How Your Career Affects Your Happiness (or: Are There Any Happy Lawyers?)
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Reader C wonders who the happy lawyers are… but I think this leads us to a bigger question that will hopefully make for an interesting discussion: how do you view your career in your general quest for happiness?
Hi Kat, I have a question for you and your incredible readers. I am an undergrad applying to law schools now for next fall and I do recognize the oft-quoted “realities” (from friends of family, professors, etc) of being a lawyer- mountains of dense reading, long (sometimes extremely so) hours, getting stuck in a job you hate just to pay of the $200k of student loans your education cost you. I sort of stumbled onto the idea of law, I wasn't one of those who dreamed my whole life of putting away the bad guys or anything; I randomly found it through a class but I have never been more in love with a subject. I am an avid Corporette reader, but the things I read in the comments section of many posts terrify me and leave me to ask, rather desperately: Is anyone happy being a lawyer? I know everyone is different, had a different idea of “the dream lawyering job,” reacts differently to stress, etc. but if there is anyone out there who loves being a lawyer, it would be a huge comfort to hear about it!
First off: apologies to the non-lawyer/JD students among Corporette readers; hopefully our discussion will take us to greater truths about happiness and your career.
That said… reader C's question is a great, great question, and I think the readers will give far better answers than I will considering that I never really found my happy sweet spot in the law, personally.
Something I've heard often, and agree with wholeheartedly, is that there are two kinds of people: those who enjoy law school, and those who enjoy the practice of law. I am totally in the first camp of people — I loved law school, which I found to be filled with ethereal questions that you can ponder at your leisure and come to your own conclusion. There are clear paths to “success,” and good work is tangibly rewarded with grades and other honors.
(Pictured: Rainbow Valley, originally uploaded to Flickr by rwangsa.)
On the other hand, I found the practice of law (and to be clear, my experience is mostly limited to BigLaw litigation) to be better suited for people who loved debate — you're not picking the “right” answer for yourself, but arguing whatever's best for your client. The practice of law involves both customer service (and in BigLaw they expect you to be always responsive) and, the higher you climb up the ladder, sales — in that you're expected to wine and dine new clients to bring to the firm.
There are not many tangible rewards for good work, at least in Big Law — everyone is paid the same, and whether you win or lose a case often has very little to do with the level of effort on your part.
The drudgery quotient is also high, at least at the beginning — lots of doc review and case-hunting (where partner says, “I need a case that says the sky is blue — go find it.”). There's also often an element of “you must learn your client's industry and business inside out so you can understand the documents you're preparing or the arguments you're making.”
All of this isn't a bad thing, per se, but when you hear about the high number of unhappy lawyers I think it's often because people went into it thinking they “like to write” or “loved thinking about legal questions” and find themselves in a customer service and sales position.
That said — there are LOTS of happy lawyers, and many of them read this blog. In reader surveys, people consistently say that they're happy with their work on an intellectual, monetary, and lifestyle basis. I've noticed more than a few comment threads where people talk about their love for their job, and some of the older readers even noted that they had to switch jobs numerous times or that they had to work for 15 years before they found their happy place. (Way to be persistent, ladies!)
The other thing to mention (especially to a college student) is that I'm not sure I put stock in the idea that your job is going to be your ultimate source of happiness and fulfillment — after all, they do pay you do to it.
I think it's better viewed as primarily a source of income (and possibly accolades) and certain types of happiness, such as the society you keep at work as well as the intellectual stimulation the work provides to you, weighed against the stress inherent with the job and the time your job takes you away from other things.
So let's talk about this. Readers: If you're in law, are you happy? For those readers who've been lawyers for more than 5 years — what facets of the job do you enjoy the most? In general, ladies, how do you balance the “work” nature of work with this broader idea that we want to be happy and fulfilled most of our waking hours?
I’m a happy lawyer! I’m fortunate to have specialized in trusts and estates — a wonderful practice — and although I sometimes find the firm leadership at large frustrating I enjoy working with the people in my office. I’ve kept time for my family and for volunteering and reading, gardening, entertaining. Yes, there are happy lawyers.
