Texas Lawyer Recruiting & Attorney Search : Courtney Sapire : Texas Lawyer Jobs

As you gain experience in your legal career, you’re likely to be contacted by a legal recruiter at some point.   Here are tips on building and managing strong relationships with them:

Know what you want. Offer yourself as a candidate only if you’re serious about making a change. Headhunters don’t like “tire-kickers.”  Legal recruiters are engaged by their clients to find qualified and motivated candidates.  

Be available. Once you’ve agreed to submit your resume for a particular position, make yourself available for interviews.   Although it’s time-consuming, being too difficult to schedule potentially sends a message to a prospective employer that you’re not interested in the position.

Is everyone on board? Be sure to discuss career moves with family members who would be impacted by a change, or whose voices count in your decision-making process.   Don’t get to the offer stage before you discuss relocating with your spouse.

Disclosure. If you have submitted your resume to other firms or companies, and by all means, if you are currently interviewing for a different position than the one for which you’ve been contacted, disclose this information up front.   No one likes surprises, especially the firm or company that’s about to make you an offer. 

Stay in touch. Check in with legal recruiters about once every two weeks to stay on the radar screen, and especially if you have a status change.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

In a recent survey on the effects of associate salary increases conducted by Altman Weil Inc., companies are feeling the ripple effects.  In addition to restrictions on the extent to which junior associates can work on files, these increases are having an impact on corporate law department recruiting and hiring. 

Attracting and landing qualified candidates is getting harder.   In the past, non-executive level lawyers usually took a decrease in salary of approximately 20% when moving from a law firm to a corporate legal department.   That percentage has jumped to about 30% - 35% now, which has caused some associates to think twice about leaving. 

Corporate human resources departments are also feeling the pressure.   As outside counsel rates climb, many GCs are bringing more work in-house, as Law.com reports (see, “General Counsel Keep Close Watch on Associate Pay Hikes,” July 12, 2007). And more work in-house means legal hiring managers are leaning on HR to make budget adjustments in order to attract top lawyers.   Hiring a new lawyer at a higher base salary than those at comparable experience levels often necessitates across-the-board adjustments. So, the ultimate beneficiaries of associate raises may end up being the lawyers who are already practicing in corporate departments.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Top attorney candidates often have multiple job offers to choose from, especially in a tight legal job market. How do you maximize your chances of recruiting these lawyers to join your legal team?

1.      Quick Contact.   Let a candidate know you’re interested quickly. If several days go by following the submission of the resume, candidates assume there’s no interest and move on.  

2.      Scheduling.   After you’ve decided that a candidate is interview-worthy, scheduling an interview quickly demonstrates your interest level.

3.      Communication.   Prior to the interview, send a written job description and a list of the people with whom the candidate is scheduled to meet. Ideally, that list should contain a brief bio for each interviewer to give the candidate valuable information about the people on the team.

4.      Feedback.  Candidates have taken time off to come to your office for interviews. They want to know how the meeting went and whether they’ll be advancing to the next step.   If you’re on the fence about moving forward, just make a call to let them know you’re still in the evaluation process. It’s the thought that counts.

5.      Branding. Every communication with a candidate brands your company. Difficulties with scheduling, last-minute interview changes, changes to the job description and delays in feedback following interviews not only risk losing strong candidates to other jobs, but may suggest to outsiders that things are a little crazy or disorganized on the inside.   At worst, candidates may get a negative impression of how the company values people.    

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Not long ago, in-house counsel positions were highly coveted and in far greater demand than supply. With recent consolidation trends, new law firm associate salary raises, and the often large compensation disparities between law firm partners and in-house counsel, deciding whether to accept that in-house offer requires due diligence. 

Preliminary Research

Learn as much about the company as you can. Good sources of publicly available materials include Hoover’s, Yahoo Finance, Google Finance, and of course, the company’s website. Search the Internet for company news items from the past year and read the analysts’ reports.  Finally, use your own network of personal contacts – do you know any former in-house lawyers from the company, or lawyers who might have worked on an outside counsel basis for this company?

Ask Good Questions

Part of your research involves asking good interview questions (see my post of August 2, 2007 on good interview questions).

Law Department Profiles

How long has the General Counsel been in the role? If approaching retirement, what’s the succession plan? Do you like, respect and want to work for this person?

Get information about members of the legal department. Simply knowing experience levels, titles and practice areas can be useful. 

No amount of research, insightful questions and diligence can reveal every potential problem, but you’ll hopefully have a better feel for the department and the company before you take the job.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

My clients frequently consult me on law department benchmarking as an initial step in the hiring process. According to the 2006 Altman Weil/Lexis Nexis Law Department Metrics Benchmarking Survey (conducted and published annually), most legal departments are staffed in accordance with lawyers per total revenues. Averages are as follows:

• 3.49 lawyers per billion in revenues
• 1 paralegal per billion in revenues (or .3 paralegals per lawyer)
• 2 administrative assistants per billion in revenues

According to the survey, average internal costs per lawyer were $333,000. In my experience, the balance tips in favor of adding an additional lawyer to the department when outside counsel costs in a particular area exceed $400,000. However, certain industries have much higher headcount needs, such as electrical and chemical manufacturing. See also the Law.com In-House Counsel section for additional information.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

For an industry that runs on natural resources, it’s the human component that is becoming its newest challenge. The energy sector of the economy is more active than at any other time in the last 20 years. However, the industry has not only failed to attract new graduates, but it has lost seasoned professionals. 

Despite periodic spectacular earnings over the last 20 years, the oil and gas attorney workforce has been declining steadily for almost 20 years. The industry slump of the 1980’s was unusually severe and left long-lasting scars. Moreover, the “dirty industry” image has not done much in the past to attract people to the profession. Many recall the oil-soaked birds and dead otters on the beach following the Exxon-Valdez spill. Others simply viewed the industry as a slow-growth, old economy behemoth. 

