I provide support and guidance in individual confidential sessions primarily in person for those who live in New England or New York and over the telephone for those living in other parts of the country. I work with lawyers actively seeking new positions as well as those simply interested in exploring their options. This enables clients to make informed decisions by giving them the information they need to overcome the barriers, including false assumptions and outside pressures, that keep them from making positive career moves.
What Do I Charge?
Many clients learn that they do not have to choose between staying in the law or leaving it. They begin to see themselves not simply as lawyers but as individuals each with unique goals, values, skills and abilities. By focusing on settings, fields and roles that appeal to them, rather than on "legal positions", they discover worlds where not only their legal training, but many of their other experiences, interests and talents are relevant qualifications.
For a number of articles which I co-authored about the career search written almost chronologically - from dissatisfaction through options to how to search - go to Find Satisfaction in the Law: Taking control Over Your Career And Your Life and read any or all of the first 19 articles.
My suggestion is that you read at least the first five articles from Introduction to Through the Looking Glass: Your Options in the Law
While most of my time from 1984-1994 was devoted to advising law students, I have not had much of an opportunity to work with them since. As a favor to friends, I have also on some occasions been asked to talk to their sons and daughters (and grandchildren) considering attending law school. I strongly encourage both those in law school and those contemplating being there to read Looking for Law in All the Wrong Places? Choosing the Best Law School and Alternatives to Law School for Those Who Want to Be Lawyers" .THE CAREER SEARCH My approach requires that clients take control over the process and make all important decisions relating to their careers. There are two phases - the first, the Career Search, is followed by the Search for a Satisfying Position. During the Career Search, clients
- analyze and evaluate their present position
- review their past decisions
- recognize what is important
- become aware of goals, values and needs
- learn about and consider a range of options, and
- choose a setting consistent with their goals.
Quotes from “The Reinvention of Work” by Matthew Fox (no relation), a defrocked Catholic priest:
"If there is no bliss in our work, no passion or ecstasy, we have not yet found our work. We may have a job, but we do not yet have work. We have a right to and a need for joy in our work. There can be no joy in living without joy in our work." Page 95
"Here we come face-to-face with the mystery of vocation, or calling. …we find our calling by our natural inclinations, by that which we enjoy doing, are equipped to do, and feel joy in doing. …. In our times, we workers are being called to reexamine out work: how we do it; whom it is helping or hurting; what it is we do; and what we might be doing if we were to let go of our present work and follow a deeper calling." Page 103
"I think most of us are looking for a calling, not a job. Most of us, like the assembly line worker, have jobs that are too small for our spirit. Jobs are not big enough for people." Page 104
"If our work is small it is not revelatory; it contains no mystery, no deep passion …no wisdom, no real truth. It is drudgery without meaning; it is sweat without purpose; it is duty without play; it is toil alone that bears no fruit. It lacks newness, energy and hope for the future. It is not an adventure. It is not bigger than we are, calling us to expand as the universe is expanding. When our work is too small it lacks Spirit." Page 122
THE SEARCH FOR A SATISFYING OPPORTUNITY
When, and only when, clients know what they want to do, are they prepared to begin the Search for a Satisfying Opportunity. During this second phase clients
- develop an action plan
- draft targeted resumes
- build databases of contacts and potential employers
- make contact and promote themselves
- prepare for interviews, and
- consider and accept offers.
Once you have entered the search phase, I suggest that you read Taking Control - How to Search for Satisfying Positions and For Workplace Satisfaction, Lawyers Should Ignore Ads and Law Students Should Ignore On-Campus Interviewing
FOR MORE INFORMATION
If you would like more details about how I work, please write or call me at (781) 639-2322. Here is some advice about contracting with career planners and my fee structure. There is no cost to you or any obligation for the time I spend responding to specific questions about my services.
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