important, no matter what you're doing to be doing the right thing.
And so that's what we're going to be talking about today. I've had a lot of interest in this topic for quite a while. There's we've also made live on BCG and if you're if you use BCG or LA cross sooner in your rest sites, you may have gotten notifications about it. But we started using what are called disc profiles and sending those to candidates and allowing them to fill them out.
And and then giving you reports about your different personality type. And what's important to understand about different personalities is just that you need to do and gravitate towards the work that matches what you are, the type of person you are. And the more you do that, the better off you're going to be typically because you're.
Yeah, everyone is born with natural skills and interests and talents. And so gravitating towards those things [00:02:00] is really one of the smartest things you can do. And and so that's what we'll talk about today. And this presentation is too long, but after this presentation then I'll, of course I'll also take live questions about anything.
You guys want to talk about related to this or anything else. Pretty much when I talked to attorneys all day they always will tell me pretty much the type of attorney they are. So partner, no business will always they always say things like there, aren't a lot of committees for associates and in charge of associate satisfaction.
And I've always said I do well helping associates and partners relate to one another and this sort of person is what's called a binder. A binder is someone that's very good at making sure the firm and various people inside of it, like paralegals, associates and partners and stuff get along cohesively.
And that's an actually a personality type. And you may have been in that personality. You may recognize aspects of that in yourself or another people. I have. My sister for example, it works in a hospital [00:03:00] and she's, what's called a a patient advocate which I guess is a pretty good job.
And and she basically, if patients have complaints and they want to Sue the hospital and they're mad at the doctors or the hospital, she will be an intermediary and make those two sides get along. And she's always been very good at that even more when she was growing up, that type of thing.
And so people that are binders have a certain skill and there's attorneys inside of firms that, that Excel at this. And that's a real skill that people have. They're able to help people get along. And then a partner with business may say something along the lines, that they brought in all this business and originated all this work for different attorneys.
They may talk about, large matters that they're working on and just very proud of that. And and those people are typically known as finders by the way. It's not always the case, but it's often the case that they're actually much more interested in bringing in business than they are actually doing the work or the type of work that's done.
They're more kind of salespeople. But they typically bring. It's not [00:04:00] always that way though, by any stretch of the imagination, but the stereotype is, and so they bring in work and they keep other attorneys busy and then they give other people work to do inside of the firm which is a very important role.
It's important to have obviously people to do that. The finders are typically in most firms aren't the most highly compensated. It's not always the case, but it's quite often the case that the most highly compensated almost always and then associate mono business might say things like, I've been working very hard.
I need a job that's less demanding and I'm in the office all the time. And and these are what are known as grinders, which are the people that do the work. And so the people that do the work, obviously. You can have finders and minders and binders and all these different things, but the people that do the work are very important because that's where most of the profit comes.
And that's what the actual product is. And law firms always are going to need grinders to do the work. And most associates are grinders. A lot of other people are grinders, but service partners are grinders. [00:05:00] Councils are grinders. And the whole front line of the people that are doing the work is very important because you can't have, everybody, doing the other roles and then a managing partner of a law firm will obviously say something like, it's difficult for me to keep up with a man's of committees and, being expected to bill all these hours and bringing all this work.
I'm always doing these administrative tasks and rules and and I don't like that being compensated for my time. And and then they always say, they'd like to concentrate more on other types of things. And this typically person is known as what, as a minder and a minder is the kind of person that creates rules and procedures to make sure that grinders, binders, and finders and other people get along.
If you were to think of how a company works, a company is going to have a marketing department, which would be finders they'll have a COO, which would be a minor. And then they'll have people that are in sales and so forth. So you have different types of people in all organizations and and law firms are the same.
And so [00:06:00] you're typically going to have skills in one of those departments, and you're always, most law firms will find yourself in one of those roles and either enjoying or not enjoying it. So if you don't enjoy being a grinder which most young attorneys are, for example, you have to understand that there's a future in these other personality types that may be more fitting to who you are in the long run, and people will pick up on your skills in those areas.
And. If you're very good at them, we'll put you into those roles. Over the long run. So I've seen lots of grinders reinvent themselves as minders at the same firm because they found that they enjoyed that more and more, and then major law firms you can always transition into a minor role or into one of these other roles.
In other cases I've seeing lots of attorneys leave large law firms and become, and start their own law firms and those law firms maybe more much preneurial oriented and and they want to be finders. A lot of attorneys will leave law firms very early that are finders because they're so interested in that, [00:07:00] but obviously.
The role of a finder is that the traditional transition that you need to make to the partner in a lot of firms. So law firms are very happy with you being a very good grinder and so forth when you're a young attorney, but as you get more senior they're going to often ask you to have business it's at the finders and the firm aren't bringing in enough business, which most of them aren't.
So then you become you're expected to become a finder. And so it's interesting that, when you get out of school, for example, you're expected to be a very good Grindr and learn those skills, but only a certain percentage of grinders are able to be finders. And then but then obviously finders need minders to watch the people that are doing the work.
So there's all these other different roles. I've seen lots of other attorneys leave large law firms where they were either finders or grinders and become, mediators, which is a binder role. So some people are judges, which I guess a judge doesn't necessarily a role, but a mediator definitely is because they enjoy helping people find common ground.[00:08:00]
And and so that's also a role for binders. And so there's all these kinds of roles that you have in the legal profession and inside of law firms and outside of them. And what's going to happen to you in the long run will often be related to the type of person you are and and whether or not you're a finder minder or grinder binder, and and understanding where your skills are is important.