Mostly unhappy at my lawyer jobs (now do policy/strateg for a company, love it). THere were some good days, but overall hated it and had to get through the day. Jobs I did: local government agency assistant general counsel- wrote rules/public hearings etc., defended federal class actions (ick spreadsheets + doc review, even going to court in manhattan sucked because of jerko opposing counsel), local gov’t job negotiating labor contracts and things of that nature, short stint at securities boutique doing doc review (worst, worst..). None of these had long hours for the most part. They did have plenty of jerks who could make life miserable: bitter bosses, horrid opposing counsel that made everything miserable and personal, lazy incompetent support staff. Sometimes I liked my colleagues for the most part though didn’t love them like my current ones. The work itself could be satisfying at times, interesting at times, drudgery at times, frustrating, motivating- many things. But rarely inspiring. I planned a strategy to do environmental work, my passion, do that now and love it. Took years to implement, was worth it. My mother in law during those years joked that I was in the 7th circle of hell, then the 6th, 5th etc. – it was 7 yrs before I escaped. By the way I didn’t dream of any of these jobs- the lawyer job market was terrible in my areas of interest when I got out of school in 03. there’s been a glut of lawyers for a while- it isn’t just the recent recession. I advise everyone not to go to law school, due to the crap job market and fact that MOST not all of the jobs aren’t something that makes for a happy life.
I’m glad to see from the posts that there are lots of happy lawyers out there- my impression over the years has been that most aren’t. I know some in private practice who like it, but don’t have much of a life so wouldn’t be for me. Lots of the government ones are happy enough but those jobs aren’t a dime a dozen these days. The happiest people I know are those who have morphed into something related that they really like, but not actually law anymore.
I’m a third year associate in big law and pretty unhappy. I don’t know any happy lawyers either… I think if you don’t know 100% that you want to be a lawyer and you aren’t ready for the sacrifices that it will take (there are a LOT — I have cut every single “fun” thing out of my life, never see my husband, went on my honeymoon a year late, etc.), then you should not incur the debt.
There are happy lawyers out there, but it is easy to get trapped I really soul crushing, hateful work. Ironically, this is all the more true if you do well in law school. At least at my school, those who did well generally had an easy, fairly unexamined entree into big law. It is hard to turndown the money and prestige.
That was certainly the case with me. I graduated law school in 2005, and went to work for a big firm in the northeast. Literally spent three of the worst years of my life there. I actually bought giant dark sun glasses to wear in on the train in the morning so people couldnt see me crying. Another thing to consider- if you are unhappy in your job you tend not to do your best work, which feeds the downward self esteem spiral.
But, there are good parts! I left big law after three years and took a federal clerkship in a desirable district. I loved every moment of it, though it was frequently a lot of work.
Now I am a prosecutor in the same very competitive city, and it is the best job ever. I work reasonable hours, though not 9-5, on very interesting and challenging cases that have real meaning and impact. The pay is not great, but not terrible. People are great, work, though some times dark subject matter, is interesting.
So, although I hated big law, it gave me the ability to make substantial progress on my loans, and had some resume value. I wouldn’t do it again, but there was at least some moderate upside.
FWIW, it seems like there are a higher percentage of happy prosecutors than there are other types of lawyers.
My advice to anyone who’s considering law school is to work in some sort of legal field for a little while – and the more mind-numbing, the better. I was a BigLaw paralegal for years before going to law school, and in so doing I realized that I found the practice of law fascinating, but I never wanted to do that kind of work. That said, I didn’t know exactly what kind of law I wanted to practice. I was lucky to discover a passion for criminal defense early on in law school, which meant I could tailor my courses, clinical work, and internships so that I was almost always doing what I wanted, and making it easier for me to find a job after graduation.
One thing is for sure, though – don’t go to law school with the assumption that you’ll make lots of money once you graduate. It might have been a realistic expectation once upon a time, but not any longer. And if you have to take out student loans, then do so with your eyes wide open – I knew before law school that I was going to work either in a nonprofit or in government, so I was aware the financial hit I was setting myself up for. Knowing what I was getting myself into (and the fact that I love my job) makes it a lot easier when nearly half my paycheck goes straight to student loans.
