Creatures of Habit: Time for New Ones

Being a successful attorney has come to mean being a total mess in every other area of your life. And we’ve all seemed to accept it as status quo and often try to indoctrinate newer attorneys to indulge in the same habits we’ve come to know as the bane of our lives. Why have some of the “brightest” attorneys in the world proven to be the most ignorant individuals in every aspect of their lives? Why do the “best” attorneys always seem to have the nastiest attitudes? How have we allowed ourselves to become the monsters we once complained about to our loved ones or the random person we met at happy hour because we haven’t had any time for our loved ones lately? We could continue to pretend this is the only way to thrive in the workplace or we can change our mindsets about how we need to show up to glow up in every area of our lives.

“When I was a new attorney, I sat at my desk and did everything I was told and I didn’t go home until my supervising attorney said I could. After a while, I just kept a sleeping bag under my desk because it was more efficient to just be in the office.”

Could you imagine wanting to succeed at work so badly you camped out every night in your office and used the office showers daily? Eww, that was never going to be my narrative, even for a second. Becoming an attorney was the dream I remember first having. At two years old, I wasn’t quite sure what the word meant but it sounded like exactly the thing that I should be doing. Every adult that ever tried to make conversation with me would ask “what do you want to be when you grow up Aubria”? And every time I said lawyer the dream became more real. It was no longer a want, it was happening. It was also never my dream to give up every other part of me to become an attorney; in fact, the idea never even dawned on me until people explained that working in a big law firm meant that they owned me. OWNED me? I would unpack it here, but that is another post for another newsletter. One thing has alway been certain in my life: I needed all of who I was to live a fulfilled life. But how could I maintain my personal harmony when the people I worked with ever day lacked the discipline to maintain balance in their own lives? I had practice doing just that, growing up with a mom who was always working. At fourteen, I knew what kind of day I wanted to have, how having that day would impact my week's plan, how that week could accelerate or diminish my progress in any given month, how a month might propel my year forward how a year might impact a whole decade. This was the structure I personally needed so that I could set the tone of my experiences every step of my journey and thoughtfully curate the life that I wanted. Of course, having this level of autonomy for as long as I've wielded it is problematic for a space where individuals have an irrational expectation of worship and obedience with no room for questions. Even the Yahweh let's people ask questions. It’s one thing if you’re a member of the leadership team making waves but how does a first year associate set and maintain boundaries?

“Everyone has to pay their dues; if I had to do it you have to do it too.”

We have all heard some variation of that toxic statement. The idea that even if we have more efficient and inclusive ways to do a thing that we ought to stick to outdated systems to uphold some draconian unwritten rule doesn’t make a lot of sense right? Yet, this is one of the cornerstones within one of the most powerful careers anyone could hold. Feel free to disagree but attorneys wield an exceptional amount of power and authority in every aspect of society. From the courtroom to the boardroom, lawyers have had a tremendous influence, so we have to raise, and if I’m being honest, burn some of the standards we’ve settled as the foundation of legal practice because we’ve all witnessed the career-ending damage and trauma so many have endured because of our toxic relationships with ourselves, our loved ones and our colleagues. Are we so stuck in our ways that we refuse evolve with the society we are lead? How can we continue to positively impact society if we are married to 50-year old customs that limit our mindsets and by extension our outcomes?

“But this is how we always do it!”

And maybe that’s the problem. We can’t sustain the profession by doing many of the things we’ve always done. For starters, why are so many lawyers such heavy drinkers. Are we still convincing ourselves that we’re just social drinkers? Don’t get me wrong, I have the occasional cocktail or glass of wine but every legal event I’ve gone to I’ve been embarrassed by how hammered attorneys get while pretending they’re not hammered. I don’t think everyone drinking is struggling with alcoholism but one thing has remained certain in my immersion into the legal space: many attorneys are drowning out reality. And the sad reality is there are infinite reasons why that might be the case.? Yet, the legal field’s drinking problem is the least of our worry. Many of us get 0-4 hours sleep each night and have been at it since we started as 1Ls in law school. Many of us barely eat and when we do, it’s not always the most nutritious option. Many of us lack a work out routine and barely even move unless we need to grab food or use the bathroom. Many of us have nothing to believe in because we have been failed so many times. Many of us lack real support systems. Many of us are working 70+ hour weeks and never take a day off even when we request PTO. And because of some permutation or combination of the flaws I’ve laid out, we can be some of the crabbiest people to deal with even on our best days. Maybe some of us keep it professional but our loved ones get to see the not so righteous anger we express when God-forbid our knife fell off the table in the middle of dinner.

“Lawyers can and should live well because the firms we run and our relevance depend on it.”