And most people. At a very young age, demonstrate the types of skills and interests that make them one of those things. But the odds are pretty good that you already know instinctively what you're most interested in. If you are someone that wants to be a finder, that probably is very exciting for you.
If you like looking around and seeing work in, that's not being done efficiently. Other people and so forth and how people can do things better. That's probably that type of role is probably very good for you. And if you're someone that just enjoys doing work and wants to be left alone and you very much enjoy [00:09:00] practicing while you're probably more of a, a worker bee, which is great.
And then if you're a binder you probably instinctively want to help people get along and find common ground and so forth. And don't necessarily like a lot of conflict. So there's just these different four different personality types, and the odds are very good. That you're one or the other and whatever type of person you are.
You need to realize that, and really should be basing a lot of your career decisions in the long-term not necessarily on the short-term and developing those because you're never going to be happy, really, if you're not a one in the type of personnel and the type of role that makes you the happiest, and there's nothing wrong with being a grinder, for example, which is which is just enjoying being an attorney attorneys are expected to generate business in a lot of firms.
And if you are in that type of role and you're not happy being a finder, then there's no reason that you should have to do that. If you don't, if you don't if you. I have a minder and you like watching other people do that, helping manage people and so forth. And that's also a good role for you.
[00:10:00] So it's just very important for you to understand what type of person you are and what appeals to you, because, then you're going to be much happier in their long-term career. And and that's just a very good thing most a lot of teachers, and people that teach in law schools are often.
No grinders man, it's just different types of people have different personalities and it's not, you don't need to take a personality test necessarily. No, this, most times people know it instinctively, but it's just important that you have a very good understanding of what type of work that you should be doing.
And and if you know this now rather than later you're just going to have a, it's going to have a very major impact on how happy you are when you start practicing. When, if you're starting to practice law or, in your long-term practice a lot, because a lot of times people are.
Yeah, in one role for a long time, and they're just never happy. And failing to understand your role is very can really create a lot of problems. One thing I often see is it's funny. It's in a lot of major firms, [00:11:00] people may make partner by being a very good grinder for, 10 years.
And I, I remember. Someone that I used to practice law with my partner. I think it like white and case. And and and he was just very good at doing work. That was his thing. And and then after he made partner, they told them, okay now you have two years to go out and find work well that wasn't his skillset.
His skill set was being a grinder. So after not finding work for two years, that he had to go, find a new job and and eventually he found a job where he could just be an attorney, meaning just practice law. And I have to worry about bringing the business. You have to understand how the rules work and there's nothing wrong with not making partner in a law firm because you don't have business.
There's nothing wrong. You just have to find an environment that makes you happy and and different attorneys just have different skill sets and are hired and kept around. And let go because of the firm may have, different demands for them at different points in time. And if you don't bring in business, it doesn't mean you're a failure.
If all you think about is bringing in [00:12:00] business, that doesn't mean you're a failure. If, you want to just watch other people do the work at supervised that's, these are personality types. And and if you don't understand what your role is in the firm or what your skill set that are that, that can often create a lot of problems.
So the law firms made up the first one is the grinder which I talked about already, but I'll just go into a little more detail and they're always hard to do the work. Someone else is bringing in the business and the law firm. Only wants the attorney to do work and nothing else.
They don't expect you to bring them business. They don't expect you to supervise other people doing business. They don't expect you to mediate disputes. They just want you to do work. And and I remember when I was a young attorney, I would go to a partner I was working with at one firm and come up with these ideas for cases and different things and how to get more business out of a client.
And he's listen, you're a soldier. Basically meaning you're your grinder and your job is just to do the work. That's what,[00:13:00] that's what, you need what we need right now. So that, and most attorneys when you're young are being hired just to do work here that's all people care about.
They want you to fill hours. They want you to learn and be trained in the job. And they kept the plea just to expect that. And a lot of times, if you're very good at your job, meaning you do, you're competent you don't matter. You know what you're doing, then you can be a counselor.
Or a non-equity partner. And and especially if you're an expert in some kind of, smaller branch, a law, so there's nothing wrong with being a grinder. You typically will have a very specific skillset and most often with grinders when they get more senior or this is not always the case, but in larger markets, on larger law firms, they're often going to be doing transactional type work as opposed to litigation, but not always.
And if you're trained in very rare transactional skills, which could be, IP real estate finance, different types of corporate skills you can [00:14:00] often get a job as a grinder as well. Litigation again is not that transactional. And it's much harder for older litigators to find work just because of the fact that.
There's just a lot more of them. If you feel like you're a grinder, which is the point of what I'm saying here, meaning you just like doing the work and you're not as interested in going down and getting a lot of business, it's the best role for you often can be doing transactional related work if you're not a litigator.
And and older living older grinders are generally very marketable in smaller markets. There's not a lot of people with those types of skills. And and again, it's just the, as you get older and practicing law and the more you've done it you're often going to be a much better off in a very kind of niche type of job that makes sense with transactional work.
And and when the law firm hires grinders, they typically want them to do a specific type of work and nothing more. It's very common by. If you're a securities attorney there's firms all over the [00:15:00] country, even if you're senior where you could get a job in the Midwest and, Rocky mountain states and, in smaller markets, if you're an IP attorney, it's often the same thing, but it's not the same thing for litigators.
It's just, when you have very niche skills it's much easier as a grinder to keep going in your career in the law firm world, as well as, for the most part. Most attorneys by the way are grinders. There's nothing wrong with that, but it becomes harder to to survive in, in large law firms, if that's your only.
Quality grinders by the way are preferred meaning there's lots of people out there. When you're competing to work in the largest law firms they want to hire the people they think are going to be the best and meaning your law school, your grades the firms are coming from and the prospect you'll like to stay around smart law firms.