I just made partner in big law a year ago. Day to day I often am not happy, but that said I love my job! Trying to juggle my job with motherhood is very difficult, I don’t sleep or exercise enough, and the constant demands of the job are stressful. But it’s SO rewarding intellectually and personally to have thorny, hard problems to figure out, and have the opportunity to really work on a piece of writing to make it as good as possible. I love my colleagues and respect and admire the partners ahead of me at my firm — they are good people with good values whom I wish to emulate. And I know that the last few years and the next few years are likely to be the hardest of my career as I figure out how to be a partner and my kids are still little, so I’m just trying to hang in there.
this is a great topic and I don’t have much to add that other people haven’t already said. in-house, and I like (but do not love) my job. my ideal job would be something where I could feel like I was helping people (crim defense, family law, etc.) but this job allows me to live in Europe and have a great quality of life. Of my group of friends from law school (2005 grad from 2nd tier), only 2 are still in biglaw. 1 loves it and will certainly make partner. the other hates it but has no choice in order to afford the nice house and good nanny. the rest of my friends work as PDs (they LOVE LOVE LOVE their job) or in the policy area (like their job).
The main problem with this issue is the same reason I went to law school – all of the warnings would *never* apply to me because I always did well in school and was able to achieve what I wanted to. But guess what? All the people at law school have also always achieved their goals, and it is a whole new playing field – so the chances of you getting your dream job (or the grades to enable that) are all of the sudden a heck of a lot less. And that is something that is just impossible to internalize for most young graduates. I certainly wasn’t able to internalize it despite the warnings I got. And while it worked out for me, I wouldn’t want to have to go back to the US and look for a job right now, that’s for sure.
very true. i couldn’t believe it after law school when me, star student and leader in past, was unemployed and taking bottom of barrel jobs. it was depressing and humiliating for years til after much hard work i pulled out of the slump, by my own making and some luck. i definitely didn’t think it would happen to me. it’s a market numbers game, to those of you thinking about law school- not always or often in your control.
I will be lucky if I manage to graduate with $140,000 in debt. But I also got good grades at a good law school and scored a biglaw job. I think it’s important to keep in mind that the interest rate on graduate student loans is 6-8% these days, and it now accrues while you’re still in school. That means that it is a lot easier for debt to spiral out of control than it used to be. My biggest piece of advice would be not to take on six-figure debt UNLESS you are 1) at a top school where you would be able to snag a high-paying job and 2) willing to work at a high-paying job that undoubtedly will require to work long hours. The legal job market is improving, but it still ain’t what it used to be, so also make sure you can get the type of job you want after attending the schools you’re considering.
I disagree completely about having to take on a high-paying job. It’s like somehow people go to law school and come out completely unable to live on the median salary of an average American. As far as I know, people who enter law school now have better options for paying off their loans than earlier classes have had since they can consolidate at lower rates. If you’re working in public interest or government, there isn’t that expectation to spend as extravagantly as you do in biglaw. People bring their lunches, live frugally, and still live decent lives while slowly paying off their student loan debt.
That said, I’m not saying it’s for everyone. I have quite a bit of debt and I hated my previous career- so much so that I was physically ill in the morning and spend all my time off work dreading going back. I know people who graduated in other bad economies and they managed to do alright 5-10 years down the road.
I should have been more clear in my post: what I mean to say is that I don’t think you should take on mid-six-figure debt if your dream legal job pays $50k a year and you want to live in an expensive city (e.g. New York). Loan consolidation options I’ve found so far don’t take the interest rate down much. If you are making $50k in New York and pay $9k in student loan payments your first year, you have just paid the interest on your debt (assuming $150k debt and you consolidated your 8% loans to 6%), and that doesn’t leave a lot for savings.
After reading all of these posts, and thinking of my now 20 year legal career, I think a big key is perspective. I come back to my first comment that you should not expect to “love” your job. It is a job. A means to an end.