Like other oil and gas professionals, lawyers left the industry for less cyclical sectors of the economy. However, unlike other industries affected by the economic downturn, the energy industry recovery did not bring these professionals back, nor were they replaced with new talent.  And the high tech boom of the late 1990’s provided refuge for the best and brightest. 

Adding to the problem, the average age in the oil and gas industry workforce is 49 – among the oldest of any sector in the U.S. economy. According to Martindale Hubbell, 85% of the lawyers who specialize in oil and gas law have more than 10 years of experience. In addition, a Labor Department study found that more than 65% of workers in the oil and gas industry are between the ages of 35 and 54, while only a “small” percentage are in their twenties. 

With the retirement wave approaching and global demand at record levels, energy industry legal departments are headed for a human resource crisis.  

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

After months of filling multiple roles in your legal department, you’ve finally received approval for a new attorney hire. The first step is creating the job description. Often, we become so familiar with our own organization that we fail to include the “sizzle factor” when advertising legal job openings and consequently, miss out on a great marketing opportunity.

Here are 6 tips to make your job description stand out:

1. Brief Summary. Provide a one-sentence opener with simple information about the company and the position. For example: “Fortune 500 energy company based in Houston seeks a senior commercial transactions counsel to support the pipeline division.”
2. Ideal Experience. List the type of experience that will lead to success in this position. Providing this information sometimes causes candidates to self-screen (depending on where you post the job), and might save you from an avalanche of unqualified résumés.
3. Position Details. What is the role? To whom does it report? If you have a range with an absolute maximum, list it. If you think you might want to consider candidates with on-point experience but who might have higher compensation expectations, leave the range open or negotiable, depending on experience.
4. Opportunity. What’s great about this job? What will this employee get to learn and accomplish? How will it advance a career?
5. Describe the company. Along with the basics, such as company size (in revenues and number of employees), industry and location, be sure to include information about the company vision for the short and long term, and what it’s like to work there.
6. Benefits. Provide detailed information about your benefits offering. Many descriptions merely tack on a line at the end that says, “… and excellent benefits.” Remember – this component is increasingly important to Generations X, Y and beyond. Most law firms don’t offer a 401(k) with a matching contribution to non-partners, and very few companies these days offer defined benefit plans.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

You’ve been through the pile of resumes for the last time and have finally selected your top five attorney candidates to interview. How will you elicit the information you need during that initial meeting?

Here’s a list of good questions to ask (of course, after the small talk):

• What interests you about this company? About this position?
• If you could design the perfect job for yourself, what would you do? Why?
• As a professional, how would others describe you? How would your boss describe you?
• What can you do for our company that no one else can?
• How do you structure your time?
• What do you like about your current job?
• What are your three biggest accomplishments in your current job? In your career?
• Describe a work situation in which you had to delegate responsibility. How did it turn out?
• Describe a time when you took initiative with respect to a particular project at work.
• What is the best constructive criticism you’ve ever received? Why?
• Tell me about a time when you made what you consider a mistake or bad decision on the job. How did you handle it?
• Tell me about a time when you set specific work goals for yourself. How did things turn out?
• How do you typically handle stress on the job? Describe an example.
• Can you describe a time when you went above and beyond the call of duty for a client?
• Imagine it’s six months after you started this job. On what criteria will you rely to determine you’ve made the right choice?

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Federal and state laws prohibit asking certain questions during an interview. The basic rule of thumb for playing it safe when conducting an interview is to keep it job-related. 

Here’s a list of topics to avoid:

• Age or date of birth
• Sex, race, creed, color, religion or national origin
• Disabilities of any kind
• Date and type of military discharge; military service
• Marital status
• Maiden name (for females)
• Citizenship (however, “do you have the legal right to work in the U.S.” is acceptable)
• Whether a person has children and what childcare arrangements have been made
• Psychological treatment history
• Arrest record
• Number of sick days last year
• Worker’s compensation filings or injuries on the job
• Retirement plans
• Residence ownership
• Pregnancy status
• Credit history
• Birthplace of parents or spouse

For more information, you can consult the EEOC: http://www.eeoc.gov/abouteeo/overview_practices.html .

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

Letting an employee go is one of the most difficult tasks to navigate as a manager. And yet, talent management, cutting costs, and redundancy elimination following a merger may all be eventual business necessities.

Here are 8 tips to make it as painless as possible:

1. CONSULT YOUR ATTORNEY. Make sure you understand the law and get coaching on traps to avoid.

2. Read the employee handbook. It contains all your company’s policies and procedures.

3. No surprises: make sure you’ve documented performance issues in the file.

4. If this is a performance issue, this is your opportunity to put the employee on notice and give her time to correct the problem.

5. If you plan to offer a severance package, a fair trade is a release of liability.

6. Keep it short and resist the urge to “sugar coat” the news.

7. Being “layoff-friendly” and helping the employee find a new job is a good idea, if possible.

8. Respect the privacy of the departing employee, but don’t underestimate the importance of communicating news to existing employees when appropriate.

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks

1. In what capacity did you work with Jane Doe?
2. How would you describe her overall performance?
3. What would you say are her strengths?
4. What do you feel would be areas for development?
5. How did she get along with co-workers?
6. How capable is she of working independently?
7. Tell me about written (or verbal) communications – did her work require much revision?
8. If you could, would you re-hire her? Why or why not?
9. [Describe the job]. Do you believe she would be effective in this role? Why?

• Email This
• Print
• Comments
• Trackbacks