Also if you're, if you're very outgoing and have a great personality our cool, and and, in a law firm interviews you, and then they interview [00:16:00] someone that looks more like they're, a very high quality law arm interview, someone that looks more like they're gonna work hard and stuff.
Many times the law firms will prefer the person that looks more like a grinder than, outgoing and potentially like a long-term finder because they want they want people that are very good grinders when they're hiring young attorneys, because they need people to do the work.
They don't want people that want to do other things and are excited. They will want that later, but that's not really what they want out of young attorneys. So just imagine if you were hiring. Just think about, how a law firm sink about binders. If you were hiring football players for your professional football team you could hire players from the best teams with the best stats, or you could hire a players from average, poor teams, but not as good stats.
And if you had a lot of money to spend, you're always going to hire the best players you can. And large law firms are the same way they're going to hire the people from, the best schools and the, the, with the cause they have the most money to spend. And [00:17:00] typically they want them to be young.
Just like the sports team would want their AA, the people that are hiring to be young. And they typically will hire them based on, how much work they have in them. The attorneys worked very hard when they're young. So they'll, it's not uncommon for, attorneys in their twenties and mid thirties to stay all night and work and stuff, but people don't want to do that when they get older and they have houses and children, they just, it doesn't happen.
So law firms want, when they hire attorneys, there is a preference for younger people for these grinder roles in most major cities. And and and one way to think about it is think about how you would, what would you do if you were hiring someone for the Navy seals?
You could hire someone who's young, conditioned who has never seen war and isn't scared and has gone, oh, are you going to hire someone who's worked for the Navy for 10 years and been in multiple jobs and have ups and downs and, as cynical and tired. Not as fit and so forth. And and and soldiers like this, probably seen a lot of people quit and have a lot of [00:18:00] negative feelings about the Navy.
And they probably seen people die and and and they may think they know it all. They're more risk averse. They're not willing to work as hard. They don't think it's worth it. That's typically how law firms think about grinders. They're more willing to hire people with less experience and they want stamina, youth and enthusiasm just because, especially when they're paying you on a salary and it gets not like you're getting paid by the hour.
So they'll, they can get you to work harder. And that's how they think when they hire grinders, they want people that are gonna work very hard. They know that you have a shelf life and again, This is just, it's always been this way. So I'm not, picking on farms or anything, but there's just, there's a shelf life of around six to 10 years, maybe a little bit more or less.
And they know that for the prospect of advancement and getting ahead, everyone's trying to do that when they're young they have limited, you have a limited number of years and and at some point, if you don't get ahead, you're going to lose your time around enthusiasm for hard work and things will change.
So if [00:19:00] you're a grinder they don't expect you to question your role. They want to hire people. They're going to follow orders and without following orders and without thinking you're too good to be a grinder. The second you start doing that then you can typically we'll, the law firm will replace you with people that are good soldiers and will work hard.
If you're. If you're in the army or you're working in the army in any country in the world people are expected to follow orders and do what's expected of them and just March, should it be that the that is bond and that's just how it works.
And Law firms often have very serious problems finding grinders because there's the, it's always been this way. There's a sense of entitlement that a lot of young attorneys have depending on, what they bring to the table in terms of their education and so forth.
And they, law firms are trading off between quality and people with title issues and so forth. And trying to find the people that are gonna work the hardest and and keep the morale of the firm up. That was [00:20:00] funny on that. We were on the the presentation last week.
Someone asked a question. I thought it was a pretty good question. They said does do Wachtell and Cravath hire laterally. And no, they don't because they want to maintain that morale where people are questioning everything and they're not bringing in all these outside influences and they're coming in at a certain way, and it's a very effective model.
They want to have a very good soldiers and they want their soldiers to be trained from day one, the summer associates and so forth. The attorneys and law firms, this, the idealists have hired people that do what they're told not question the system and and just get ahead and do things that way.
And I've told this story before, but. Actually, I'm not going to tell a story about it right now, but law firms will come down very hard on people that step out of line just the army. And and other groups that question if people should be working hard and all that kind of thing, so it's just because they need grinders to do the work.
That's where the profit comes [00:21:00] from. That's where the service or the client comes from. And and that's just what they need done. And when people start questioning that then you know, that creates problems. One of the sadder stories that I've heard in the past couple of years this was several years ago, but I was working with a a really good candidate from I think he'd gone to he'd gone to a top three law school and he had questioned the the necessity to do a certain type of work in his from, for a with a young junior department that have brought in the client.
And because of that he was actually fired when he was about six months in and and was so upset by it. He quit the practice of law. And so the point is that, he was questioning the necessity of during some work. He didn't think it needed to be done, that there was a faster solution would save the client money.
And the law firm didn't want to hear that. Or the partner did. They basically identified him as a isn't a good soldier and wasn't the kind of person to do the work. Law firms [00:22:00] the second date, they sent your question in the system or not willing to do good work or undermining them with other employees.
You will often be out of a job. I I knew one major from not too long ago that saw someone just make a post about the firm. They were using screen recording software make a negative post about the firm on a, some sort of blog site. And they let them go for that.
There's just law firms have to be careful. They're running they're running businesses and and they need to get the work done. And if there's questioning, if they see a question in the system in terms of how things work they're not going to want to hire you again.
Some CIS things that they see that they don't like you don't, if you quit a job too often with nothing lined up. Most law firms are not going to want to bring, hire you. If you switch jobs too much they don't like that. That shows that you're probably not getting along where you're at.
