The charm defensive - part 1
I resigned last week.
Under my contract, the firm requires me to give three months' notice and, as I need the money, I agreed to work out the notice period in its entirety. The beauty of this situation, of course, is that the charade is over. I am now effectively dead man working.
Except for serious misconduct (such as the maintenance of this blog on work time), I cannot be fired. That's quite a liberating feeling. Rather than having to pretend I care, that I genuinely would take a bullet for a client, I am free to conduct myself according to my own priorities and sense of reason, not the firm's.
In the period since I submitted my resignation, I have had one moment when a partner sought to impart the usual subtle pressure by suggesting that he was "disappointed" I hadn't seen fit to come in before 8am on a particularly busy morning. I heard him out, said nothing but "Sorry" and shrugged. There was a momentary, glorious flicker of recognition in the partner's eyes that he had lost his intimidatory power.
By resigning, I had completely messed with the existing power dynamic of the relationship. There was no more need to dance the dance.
Earlier, when I informed my responsible partner of my decision to resign, he transformed from a frowning, full-throttle, stormy machine, too busy to waste words on compliments or niceties, to a previously-unseen genial bloke, with all the time in the world to discuss my strengths, interests and future plans.
Then, when I told a more senior partner, who had played a key role in hiring me all those years ago, there was genuine disappointment. "Is there anything we can do to make you stay?" she asked.
This was the perfect opportunity to set out the JLU's manifesto in its entirety: fewer working hours, respect (not just lip service) for work/life balance, a sense that employees are valued and appreciated by the firm, proper mentoring by partners - including a genuine interest in junior lawyers' professional development, proper diversity of work (beyond slaving away endlessly on Project Rectal Exam), etc, etc...
And, of course, it was a chance to get a few extra bucks. Maybe $10K.
Instead, I stoically shook my head. "No," I said. "I've made up my mind."
Under my contract, the firm requires me to give three months' notice and, as I need the money, I agreed to work out the notice period in its entirety. The beauty of this situation, of course, is that the charade is over. I am now effectively dead man working.
Except for serious misconduct (such as the maintenance of this blog on work time), I cannot be fired. That's quite a liberating feeling. Rather than having to pretend I care, that I genuinely would take a bullet for a client, I am free to conduct myself according to my own priorities and sense of reason, not the firm's.
In the period since I submitted my resignation, I have had one moment when a partner sought to impart the usual subtle pressure by suggesting that he was "disappointed" I hadn't seen fit to come in before 8am on a particularly busy morning. I heard him out, said nothing but "Sorry" and shrugged. There was a momentary, glorious flicker of recognition in the partner's eyes that he had lost his intimidatory power.
By resigning, I had completely messed with the existing power dynamic of the relationship. There was no more need to dance the dance.
Earlier, when I informed my responsible partner of my decision to resign, he transformed from a frowning, full-throttle, stormy machine, too busy to waste words on compliments or niceties, to a previously-unseen genial bloke, with all the time in the world to discuss my strengths, interests and future plans.
Then, when I told a more senior partner, who had played a key role in hiring me all those years ago, there was genuine disappointment. "Is there anything we can do to make you stay?" she asked.
This was the perfect opportunity to set out the JLU's manifesto in its entirety: fewer working hours, respect (not just lip service) for work/life balance, a sense that employees are valued and appreciated by the firm, proper mentoring by partners - including a genuine interest in junior lawyers' professional development, proper diversity of work (beyond slaving away endlessly on Project Rectal Exam), etc, etc...
And, of course, it was a chance to get a few extra bucks. Maybe $10K.
Instead, I stoically shook my head. "No," I said. "I've made up my mind."
posted by Shop Steward | 5:45 pm
9 Comments:
I have recently resigned too. To make it worse I'm the 1,825th person to have resigned from my department within the last 2-3 years, such that a department which once took up an entire floor now takes up only less than one third.
Anyway the reactions from the partners were interesting. The one to whom I handed in notice looked angry when I resigned (another 3 have resigned recently), but his face suddenly turned for the better as soon as I announced that I will be joining a client. He then proceeded to give me the whole "we would have made you partner in 4-5 years" speech.
Another partner was genuinely saddened.
Then, in the spirit of eternal cynicism, one partner asked if I might stay on, before proceeding to say that he hopes we will work together in the future and let's have a few beers sometime both before and after I leave.
In short, they are now all very nice to me. I wonder if things might've been different if I am not going to become a potential client.
You raise a couple of very interesting points. One of them - relating to what firms euphemistically call "attrition rates" - will be considered in the next post ("The charm defensive - part 2").
Enjoy your new role, experiences and lifestyle in-house!
Congratulations, Shop Steward! I guess your draft resignation letter moved from its draft status. What I want to know is whether your resignation letter was indeed signed off "Hugs and kisses"???
When I resigned from my last firm, morale was so low that no one even blinked an eyelid. They all said they were sorry to see me go, but they could understand why I had resigned to take another opportunity. It was quite weird.
When I went back and visited a few months ago, I enjoyed catching up with a couple of my old bosses. I like them as people, I just don't like law firms.
Oh, I second the comments of angry bee. I'm still in the law, just not in the law firm. But I think good people need to stick at it because otherwise there's no chance for change.
Angry Bee, you describe a place lacking in respect for its employees, a culture of cutting corners when it comes to employee rights. For this reason, among others (or, should I say, inter alia, I have chosen to leave the law. In short, I find my work neither inspiring on a grand scale nor enjoyable on a daily basis.
So I leave even though I do not yet have a "Plan B" in place. I am leaping into the unknown. It is possible that I will be posting to this site as an ex-lawyer from a villa on the Mediterranean in six months' time. That wouldn't, I imagine, be the worst case scenario.
My notice period, as I mentioned in my post, runs for three months. I still have plenty to say in that time and, over the past five months, the JLU has received significant positive feedback imploring us to keep fighting the good fight. Consequently, I do intend to maintain this site indefinitely.
Legal Eagle, my final flourish was replacing "Hugs and Kisses" with "Yours sincerely". The alternative - "yours faithfully" - would, of course, have been an outright lie.
Best of luck with your next move. Looking forward to the next three months of posts.
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Didn't realise I had "fans", RL!
Best of luck with the pomp-free lawyers. Knowing as many lawyers as I do, sounds like an uphill battle to me! :-)
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