Dream Career Possible? Forum

[kalvano]

1) Why do you even want to be a lawyer?

2) I work for a small firm that has quite possibly the most awesome partners who genuinely don't care when you're there as long as work gets done. I can work from basically anywhere and people often work from home or late at night or whenever. If I tried to keep the schedule you're proposing, I'd get fired in a couple of weeks. It's just not possible as a lawyer unless you work for yourself, and even then, you still have to be available to your clients.

[09042014]

Just to litigation at a non NYC firm. The partners will understand.

[johnB86]

I want to keep doing research on this, since I feel like there must be someone out there who was in a similar situation, at least in terms of scheduling conflicts, and made it work.

How to make bad decisions:

Assume you're right

Look for information that is consistent with your conclusion

Disregard information that conflicts

Maybe OP can be a law professor. Teach two 1 hour classes per week and use same logic as quoted to write law review articles?

[A. Nony Mouse]

I work in the public sector, and the problem (if you're in litigation) is that you're subject to the court schedule, which is 8:30 to 5 (roughly). Flex time is an option in my office (once you've worked there 4 years), which means you can work longer days M-Th and get every other Friday off (or another day if that works better for you), but flex only goes so far. Part time isn't generally an option.

A big firm isn't going to accommodate this kind of thing because they don't need to - there are going to be lots and lots and LOTS of applicants who don't have these scheduling issues, so why should they hire/accommodate you?

Honestly, I think one of the biggest issues is that you talk about having rehearsals between 10-5 4x a week. If rehearsals were all in the evenings, you might manage to swing something, especially as you're willing to come in early. And while plenty of big firms require weekend work, you might be able to organize that around weekend events, since it's outside usual business hours (but you might not).

As for parenting, yes, parents often want flexibility, but they don't always/often get it (especially in biglaw; some firms figure they're paying you enough to get childcare!), but the schedule you imagine isn't a realistic one for parents, either. Childcare is organized around traditional working hours, 9-5 or the like, or maybe for after school stuff once the kid is old enough to spend the day in school. I don't know of any parents who have to/want to duck out of work 4x a week for 2.5 hours between 10-5. It's usually more about how to coordinate getting kids to/from childcare/school with the start/end of the work day, or it's short-term emergency things (your kid gets a fever and has to go home at 11:30).

Maybe you will be able to swing something like this, but if you do, it will be extremely unusual and unconventional, so you will probably be forging the path rather than finding examples.

[FSK]

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[AllTheLawz]

I know several people who keep up with classical music (albeit on a smaller scale than what you are describing here). All are former professionals who got tired of making little money and switched to other professions. My understanding is that you pretty much have to be in Boston/NYC or a similar place that has a variety of classical music organizations at a variety of different levels. In addition, none of them do it as a second career, they basically play in either full-amateur or mixed pro-am organizations and only take on something small for pay once or twice a year.

As far as maintaining both as careers it is absolutely impossible. There are no "shifts" in law. Quite often things change rapidly for something that then needs to be turned around quickly once received. You can't schedule around things like that. The only possible groups at major law firms you may be able to do something like this are Investment Funds or Investment Management groups where things have relatively predictable work spikes throughout the year. Even then, probably won't work well.

[guano]

Compliance might be a possibility...

[LsatDork]

Thanks all for your replies. Encouraging or not they have all been very useful. Did more research. Here are the three main things I found. Posting for other interested parties as far as comments/thoughts:

One solo practitioner (land use, RE) and orchestra musician.
1. Went to music school
2. Won their orchestra job (regional orchestra (ROPA) so lower time commitment, 3-4 2.5 hours services per week, evenings only, 8-10ish weeks October through May)
3. Went to law school a few years later;
4. Associate corporation counsel job
5. Opened solo practice; also does a bunch of other legal things (some for their orchestra), board, talks, whatever
Steps 3-5 while holding the orchestra seat through law school and work.

