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Here to Stay: Balancing Social Media with Your Legal Career
Bloomberg’s latest article discusses the pitfalls of Biglaw attorneys on TikTok. It discusses how slow firms are to respond and how conflicted they are with associates being active on social media. I’ve been seeing more and more legal content on TikTok and when a recent Cravath associate opted to resign then to stop creating content (content that seems to be very lucrative), I couldn’t help but notice how far we’ve come! fyi, Cravath is the most white shoe of white shoe firms–if any firm is going to have a conservative stance on social media it’s going to be these type of firms. In 2015, I wrote a social media dos…
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Big Law is Horrible…Or is it? What the Latest Big Law Drama Can Teach Us
This week a slide from an alleged presentation by Paul Hastings dropped and boy…did people have a lot to say. Whether or not it was actually part of the presentation, the overall consensus was the Big Law is horrible and this is just another example. And I get it—seeing the slide by itself and how it prioritizes work above everything seems, at the very least, a little unhealthy while others may see it and think those expectations just come with the job. There is a widening gap in the way people approach work with a younger generation being more attuned with their rights and pushing for a more tenable work/life…
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What Does Confidence Get You? Career Growth While Facing Systemic Barriers
This past weekend I had the chance to speak on a panel on leadership with other super accomplished Latinas (including an elected official!). It’s always a great opportunity to glean tips and knowledge from others both in the audience and fellow panelists. Because we were discussing leadership, one of the big themes was having the confidence to go for it-to go for the leadership roles and have faith in your ability. I totally agree. You have to be aware of your abilities and have the confidence to know your strengths and talents and to push yourself to the next level because you know you got it (or have the skills…
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What Will You Be? Figuring Out Your Legal Practice
I’m going to reveal a big secret—a lot of law grads and new attorneys don’t exactly know what kind of lawyer they want to be. Seriously! Maybe you go to law school with the exact idea of what you want to do and stay the course—that’s great! But maybe you’re unsure because all you know is you want to “do good” or make money but not sure how that looks. Or maybe you have an idea of what you want to do but one day you are in torts class and suddenly realize you have a passion for personal injury (which I’m adamant is how personal injury attorneys are born).…
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That’s It? The legal industry’s slow, resistant march towards diversity
First, if you haven’t had a chance to do a deep dive in the latest legal profile by the ABA here it is. It is full of great gems and covers various sectors but as usual focuses heavy on big law. Ultimately, what the profile reveals is that it is hard out here for a Latina attorney. Latinx have the highest rates of attrition, attorneys of color, in general, are less likely to be promoted to equity partner than white attorneys and more likely to leave the firm. Women also left during COVID to take care of households and that will have long-lasting implications that we are yet to see.…
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Goal-Getter: On Setting Goals as a New Attorney
We’ve discussed goal setting before (a lot!) but today I wanted to share a little more on why goal-setting is so important, especially when you’re new. Because when you’re a new attorney and new to the professional world, it’s easy to think that your firm or boss will always keep your career growth in mind. And some might! Some firms are really good at performance evaluation and career development, but your career is too important to leave in the hands of others. It’s important to set long-term and short term goals for yourself so that regardless of what your firm does or doesn’t do, you are developing as an attorney…
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Whose Gate are You Keeping?
A few days ago I posted about the quandary I often feel in discussing professional norms and how to abide by them while understanding that those norms are rooted in classism, sexism, and racism. As always, my goal with teaching “how tos” is not to push for assimilation but rather to uncover these unspoken rules so people can decide which, if any, to follow. And how one abides by those norms is wholly dependent on your own career goals, current needs, and other obligations. Ok, but say you quickly learn and adapt to these standards, what does that mean? It means that while you’ve figured out the way to advance…
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What If I Hate Practicing?
So lately I’ve been thinking how it’s probably not helpful that I’m always like BEING A LAWYER IS THE BEST THING EVAR! Because I get that not everyone feels that way and in encouraging folks to enter this field I don’t want to make ppl feel like there’s something wrong with them if they don’t enjoy practicing. Yes, it’s totally normal to actually not enjoy being a lawyer. I mean maybe that’s not a huge surprise when you look at the data that shows how badly our profession suffers from depression and addiction but only pointing to that can feel extreme. There can be moments in your career where you…
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The Danger in Being the First
Wow, so I didn’t think I would write anything substantial about the American Dirt publishing industry scandal but like always Latino USA came through and inspired me. To bring ppl up to speed, American Dirt was written by a White woman and given a seven figure (!) advance by a publishing industry that then turned around and spent even more money to promote it. They landed promos with Latina influencers, a spot on Oprah’s book club, and blurb by the Chicana literary icon, Sandra Cisneros. The book, while fiction, seemed to be steeped in stereotypes and an obvious lack of knowledge of what it means to be Mexican. When a…
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Sidebar: 2020 Vision, lessons for the new year
It’s still early enough in 2020 to share the vision and plan for the new year, right? Just asking because the new cycle moves fast & we’re basically on the brink of god knows what but trying to not live in terror, you know the vibezzz. #hidethepainharold 2019 was such a year of growth for me and I want to share some lessons I learned (some the hard way!) and hopes for the new year. One. Have the courage to change. Easier said than done! But 2019 was when I realized that if I wanted to grow in my career I needed to seek new challenges. It would have been…