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A few of the paralegals at my firm recently revealed to me one of the pettier associate job security strategies I've heard. Apparently a number of attorneys create their own coding system for labeling case documents. For example, if a letter of engagement would normally be labeled as such in the file trail system, the paranoid (around here anyway) associate would instead label it "8.3" or something similarly nondescript. This way, the logic goes, only the attorney knows their way around their cases, so they cannot easily be replaced because the case transition would be so time-consuming for the firm.

I suspect this is not as successful as the attorneys would hope given how much bad blood the practice has created amongst the paralegals (a group not to be discounted in firm politics) and how one would predict the partners would react to this antagonistic brand of survival behavior.

Does anyone else have similar stories of desperate job security strategies in big law?

Does anyone have job security strategies that actually work?

The firm I was at had a centralized database for all documents with standardized categorization... so this would not work there. I bet most large firms have something similar.

You want to keep you job? Become liked and respected. How?
1) Don't talk shit about your peers or superiors
2) Do consistently solid work
3) Volunteer for extra work
4) Engage with several partners and try to develop a few into mentors.
5) Be positive
6) make friends at work