If you show a lack of commitment to your practice area, that's another thing grinders are expected [00:23:00] to, it's basically just pick a practice area and do what, do what they're asked and learn or. Jumping around between all sorts of jobs that shows probably that you're never committing someplace and that's a bad grinder.
If you're quitting your job and nothing lined up that may show that you've been fired for not doing good work, or you just don't care enough about your job if you're upsetting people and with that, or that you're working for that's also a bad thing because that means that. You're typically not doing good work.
If you're making your jurors they're not gonna like that. The big one that I said earlier, bad mouth in your firm or superiors the law firms know who's on their team and who's not. And if you ever come across as not on their team or someone that's badmouthing them, that's just a bad soldier.
If you look at the the army and things, and you don't see, people in the army writing blog post, or talking about how awful the us army is at work there. The ones that do are immediately relieved of their duties and jobs, even if they're a [00:24:00] general. If you speak out publicly against your firm, you're going to be in trouble.
If you if speak out publicly about the, from business that can get you in trouble. And then many times just, sometimes the acne and appropriately outside of work in ways that actually that, can bring into question your commitment to practicing law.
I saw this one thing happened once where there was the firm merger and these two firms were merging. And and one of the firm that was doing the acquiring when looked at everyone's Facebook posts, I don't know why they had the time to do that, but they found someone that they made a Facebook post saying they didn't like practicing all the time or something.
And and that person just lost their job. It wasn't brought over in the merger. There's just you have to be very careful. And then just things like taking credit for work publicly, if done on behalf of the superior, which isn't that big of a deal or publicly questioning or.
Your superior says, kiss another big one. And those are just unacceptable for people that are grinders. They're unacceptable for grinders that are [00:25:00] young attorneys. And they're also unacceptable for binders that are old attorneys. If you're a worker you're a foot soldier, you're doing the work.
And regardless of how you feel about your superiors or the practice of law you're generally expected to just put your head down and do the work and keep your opinions to themselves. Imagine an army going into battle. With everyone questioning the general it's just doesn't work that way.
And or the purpose of the war and stuff you're expected to be a soldier. And and as a soldier, the only thing the law firm cares about is whether you do the work and how well you did the work. And so that's, really just the important thing to understand and and many grinders also believe that they need to generate work.
And but this is not something really that's that important when you're a young attorney, especially you may need it at some point in your career. If you have the work when no work when you're hired you're almost always being hard based on your abilities as a grinder.
I remember when I was a young attorney and people were giving me and [00:26:00] I actually brought in quite a bit of business when I was a young attorney, cause I was more of a finder than a grinder. But when I would tell partners that I brought in this client, I would expect them to be very excited, but they weren't excited.
They were actually the, their faces would frown because it was like they wanted, that's not what they needed from me. They needed me to be a grinder. And and this is something to think about. The shelf life of a grinder again is often relatively limited again, unless you're on a transactional practice area, like I said earlier you're expected to be a grinder only for, most, six to seven years maybe a little bit longer, but the question is what happens with grinders.
And it really depends and and really what happens and but it can be a frustrating role. The ideal scenario for a grinder is, and again, it depends on the firm. There was most firms the grinder is going to. Be expected to B ended up getting pushed out.
So when people say, this whole idea of going in house is like [00:27:00] really more an idea of people going house because they're grinders and all they can do is work. And so they want to be in an area where that's what's expected is just to do the work and do it at a certain number of hours. And as you get more seniors at grinder, that's what happens unless you have other types of leadership skills and so forth and being a grow another business generating skills and it can be a very frustrating role.
Most grinders. If you're a very good grinder, you'll be made of counsel, or you can be made a non-equity partner in some firms that have the ability to do a grinder can be made a full equity partner without any business, but they have huge institutional clients, but that's a. Becoming rare and rare.
And the ideal scenario for Grindr really is to work very hard to do good work, to impress your superiors and clients. And then and then do such good work that they start getting all these referrals from people because that comes without them having to go out and and get business.
And and that happens. If you get an X, if you develop an exceptional [00:28:00] reputation as a grinder you, you can typically a lot of times you will get work from existing clients and other people and and rewards will follow. And you'll also become ideally the best grinders are indispensable.
When you're young, you'll do you'll work for one partner or a couple partners. You could do such good work that they want you to do all their work, and then they'll get more business because the type of work you're doing and then that grinder will, want you to be a partner as well, because they'll want to give you work when you're a partner, because they have so much work to do that.
They can't possibly do it all on their own. So again, being a grinder is, can be a very good thing. When you go into most large law firms, there's always going to be. Some partners in all large national law firms that have 5, 10, 20, 30, 40, $50 million in business, it's not uncommon these days.
And those partners that have those giant books of business, especially when you start getting to the, $20 million plus we'll always have Grindr partners that they're [00:29:00] giving all their work to even partners with 5 million in business have grinder partners that work for them. As a very good grinder your career path needs to be to really be the right-hand person, to at least a couple of one or two very significant partners.
And if I was in a large law firm, And and I would develop all my skills to be the best grinder I could you know for the partners for the most business, because the partners were the most business, we'll always take along the best grinder partners for them because the partners, they want to basically oversee the work.
They want to go out and generate work. They want to do some work and think about the higher level problems, but they want Brian just on the ground doing the business and every AmLaw 100 law firm. And there's lots of Grindr partners that are working for partners from lots of businesses.
The second scenario for grinders really is to hit a wall. And so what that means is they may, be made a service partner or kept as an associate or putting kind of a long-term role as a council attorney. And that's fine. That's very hard to do. There's [00:30:00] some firms, very, major us firms, top firms in New York and so forth being made up council, there is actually a very major honor.
