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[UnicornHunter]

You should even just start with - what percentage of jobs have a fucking work email tied to a personal device. That's something unique to the professional service industry. That shit is not normal. Less than 10%.

Nah dude, my gf designs clothes for a living and they loaded her shit up with company e-mail and a way to access their servers remotely.

I read something about the 20/20/20 fashion/media aspiring workers. Available 20 hours a day, in their 20s age, and paid in the 20s of thousands. Basically how these people get milked as interns in a more pyramid scheme than biglaw. That shit def sounded terrible. Sucks for your gf, she (prolly) has me beat.

She's lucky in that she's no longer an aspiring worker, but yeah her work actually is pretty brutal. 9-5 she's at the office dealing with meetings, fittings, training, presentations and shit like that and she does all her design work from home on nights and over weekends.

But yeah, her fault for choosing that industry. Not that you'd catch me saying that to her face.

[crazycanuck]

I take deliberate steps to remove the word "busy" from my life, and I think I'm more laid back and chill because of it.

If you ask someone how they are, a lot of times they say "good, busy". I just say "great" now. I've removed work email from my phone, and I often don't take my phone with me places. Fuck that. I focus on the person I'm with, not about whether I got a work email. At work when I switch projects, meetings, whatever, I take a minute to just relax and not be busy. Literally a minute.

Living in constant busyness sucks. I've come to terms that I'm not going to be an all star in my field. I'd rather enjoy where I am, and enjoy every moment.

[skers]

I take deliberate steps to remove the word "busy" from my life, and I think I'm more laid back and chill because of it.

If you ask someone how they are, a lot of times they say "good, busy". I just say "great" now. I've removed work email from my phone, and I often don't take my phone with me places. Fuck that. I focus on the person I'm with, not about whether I got a work email. At work when I switch projects, meetings, whatever, I take a minute to just relax and not be busy. Literally a minute.

Living in constant busyness sucks. I've come to terms that I'm not going to be an all star in my field. I'd rather enjoy where I am, and enjoy every moment.

Good outlook and fundamentally incompatible w/ big law unfortunately.

[dresden doll]

I'm obsessed with my work email. I hate myself for it, but there we are.

[Holly Golightly]

I'm obsessed with my work email. I hate myself for it, but there we are.

I worked from home several nights this week not because I had to, but because I wanted to.

[MCFC]

NYT writeup of the paper. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/05/upsho ... abg=1&_r=0

[Frayed Knot]

I'll never forget the time in maybe my first or second year, when I had just arrived at the park -- a 25 minute walk from home -- with my kid in the stroller, and the "nice" partner called me to look at some stip. I told him "I just got to the park with my kid, do you need me to look at it now?" figuring he'd say no, just get to it later. He said "yeah, I need you to make edits to it now and send it back." So I walked all the way back home with my kid. I read the thing as I pushed the stroller and edited it when I got home.

A dad in the park who overheard my conversation looked at me and was like "that's the worst, isn't it?" -- probably another lawyer.

But again, in my job this kind of thing only happens once in a while. In biglaw it's constant.

and if you said, I got another call in 5, I'll take a look in an hour, you would have had the hour with ur kid.

Found this to be true. If someone finds a window in which they can get you to work, they will feel like they can ask/demand it. If you just block out your hour with your kid/dog/hobby or say, "I will get you comments shortly/by 10", then usually everything works out fine.

Oh yeah, that's definitely true. I mean it was a rookie mistake. The best defense against work is other pending work, and I often use pending work as a shield for family time.

Reading through this, I'm starting the think that it's a mistake to ever give a non-work reason for not being able to do something. If I were to say "I can't do it because I have to X", I bet there'd always be some jerk who thinks X isn't important no matter what it is. (See my wife, go to my kid's play, get more than 4 hours of sleep, get more than 2 hours of sleep, be in a friend's wedding, etc., etc. ...)

Is TCR to just say "I can't" without giving a reason?

[dixiecupdrinking]

Yes IMO. even if you give a good reason, it sounds defensive.

[Frayed Knot]

Yes IMO. even if you give a good reason, it sounds defensive.

I think that's a good point to emphasize to K–JDs. School trains you that absences are either excused or unexcused, so it's always better to give a reason unless it's horrible (e.g., hung over). But the workplace doesn't work like that.

[PennBull]

I've come to terms that I'm not going to be an all star in my field. I'd rather enjoy where I am, and enjoy every moment.

Kinda how I feel

[PennBull]

Also there is no definitive mentality on vacations in biglaw. It change wildly between practice groups at the same damn firm. Some places you can definitely be out of pocket for two weeks. Some places will crucify you for taking more than two weeks of in-pocket vacation. I haven't heard of any place without a policy, but the policy never matters.