If we already have so many lawyers who have tapped into living full lives, why does the entire industry continue to put new wine in old skin? The answer is simple, we are creatures of habit that only change when we are forced to. Just look at the way every top 100 firm matches the Cravath scale in pay (and not much else) because they are fearful of missing out on talent. Yet, new attorneys have figured out a very important truth any aspiring attorney should accept and adopt. While all the top 100 firms pay essentially the same rates at every level through 8th year, NOT all of these firms prioritize people, foster cultures that promote and encourage individual well-being AND many firms encourage and enable bullying, gossip and exclusion of otherness. Most people are afraid to speak about egregious behavior because they are afraid of being forced out of their high income jobs OR worst having their reputations tainted by folks who are still traumatized by their 1994 experience with a partner or counsel they swore they would never become.

A few months ago, a partner at a global law firm died by suicide after she lost control of her ability to manage the stress and “responsibilities” of her role. It was all over LinkedIn and in some global newspapers. When I read the article, I thought about my experiences as a newer attorney in this space and how I maintained my voice no matter how difficult the words were to say or to be heard my audience because it was more important to me to speak the truth about what it was like to be lawyering while black + a woman + with chronic pain + devout in my faith + cultured + multi-hyphenate + childfree + partner-free + financially savvy + fearless. And it dawned on me that I was one of the lucky ones who keeps talking because I am more concerned about my overall wellbeing and the wellbeing of others, than I will ever be about ANY career…and check my stats I’ve had 4 solid careers. I also realized that the people we expect to lead us are broken and traumatized by their experiences as new attorneys and while they’ve moved up the ranks, gained some prestige, or really just ended up being the last one standing when the partner track memo landed on their desk (I mean can we get honest about the truth of this space?) many people who are wielding power in law firms, are dispensing the same poison that almost killed their careers when they were starting out and still very much flows in their veins.?How can someone who hasn't gotten over their trauma create an environment of inclusivity and foster a culture of belonging? Hint: They cannot. Have no fear, a solution is here.

“The only place to go from here is up!”

We have managed to be extremely successful in wielding the aspects of society that have been entrusted to us so why fix it if ain’t broke. The problem is the only people saying we do not need to evolve are just as broken as the system we exist in. But there is another way and in every law firm globally, there is a remnant of individuals who have decided that being a great attorney doesn’t require that they siphon every other part of who they are. They are the practice leaders who call their top performers personally after reviewing their billable hours and insisting that they TAKE A BREAK. They are the partners running deals who recognize a disconnect between a person’s work product and what they are used to delivering and communication with that person to find out what is limiting their peak performance. They are the folks with exponentially more social capital than anyone should ever have in any workspace who recognize greatness and can’t help but affirm it every chance they get. They are the seasoned attorneys who have seen it all and can tell in five minutes if someone is going to be any good, BUT allow themselves to be pleasantly surprised by the breath of fresh air. They are the upstanders working behind the scenes to amplify the silenced voices AND in many cases have false and often substantiated evidence excluded from a person’s promotion review. They are the senior partner who emails a midlevel associate to let them know they don’t need to burn a weekend on a project because we have enough runway.

In the next 5-10 years, many industries including the legal space, will need to examine their cultures and expel those individuals, policies, processes that diminish and silence voices.

We have been so distracted with all of the technological innovation we’ve forgotten to evolve beyond 1994 in our people management and professional development. But it is not too late for us if we want better. I know my fellow attorney friends are tired of going to the Brown Bag lunches, training and development conferences and the like, only to see molasses progress because folks are more interested in seeming than actually doing what is right and good. I know we are tired because so many of us have left the legal space willingly while others of us have been targeted and kicked out because we dared to live BIG as we lawyered well. When I was a new attorney I spent hours studying the big law way and adopting all of the best practices for success with a twist. I worked really hard and showed up for my teams (even the ones full of people who did not like me or bullied me or both) and produced great work even when I had been set up to fail. As soon as I became a supervising attorney on deals, I adopted a different approach that I saw from people who had decided their Big Law way would be different too.

My goal at this stage of my career is to give everyone the tools they need to thrive in the legal industry and any space really. I want to start a mindset revolution that doesn’t just put another bandaid on the system’s health BUT flushes it out, detoxes it, nourishes it and rejuvenates it by working with individual leaders and eventually organizations to redefine the corporate culture once and for all. Because I am a lawyer, I want to clean my own kitchen before I try to clean another industry's kitchen. I have a dream that one day the legal industry will cease to be known at as a career path riddled with substance abuse, sleep depravation, eating disorders, and a plethora of other issues that perpetuate the hostility in which so many lawyers survive but will never thrive but for a whole bunch of cashflow, and INSTEAD be known as the career where individuals thrive in every area of their lives by deeply focusing on transformative wellbeing as an imperative not as an afterthought.?Big dreams from the big lawyer, but I've already made my wildest dreams come true.