Or being made a service partner and all those things are fine. If you are able to make a service partner in a major firm as a grinder, that's great. Your only objective at that point is either to generate business or to, continue going and.
The only problem with these roles, and it's just, I say this to you as someone in my role is that it often doesn't end well. So if the work slows down, the grinder may often be that go and and it often happens at some point and is often unavoidable when those work slowdowns and so forth sometimes.
So a lot of these large law firms will. They want to have the highest profits they possibly can per partner. And so they'll bring in consultants and profit maximizers and things, and then they will often recommend, paying people in different ways for getting rid of grinders and bringing in senior associate, just all sorts of games like [00:31:00] that light.
So you just have to be careful. And then again, the other big role for binders is to go in house very common and sometimes people are much happier doing that if I was a grinder and most attorneys are, again, my advice for you is to try to get to work for the biggest partner you can with the most business and do the most amazing work you can for them, because they will have the power to make you partner very easily for the most part.
And and then give you work once you're a partner and then help you with those relationships. I was. Not too long ago. I was on a plane sitting next to a partner of I would say one of the top 10, most prestigious law firms in the country, and he'd never brought any business. He just, when he was a young associate, he worked for a a partner in this major law firm and the partner did I think it was healthcare M and a, and and then gave him all the work.
And then when the partner retired, he just give him all his clients. So now this guy has a, a huge deal. And and so that, that's kinda how it works. Things [00:32:00] like being a law professor going in the government are also good jobs for grinders, but again, if you're a grinder, there's nothing wrong.
That's a very good role. You just have to think smart about it. And I'm talking a lot about grinders today, just because it's such an important role for attorneys and most people are. But I think as a grinder, you're much better off in a law firm in the long run. If you have the right people behind you, because in-house can be very difficult as a grinder that the quality of your work's not always understood.
And in-house companies, change leadership all the time and you could lose your job. It's just very difficult. And then the other options, of course, for grinders start to become minders binders pursue alternative careers. And so I'll talk about in a little bit, but it's difficult.
It's not easy being a grinder. And and it's not easy when you're young especially and and the biggest thing though, that you can do as an attorney. And I say this to people all the time, Is have access to work. And people will give you repeat work.
If you do a good job, you need to [00:33:00] wind up in firms where there is a lot of work complaining about having too much work is not always the best thing. Having worked as an honor and a good thing, the best attorneys have worked and the worst attorneys don't. And at any one point in time, there's always lots of grinders out there that are having a very difficult time accessing work and getting work.
So those are things to think about. And and again, there's, there's lots of people out there that aren't, for whatever reason, aren't the best grinders. They they may have attitude problems. They may have personal problems, but it may be difficult. They may not be able to concentrate on at one practice here.
They may be undecided. But there's all sorts of people that can't find permanent work because they make mistakes as grinders. Okay. They upset the right peak wrong people many time there's lots of contract attorneys that are from top law firms that are, working and for young associates and and but didn't play by the necessarily the rules that they should have when they were grinders.
So those are things you need to be careful and it's an up or out [00:34:00] culture, but just when you think about your role, if you are a grinder, just think about, that the best grinders are going to be the people that work hard it's that that that are the most loyal, that, that are unquestioning, their superiors.
Marching to that tune. And now there's nothing, I'm not saying that you have to be that kind of person, but you do, if you want to be a good grinder and and most people are grinders. And so the more you question your role and the more you don't like it, and some people will just have other people do it.
There's people that want to work in the best law firms all day long. And and, even if you're in a great legal market there's always two. There's the thing that with grinders is that those there's different. And I talk about this every week, the economy, when the economy's good people will tolerate a lot more than our firms employers will, then they will when it's not.
And then when it's not good then the people that weren't. The best grinders typically have a very tough time. So it's just, play by the rules just in how to soldiers behave and that sort of thing. And that's not to say that you have [00:35:00] to agree with this person, agree with this, but doing so will keep you alive.
The next one is the finder which is romanticized. It's the person that goes out and gets all the work. It's obviously a very useful thing for law firms to have finders law firms as a general rule, they, they need the work obviously coming in. They the more work that comes into law firms, the better the law firm will do.
So law firms need business. It's it's much, much easier for law firms to find grinders than it is finders. I've known people that are finders that I know people that literally switched firms, every six to 18 months that are finders or that, it's it, doesn't it. I don't think there's anything good about that, but th they, law firms can almost always find people willing to do the work, not do the work that great, but they can always get people to do the work.
But it's much more difficult to find finders that can go out and generate work, which is what finders do. And and it's a skill. They law [00:36:00] firms with the best grant brand names will often be able to attract plenty of grinders to do the work. And but those same firms are all, always very hungry for people finders to bring in work even, w with very few exceptions.
Most major law firms will hire Bryant finders if they have good books, business, and almost regardless of their qualifications, it's you know, th they are of course sensitive to their qualifications, but, if you went to a third or fourth tier law school and and you did okay there, but you are now representing major us companies or major international companies and the important work you can work in almost any law firm you want.
And I say that the a hundred percent competence. Now there's certain firms you can't work in that are always going to check their grades, and your late thumbs and Gibsons and other places like that, that just, but there's very few firms of that caliber that that do that.
There's some that do, but most of them [00:37:00] don't. So if you're a very good finder really the sky's the limit and you can start out. Literally. I know people that I knew someone that I'm not a lot of examples like this, but I just want to give you guys the understanding of what you can do as a finder.
I know people that have graduated from law schools in California that are not even accredited and meaning they're not accredited. They, the only place you can practice in front of, and it, but they've may have managed to get jobs as partners in major New York law firms, because they were able to bring in a lot of business.