I am one of those lawyers who quit the law business about 4 years in to pursue my dream job of being a history professor. I had reached a point with the firm I was working in that if I did not quit, I was going to go mental. I had a lot going on them. 2100+ hours, a parent who died, a best friend with a terminal illness. I worked for a bunch of assholes. It was either quit or start drinking heavily. I had decided there was not an attorney on the planet worth working with. I went back to school and incurred two more years of debt. I loved it. I look at that extra debt is my alternative to large medical bills for psychiatric care. But eventually I missed not being poor. So I started doing contract work, then joined a small firm and I am now at a midsize regional firm. I am “of counsel” and choose to make a little less money and bill a little less time. But I make a WHOLE LOT more money than most peope in this country, many who do not have jobs right now. I like the people I work with. In fact, some of them are my best friends. I do not expect financial institution related litigation is going to make me “happy”, but my job allows me to do things like take my son to Lego Land. I live in a modertate town house intead of a giant house. I drive a VW instead of a Mercedes. But I have only missed one of my sons baseball games because I was in trial.
Girls, take it from one of the old timers on this page, go into lawschool, and the business of law, with some perspective. And think of this too, there are a lot of history professors out there with WAY MORE debt and less opportunity to pay it off.
I’ve been a lawyer for nearly 12 years. I LOVED law school and really like what I do. That said, I am not defined by what I do. My career is fulfilling, interesting, and varied. I am intellectually challenged and work with great people; these things make it worthwhile to continue to be a working mother. On the subject of balance-having it all is a myth. In order to achieve balance, one area of your life will inevitably take over, then another, and back again.
A job is a job. They don’t call it a vacation. You are not always going to like going to work. Sometimes you may dread it. Sometimes you may skip to work. It’s all cyclical.
The one universal turth I’ve learned as a lawyer is that there are no universal truths. Bottom line-choose your career based on what you like, not what you think you should do.
I’m happy in my job as a lawyer. I’m in my 7th year of practice and at my 2nd firm. After trying a few areas of practice, I’ve settled into one that I find both interesting and rewarding. I also work at a small firm for a boss I like and respect, and I negotiated hard for less hours and a flex schedule (I currently work around 30 hours per week) so I have plenty of time to enjoy hobbies, family and other aspects of life. So my job is great, my work life balance is great, and my pay is comfortable enough, though nowhere near big law salaries (the trade off for the other great aspects of my job).
First, I’d like to know where exactly those in the “I loved law school” camp graduated from, because I hated law school! HATED!!! There was nothing fun about it. That being said, I am a happy lawyer. I work for a boutique firm (13 attorneys) where for the most part everyone is gone by 5:30 and they are very family friendly. I also don’t have a billable hour requirement which is awesome. I think your work environment makes a huge difference.
I attended Notre Dame and I loved law school. Didn’t like living in rural Indiana, but I loved school.
I’ve been practicing for a few years and have been with my current small (myself and my boss) firm for about 3.5 years. We do mostly corporate and securities work with a bit of litigation thrown in. With the exception of dealing with crappy opposing counsel and tedious discovery processes, I love it. I knew I wanted to do corporate law when I graduated from law school so I concentrated on finding a firm that specialized and was luckily enough to land a job at my first choice firm.
My boss is big on family so my hours are great. We are going to a new metric in January with a billable hour target of 6 hours per day. As we mostly have smaller clients who’ve been hurt by the economic downturn the pay is terrible at the time being but will eventually pick back up. The pay, however, is a side issue to me because I’d much rather work with colleagues and with clients that I like and send my days doing work that I find enjoyable.
With the small firm I also do a lot of tasks that my law school friends have never even dreamed about: taking and defending depositions; arguing motions in court; drafting and negotiating merger and acquisition documents, etc. So, I didn’t have the boring research monkey positions that a lot 0f my friends had or still have.
With the legal community as it is now, no one should go to law school expecting the massive salaries of the ’90’s or early ’00’s because, for the most part, they aren’t there anymore. IMO, it is far better to find something that you like doing than being able to afford the newest Jag or Prada bag. Similarly, the practice of law is not generally the same as one sees on L&O or other tv shows. Go to law school because it is something you want to do and be prepared to have a massive loan hanging over your head for the next 30 years with the understanding that you may have to take a job that requires you to decide whether you want to pay rent that month or the loan payment.