[84651846190]

"because they bill by the hour"

[Frayed Knot]

Also there is no definitive mentality on vacations in biglaw. It change wildly between practice groups at the same damn firm. Some places you can definitely be out of pocket for two weeks. Some places will crucify you for taking more than two weeks of in-pocket vacation. I haven't heard of any place without a policy, but the policy never matters.

For what it's worth (not much) as a SA I was told off for leaving a 4th year in the CC line of an email chain because it interfered with their vacation.

[Anonymous User]

I've come to terms that I'm not going to be an all star in my field. I'd rather enjoy where I am, and enjoy every moment.

Kinda how I feel

I came to the same realization, that I'm never going to be a standout or a star. But I had another realization soon after that it wouldn't bother me to never be a star or standout in biglaw, or other law job. I just want to do my job, do it well, and live my life a bit (i.e. see my family, spend time with my wife and kid, focus on the important things, etc.). Perhaps its just a matter of priorities but I would take infinitely more pride in being a standout star husband and father than I would in being a standout star lawyer. At the end of the day, work is work. I will do it to the best of my abilities, but I don't think my priorities (or intellect) would ever allow me to be an all star attorney. I wonder how long one can get by with that mindset. Time will tell.

[SweetrollStealer]

NYT writeup of the paper. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/05/upsho ... abg=1&_r=0

The "fakers" described are the people who are actually good at working at a law firm (or in another hours intensive professional services industry), whereas the people that actually work all the time just use sheer hours to overcome their failure to work efficiently and set reasonable boundaries. The problem (especially for junior assocs) is that both types get rewarded (client deliverables and hours billed are both valued), so there's a significant probability that your supervisor on a project will be the shitty/workaholic type instead of the effective/"faker" type.

[Desert Fox]

Also there is no definitive mentality on vacations in biglaw. It change wildly between practice groups at the same damn firm. Some places you can definitely be out of pocket for two weeks. Some places will crucify you for taking more than two weeks of in-pocket vacation. I haven't heard of any place without a policy, but the policy never matters.

For what it's worth (not much) as a SA I was told off for leaving a 4th year in the CC line of an email chain because it interfered with their vacation.

90 percent chance that was bullshit. Nobody tells you the truth during the summer, nobody.

[TTTooKewl]

Also there is no definitive mentality on vacations in biglaw. It change wildly between practice groups at the same damn firm. Some places you can definitely be out of pocket for two weeks. Some places will crucify you for taking more than two weeks of in-pocket vacation. I haven't heard of any place without a policy, but the policy never matters.

For what it's worth (not much) as a SA I was told off for leaving a 4th year in the CC line of an email chain because it interfered with their vacation.

90 percent chance that was bullshit. Nobody tells you the truth during the summer, nobody.

This looks like the consensus, but it seems so strange. Once a year, everyone for three months just puts on a happy face? Despite the fact that most of the current associates presumably were a few years earlier in the shoes of the SAs?

[xRON MEXiCOx]

I'm obsessed with my work email. I hate myself for it, but there we are.

yea same here. I check it obsessively.

[PennBull]

I think a lot of people are genuinely just happier during the summer/having summers around

[rahulg91]

I think a lot of people are genuinely just happier during the summer/having summers around

Happier during the summer I totally get, but happier to have summers around? I've heard having summers around increases workload for everyone (because everything they do has to be looked over), is this true?

[PennBull]

I absolutely can't wait to give some of my more menial shit to a summer. Sure I'll look it over but it's still better than having to do it myself

[sam91]

This looks like the consensus, but it seems so strange. Once a year, everyone for three months just puts on a happy face? Despite the fact that most of the current associates presumably were a few years earlier in the shoes of the SAs?

[los blancos]

This looks like the consensus, but it seems so strange. Once a year, everyone for three months just puts on a happy face? Despite the fact that most of the current associates presumably were a few years earlier in the shoes of the SAs?

My office is next to where one or two SA offices are going to be, and I have no clue how I'm going to handle it.

[TTTooKewl]

This looks like the consensus, but it seems so strange. Once a year, everyone for three months just puts on a happy face? Despite the fact that most of the current associates presumably were a few years earlier in the shoes of the SAs?

My office is next to where one or two SA offices are going to be, and I have no clue how I'm going to handle it.

What options are you considering?

[kaiser]

Don't assume that people are happy just because they put on a happy face. No one wants to be the firm downer and draw attention to their unhappiness. Sure, you can usually pry out this info by having some candid conversation, but its often very hard to tell when people are unhappy. This is particularly true when summers are around, and the whole firm is making a conscious effort to market itself and put on a good face.