So that's how. Being a finder, us you, the nice thing about the legal professions here that I like is it doesn't really matter where you start. You can, if you very good as a finder, you can you really can have a great future. And it doesn't mean that every law is going to hire you if you ha but if you become very good at that the entire system relies on that.
An attorney with a large table book of business is always going to be marketable. It works. It's not just having business. It's [00:38:00] how much your clients are willing to pay and this type of work you do. The larger, your book of business and the larger the clients the bigger law firm you can work in.
That's not to say you don't need to have legal skills, but, the best finders typically are just very good at bringing the work. And, obviously it's better to be a finder, a grinder first cause you learn those skills and then you can become a finder, but a finder doesn't just so you understand what the role is.
It doesn't require that you have any type of very special personality. One of the things that it was funny bill Urquhart, who was one of the. He was the kind of the guy that brought in all the business to Quinn Emanuel early on and a very good business generator. He used to say that, the guy that brings in the most business and LA at the firm is also the biggest nerd in LA.
And it wasn't him. It was someone else. But which I thought was funny, he was saying that, the biggest nerd in LA was also the biggest business generator. So it doesn't matter really. What your personality is. This, the [00:39:00] purpose of what I'm talking about now is not how to be a finder, but really the best way to generate business and so forth as an attorney is just to get out there and be seen.
You get out there and you'll be seen by writing articles, by going out to meetings by joining different groups and and then you can, people will see you and you can hand out your card and, and all sorts of things will come your way dinners and.
Just being receptive to that sort of thing. But finders face a lot of problems. One of the things that happens to finders is they're always having their compensation messed with the the firms will become dependent on them. And then typically they'll play a lot of games with with the finders compensation.
They'll there's a lot of finders will move firms very often. They'll get to a firm with some sort of guarantee they'll bring in the work. And then and then later on the firm will start cutting our compensation. That's, doesn't happen everywhere, but it happens a lot of places.
And then they'll often leave the finder with a lot less money than the finder thought that we'd received. It's, there's different types of law firms work different ways, [00:40:00] if you can think about it, there's typically bureaucrats inside of law firms and there's people that generate the business and there's people that do the work.
If you're a Pratt's will obviously want money for themselves and projects and things. And so that, that can happen. So finders are always in conflict with their firm to some extent, and they know the power that they have. And they're often very unhappy by their compensation and bounce around between firms and so forth.
And and that's just by common, but and sometimes you'll have inconsistent collection. So they're, they're often very nervous. One year they may generate a large book of business and the next thing might not, that can happen with litigators. And their value is really based on their ability to generate business.
And when that slows down their compensation often will decline dramatically. Just a few things. And they're often in conflict with our firms. I worked with a lot of finders. I coach a lot of finders and, they're always just in conflict of firms, they'll be told to raise the rates and they won't like that.
They'll be told to they can't work with certain clients due to conflicts and and [00:41:00] they're told they can't bring in certain clients due to conflicts. And and so there's always a lot of stress related to that. And and but at the same time, this is a role that a lot of attorneys aspire to most attorneys know that being a finder inside of a law firm can provide quite a few advantages and one thing I would say about finders, just so you understand, that I don't know what the percentage of finders is, but the finder really, once you become a finder, it's almost like you're operating your own business.
And so the, and that's one of the nice things about a law firm as a fine. You basically have this group of clients and you have to take those clients in the place where you're comfortable doing the work, where it has a good brand that your clients like, but also where the firms providing that support and where you're getting enough money and all those sorts of things.
Law firms will take their, finders are the law firms will. It's almost like the law firms, not the employer anymore. The law firms providing a service to the finder. And so that's one way for you to think about being a finder. Once you're a finder and you have enough [00:42:00] business the law firm really works for you and you expect the law firm to, hire good associates.
You expect the law firm to have nice offices. You expect the law firm to collect bills, to to provide, a good working environment for associates and all those sorts of things. So it's fun to think about, that you have this ability in your career to transition from one role to the other where you have these clients and your job is to keep them happy.
And to provide good service and stuff to them in the right environment. And the more you think about that, the better off you'll be. And and it's also a psychological shift. So the psychological shift means you go from, worrying about pleasing partners with the work you're doing in the firm and doing good work for those clients to making sure that you're pleasing the clients and providing the best service and putting the clients in the best atmosphere.
So just imagine if you were if you had a $10 million book of business and you've had all these different types of clients, some of them might be IP. Some of them might be real estate, [00:43:00] but in you represent them in general matters, but then you have these other matters for them. You're going to want to take them to the best firm you can.
That's going to provide the best service where you can reasonably say, you're going to get really good service here and oppressed to clients, and that that the firm's going to be able to support. Everything that you need. So that's how find your strength. I think about the firm as providing a platform for their business, which is cool.
And that shows you like how far you can go as a in a law firm compared to a lot of other environments. If you go in house, you're just doing the work, but if you go into a law firm, you can make this transition from from a worker to almost like a business owner that's going out and finding people.
And and that's cool. I really liked that that, that, and that's one reason I'm so gung ho about law firms are really what they offer. The next thing is called the binder of binders often have very good interpersonal skills. They're able to get along with a lot of different types of people.
They can understand clients and also people then the. They're often very good at bringing different types of people together.[00:44:00] And they have very good skills in connecting people with one another. It's just a, it's a it's a natural skill that they have and they're good at making introductions.
They're they're good at bringing people together that normally wouldn't and law firms appreciate them. They serve a role. They don't obviously need to have business and they're often thought of very highly enlight because they make different types of people feel good about one another.