I am a 3L who loved working for my firm over the summer (and though not the same as practice, it was work – my first day I was there til 9pm, and only once or twice did I ever leave before 7pm, and I worked most weekends too). I worked at one office of a large regional law firm in the south, which will pay me more disposable income than a BigLaw job would (given the cost of living differential), and will allow me lots of early opportunities to argue motions and second chair trials in my first year. I think I’ll like my law job, though it will be hard for me to lose the free time with my little kids that law SCHOOL has allowed me. The perspective I want to add here, though, is that I echo what Kat says. Some people love what they do. Some people love their lives, and do what they do at work in order to fund their life. Sometimes, the target just needs to be to not hate it. I am a nontrad law student, and my prior job was not at all related to law and I HATED IT. And most of the people I worked with at my few professional jobs before law school didn’t LOVE or feel totally fulfilled by their jobs. The happiest ones merely didn’t hate it. If you aren’t independently wealthy or didn’t marry into money, you may have to settle for not hating your work. If you love your coworkers, can handle your office, and only actively hate what you do 20% of the time, I think you’re doing well!
I graduated in the top 30% of my class at a T1 law school this last May. I passed the bar on my first try. I am still looking for a job. Unfortunately, this seems to be all too common in this economy. If you can go to one of the T14 schools and you are committed to working your butt off, then fine, go. Otherwise, find another career. I hear that CPA’s are in demand.
I might be a happy lawyer if I could pay my bills. I don’t know that I will ever financially recover from the decision to go to law school.
Work/life balance is something my business partner and I discuss all the time. We are both driven women and have bad habit tendencies to forget everything else in our life during a project. I can honestly say I like many aspects of my business(es), but there are many days I would give it up for a nickle. I believe that balance is a fluid thing and sometimes things happen in your personal life that takes up the majority of your time and same thing with work.
Just to give you a more diverse viewpoint, I graduated in May 2011 and made a conscious decision not to practice law. I really had no idea what I was getting into, nor did I really understand what $200k in debt really meant. Plus, I didn’t listen to mentors, friends, and lawyers–I thought I knew better.
Fast forward into law school, even while working in public interest firms, externing, or government in-house counsel, I never felt like I loved–or even liked–the work. I took my time in law school to interview tons of lawyers, and two stories really helped me make my decision: 1) I asked an older female lawyer why people in every other profession try to retire as early as possible, but lawyers tend to work til their dying day. She responded that law firms force young lawyers to invest their youth in the firm, so much so that they gradually lose family, friends, hobbies, and their personal life. At the age of retirement, having no family, friends, hobbies, or personal life, they continue on the only thing they have, the only thing they know, and the only thing they’ve invested in–their careers. When I heard this, I realized that I intended my 7 years of higher education to liberate my, not shackle me. 2) A “happy” Biglaw lawyer I talked to told me that in retrospect, after some 10+ years, he though that the criminal lawyers seemed to have the most fun, and that in the long term, they weren’t far behind him in being able to buy property because they had learned to live more leanly.
Plus, when I was in law school, I couldn’t understand why all my classmates where trying to jump on a sinking ship. Everyone was clawing to get these miserable firm jobs when the entire industry seemed to be collapsing due to a broken business model. While nowhere near as dramatic, it seemed like wanting to join the print journalism industry when newspapers were going out of style.
Considering all of this, I decided that I wouldn’t invest too much time in finding a law job, and instead somehow landed a job in international affairs on the USG side. For what I’m doing the pay is pretty good ($70k and 9-5, with a promotion every year for the next few years), very interesting, and most of all, conforms more with my interest and personality (I hated that law made me so anti-social.) My new boss is interested in my personal and professional development (I found that partners were never great managers or leaders), and have found that if I live leanly, consolidate loans, go on the IBR plan, and do public service for 10 years, I can even save some of each paycheck. Everyday, I still wonder if I’ve made the right decision, but I look around at my classmates who are still unemployed and consider myself extremely lucky. My coworkers–some of who also have JDs–have put the question more aptly: do you want to be the international agreement negotiator, or the person the negotiator goes to for a yes/no answer (aka legal counsel)? The first is paid less but has a sexier job, the latter’s work is a bit more boring, more removed from the policy-making process, but paid more.
Just my .02. Be brave. Just because you went to law school doesn’t mean you must practice law. Where there is a will, there is a way.