We all know the numbers — women are graduating from law school in equal numbers to men, and even joining law firms in the same proportion, but women lawyers are not making it into key attorney leadership roles. When Eugena…
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A recent article in the trend-spotting report of market research firm The Intelligence Group caught my eye. It noted that on the East and West coasts, “Traditional meet-ups over drinks are slowly becoming supplanted by more immersive means of connecting,…
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It is frustrating to listen to a speaker and find yourself focused more on his or her verbal tics, an annoying tone, or not being able to hear what is being said. Lawyers, in particular, rely on their oral skills–in…
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Have you recognized the value of having a mentor, but struggled with how to find one? Have assumptions you made about a more senior colleague kept you from approaching them for mentoring? Have you been approached by a younger colleague…
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For the past two years, I have had the honor of managing the Commission on Professionalism’s Statewide Lawyer-to-Lawyer Mentoring Program. Rather than being just another part of the job, it has truly been an honor. To have played a small…
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Fortunately, there is not much debate on the value of mentoring for new lawyers. According to a 2013 National Association for Law Placement (NALP) study, The State of Mentoring in the Legal Profession, nearly 90% of all law firms surveyed…
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In Networking for Law Students (Lawyers, too) Part 1, we talked about the natural aversion that many people have to networking, and proposed thinking about it in a different way to make it less stressful. We also suggested advantages that…
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What if we could develop programs that would reduce crime, keep at-risk children in school, reduce the burden on criminal courts and prisons, and involve communities in the process? Sound too good to be true? A number of court systems,…
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In this post, Part I of a two-part series, we describe the natural aversion that many people have to networking, and suggest thinking about it in a different way to make it less stressful. We also identify advantages that law…
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American Bar Association Student Lawyer Vol. 43 No. 5 In the first installment of a two-part series on networking for law students, we describe the natural aversion that many people have to networking and suggest thinking about it in a…
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Working at the Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism tends to sensitize us Commission staffers to issues of incivility. After all, our mission is to promote civility, integrity and professionalism among the 94,000 plus members of the bench and bar…
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On November 6th, Illinois welcomed nearly 1,900 new lawyers to the ranks. I had the opportunity to attend the 1st Judicial District ceremonies, held in the Arie Crown Theater, where my own swearing-in took place more years ago than I…
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