They're often very good at resolving conflicts. So people will go to them with two sides of the story and then they'll be able to put things together. And it really nice way. And and they're able to make sure that law firms function very well often in the face of conflict. And it's a very unique personality.
And there. But again, they're not as common as grinders and so forth. But they love making connections. I'm sure you've seen people like this, know people like this, when you go into any social environment, there's always going to be binders. And and people that take pride in making connections and these kinds of people are light and they're likable because[00:45:00] they're trying to make other people happy with these connections.
And typically there'll be revealed as binders very early in their career. They will the, their connection their ability to do that will often be very easily. They can often be promoted up through the ranks, but they're there, they're able to. Because they're likable they're kept around if people find excuses to keep them around.
And they're very good at resolving conflicts with clients. They're very good at resolving conflicts within the firm as well.
And again, I was talking about my sister a second ago, but he works in a small hospital chain as an extra binder. She'll go and meet with the person and the doctors and others involved in the injury. I'm showing, understand the dispute and explaining to both sides and, very well compensated for that role because it's a very important job.
And law firms have that too. Major law firms always have people that are in those roles. I'm sure. Probably in whatever office you work in your firm, you have people like. And there's lots of people that enjoy it and and you can and often they're they can be counsel and other people [00:46:00] are in the firm that don't even practice law anymore.
And in every law firm I work with, there's always people in that role and and then those jobs can be at risk, but but the law firms need people in those roles in order to do well in the longterm. And so typically you'll start gravitating towards those positions if you're very good at it.
And if you can't find an outlet you may go to a different law firm. One thing that's very common is a lot of times in major law firms, if someone's a very good at that, they'll often ask them to go into HR recruiting type roles inside of a law firm. Sometimes they'll have people that are.
And managing roles inside of law firms that we'll do actually interviews and and then talk to the law firm about that and how, happy people are not happy. If you have those kinds of skills you can, it's often a good idea to find a good firm for that.
Binders are very good. Mediators are, they're often driven to be judges arbitrators HR inside house recruiters legal recruiters, to some extent that [00:47:00] there's just lots of roles for binders in the legal profession. And and it's very difficult for them to get established inside of a lot of law firms, but it can be done.
And most law firms have very good binders in their management to some extent. And and they can often be very exceptional attorneys. They're often very good at, making the case to both sides and, I'll just say, what does a binder do? A binder can also be a very good.
Attorney but that type of skill, to the extent that it's really someone has a an, a major and in a major way is often better outside of the law firm. Minders are also in every law firm. These are people that are into kind of managing the law firms.
They manage law firms, attorneys, paralegals, and others. They're able to create rules. They do that naturally. They're often managing partners in our committees. They're, it's a bureaucratic type job to some extent, but it's needed they set rules and expectations and they enjoy that.
And they typically gravitate towards that role. They tend to be bureaucratic in nature because and[00:48:00] as law firms grow there tends to be more of a need for minders and people in that role. Because people will not necessarily be doing the work and so forth.
And and and and so they need people to watch w watch and make sure things are working to implement rules as necessary. And as law firms grow, they typically become much more bureaucratic with a lot more minders around. And but minded people may often get into the role of being minders because they don't have a lot of business.
So what'll happen. A lot of law firms is if an attorney isn't getting a lot of business, they will offer. Put themselves in a role where they tried to get it to bureaucratic committees and so forth. And and they may not even be something they do. Naturally a lot of law firms will become overly bureaucratic in the long run.
And and because of that we'll Institute lots and lots of rules, which will choke a lot of innovation and new things happening. And, and people that maybe shouldn't be in those roles will often go in those roles, but sometimes the right people are there. It just [00:49:00] depends.
But a lot of miners would become understaffed for becoming partners because of the leadership skills. And they have enough, Florida degenerate, respect and and typically you'll be picked for that role. If you have you'll walk around and you'll see inefficiencies and so forth and law firm and and if you don't want to do that, you may often go in-house from the business.
In-house attorneys, by the way, are often very good minders because they can watch what's going on in the company and fix things. So that's also a good role. And and I think that's, a lot of in-house roles are very good for minders as well. And there's lots of roles for minders in government then, administrative roles and schools and companies.
And so it's a, a few like that kind of stuff. It's a very good role for you. Lots of minders are also very good, like COO's companies and and so forth. So the big point here though, is you need to know what you are and what is it that appeals to you the most? And for a lot of attorneys attorneys never understood, understand what they're [00:50:00] best suited for.
And you have to commit yourself to something. That matches your personality and what comes natural to you. So as you have heard today about what does it mean to be a finder? What does it mean to be a binder of grinder? One of those things should, match who you are.
And and you're going to be happiest doing that in each of those roles can lead to equal success. The thing is if you're if you're, if you feel like you're still set is more in one area, the other, you're probably going to be five times more successful committing yourself to being a minder or a binder or whatever it is then you would, if you're.
Doing one thing. And like I said, my sister she's a nice girl, but she's not someone that, would, would do a lot of other roles. And she's in this role is that, where she's a binder and she has a very natural aptitude for that. She would not do well in a role where she's not using that.
And and another thing that I just like to bring up is, many times people are just trying to do the exact wrong thing. Imagine a hard rock. Trying to be a neurosurgeon [00:51:00] doesn't make any sense, but a lot of times people will do that. And and you typically need to be in what you're doing.
But the thing about being whether you want to be a minder finder grinder as a young attorney you do need to learn. And and as a grinder, you need to basically learn the profession when you're young and commit to it. And it takes, to be to know what you're doing and to have decent skills as a litigator, as a, in pretty much any practice here, there's the 10,000 hour rule.
So I would say five years in 10,000 hours of doing something Until you really know what you're doing, and then you can develop into whatever you are, but you need about 10,000 hours to learn it. And that there's lots of books about that role. There's, but it's to really, before you can transition and become whatever you want to be you need to learn what you're doing.
And I always stress to people. You don't want to go in house after a year. You don't want to, go do something else. After two years, you want to learn how to be an attorney first. And once you learn that, [00:52:00] then you can take those skills as an attorney and be whatever you do, whatever you want.
But you need to learn skills when you're young. And I always tell young attorneys like that are upset about that. Maybe they're mad that they're not working as procedure for the law firm as they could, or maybe they're not. They're mad about, not they're working too hard or whatever the issue is when you're young and the legal profession, your job just is to get training and you can do, the better training you get and the more training you get when you're young and the more work you get, the better off you're going to be in the long run.
You, you have to learn all this stuff first. Okay. Let's see here, what else? And so again most attorneys that are on. Young attorneys that are grinders are often unhappy that, that they're in that role, that's your job when you're young.
A lot of times older attorneys that aren't getting any work are unhappy and, they should probably be doing a different role. And so a lot of times a lot of people get in trouble, so you can just hear some examples. Here's a attorney, you've been an office top New York firm for 10 years and then went to go to the office at another [00:53:00] national law firm had been working 25 hour, a hundred hours, most of his career and got to his new job and certainly gave me a lot of work.
He thought he was to be used in this top law firm pedigree to go out and get a lot of business. However, he never had any business before and he wasn't hired to be a business generator, so he was angry about that. So he should just basically realize that that He didn't want to be a grinder.
Then he went and told the firm that, and the firm didn't like him because he was hired to be a grinder. That was his only experience. And so then he ended up leaving and he's been unemployed for over, but then when I wrote this originally over six months this person thought it should be at finder cause he was more senior.
If you've been working for 10 years, it's 2,500 hours a year and that's all you've ever done. Law firms, not going to hire you to be a finder when all you've ever done is be a grinder. It doesn't make any sense. That's the only thing you have to offer at that point. And very often when attorneys are seniors are looking for jobs are leaving big firms and don't have any business.
They'll basically try to position themselves as finders and they'll write these long business [00:54:00] plans and so forth, but they're not they're grinders. And at some point they might be a finder, but they're. No, really a finder yet. I expected attorneys all the time that are expected to grant me, keep a certain amount of business to remain employed.
And then and then to maintain their hours and so forth, they get business from partners, but at some point a lot, the work drives up and attorneys start looking for new jobs. This is an example of people that were hired to be finders. And then they turned into grinders when they refer them to save their skin while the work lasted.
But then, of course that's not good either. When large law firms will always a lot of times they'll have bring in younger management with business and that younger management will always chop away at Binders and grinders and so forth. Binders may say things like, I've been the partner in charge of mentoring and associates and always, complimented for this and appreciated, but the firm will get rid of that because they want more binders.
So you have to realize what stage your firm's at and what your role is. A lot of times, partners will have spent their career kind of coasting[00:55:00] and various bureaucratic roles inside of their firms. And then younger management teams will come in and only want finders and certain grinders and get rid of them.
So you have to be careful, but that young attorneys again, we'll out from cost, called being very frustrated with their lack of hours and responsibility now, which is humorous many times when their first year, but. And and complained that they want to generate business.
But again the law firm at that point, once finders not grinders. So the big conclusions here that I just want everyone to understand real quickly was if you join the practice laws at grinder the odds are, you should stick with it. The other thing is work is most important.
I need to know joy what you're doing and and committing to something as important. And then again this is the case pretty much for any profession where you're dealing with people's lives and so forth. And if you're really enjoyed, also, driven to something else, you may not really belong in a law firm.
And it's something to think about. And that's what you need to do. Once you know who you are going to be much better situation, [00:56:00] so I will take a quick break just for two minutes. And then when I come back we'll take as many questions as you guys have for the rest of the call thank you.
I guess, let me just pull up this here.
Okay.
No, let me just get this started real quick here and we're doing the questions. Yeah. So any questions you guys have? I'm happy to answer any of them. Let me just do this here. So the first one is I'm going to be lateraling firms soon, but want to take at least a week off in between. I have a lot of vacation time accrued and would normally just cash it out, but I can't risk having a gap in my health insurance at the moment.
Is it possible to give, say three weeks notice to HR but Tell my teams that my last working days is in two weeks and then have a week of vacation while I'm still on payroll insurance. Yeah, I would recommend, I don't think, I think there's something called Cobra, which means that just because you're not working the law firm can't that, and I think it's an, it's a legal, I think it's a law, actually the law firm.
Can't you have to keep your health insurance. So just because you take time off and give notice that the law firm [00:57:00] can't deny you insurance while you're doing that. So I don't think I would worry too much about that. Depending on where. Where you're at.
But I don't think they can do that, but I would definitely for anybody that's planning on leaving it's always a good idea to take as much time off as you can, meaning two to four weeks which is always a really smart thing just because when you take time off you're it recharges your batteries.
And one thing I also recommend is doing, maybe some goal planning when you take time off. So when between leaving jobs and and some goal setting for what you want to do I just think that's a really smart thing to do because w once you get out of the trees of all the work you're doing you're often able to do a much better job with.
In your new position where you want to be going. How much does a big law first year partner make equity? And non-equity, there's an exhibition. It really depends. It depends on the city and where you're at. It depends on whether or not the person has business or doesn't have business and all those sorts of things.
But [00:58:00] most large law firms,