One DOJ trial attorney and classical musician.
1. Went to music school, won many awards
2. Went to law school
3. Got DOJ job+Founding/advising some np music organizations
4. Had 3 kids (while working, still working)
Steps 2-4 while regularly giving chamber/solo performances

One entrepreneur/business architect and chamber musician.
1. Went to music school
2-3?. Went to H for grad degree (policy not law but entrepreneurship seems accessible to HYSC grad with relevant contacts/experience?)
2-3?. Won orchestra and faculty positions @ major music institutions
4-5?. Entrepreneur, YGL, bunch of great business stuff, etc...
4-5?. Switch to freelancing/recording (LA-based, huge musical market for those 2 things)

Still trying to decipher and see if any of this can be in indirect ways useful to me: http://recoveringoboist.blogspot.com/p/blog-index.html

[DELG]

3-4 2.5 hours services per week, evenings only, 8-10ish weeks October through May

Yeah that's way different than what you initially described and sounds infinitely more doable. Anything that's evenings only would be compatible with quite a lot of legal jobs.

[olive16]

Definitely possible if you are a solo practitioner. If you aren't your own boss, though, probably not going to be possible.

[LsatDork]

Yeah it is. Significant time commitment difference between major and regional orchestras. Doesn't seem like there is anybody that actually attempted to practice law full-time and be in a major orchestra, at least not that I have found so far.

I wonder, so which entry-level legal jobs would let you leave at 5-6pm if you came in around 6am (+weekend hours)?

Thanks, sorry if this seems like a repetitive question or a dead horse flogging sort of thing, just trying to get as much precision and as many specific examples as possible.

[Emma.]

I wonder, so which entry-level legal jobs would let you leave at 5-6pm if you came in around 6am (+weekend hours)?

You are going to struggle to find one. As many others have pointed out, it doesn't matter whether you are willing to come in at 6am or in the weekend. Legal work isn't a big pile of stuff you get at the start of the week and as long as it is all done by Friday you are golden. The problem is that in most every legal job you'll be faced with work that comes in unpredictably and needs to be done on a tight schedule.

[Holly Golightly]

It's possible that something like your second scenario could work at a very small firm. Like a personal injury firm that only has a couple of lawyers. But I wouldn't go to law school without already having something like that lined up.

[A. Nony Mouse]

Leaving at 5-6 is totally reasonable in my (fed gov) job about 90% of the time. And you probably could make up any extra time by coming in at 6 am rather than staying late - we don't generally get things dumped on us at 5 with the requirement that be done by morning (I don't get work dumped on me in the same way that happens in firms because I run my own cases, and since I'm in lit the deadlines are pretty clear ahead of time); I know some people do some work at home, but come 5:30 pm, the office is a ghost town.

However, if you're in trial this all goes out the window - the court time will end by 4:30-5:30, but if you need to do stuff to prepare for the next day, you're staying late. You'll know when trials are coming ahead of time, but you wouldn't be able to do much of anything else during trial.

[worldtraveler]

You might be able to do a solo practice immigration form. 90% of your work is filling out forms or prepping people for interviews and court tends to be pretty predictable.

[nygrrrl]

As a working performer who continued to work during law school, a couple of thoughts...

First of all, congrats OP! Making it to where you have as a classical musician is a wonderful thing and I absolutely understand the amount of time and passion involved.
Along those lines, I'm glad to hear that you plan to work for a few years before heading to law school (if that's what you ultimately decide to do.) Now is the perfect time in your life to really give performing a go, see how far it takes you - enjoy.

While you're doing that, what if you got a PT job at a law firm, to see what it's like? I'm not sure you would be able to find a paralegal spot/job that could accommodate your rehearsal/performance schedule, but I had several friends who worked in law offices between tours, etc. and perhaps it's an option? Working at a firm might give you a much better idea of the actual day to day schedule of most associates, and an idea of how you wanted to proceed/whether or not you could pull off your dream job. The thing is, I agree with all of the posters in this thread who are telling you how difficult this will be. I do know a couple of attorneys in NYC who have continued to perform on the side, but all of them took time off from performing when they were starting their legal careers, returning to playing publicly only when they were established in their legal careers.
Anyway, hope this helps, and best of luck!

[Bigbub75]

OP, I know someone who works for a financial regulator who is very involved in the arts. Meaning he still performs, often teaches students and even manages a few performers. The regulator allows for a very flexible schedule (for example you can work 4 days a week, 10 hours a day), you can work from home up to 3 days a week and they give employees a generous amount of vacation time. So when you combine all 3 of these together you have a lot of flexibility. They also allow you to work part-time. One female attorney I know works at the same regulator part-time (3 days a week) and still makes about $80k. And unlike working for a firm part time, working for the gov part time is really only 20 hours a week. She moved to the schedule because she has kids. I should note that this is a "unicorn" job. There aren't a lot of positions out there like this and the people that land them usually are lifers.

[PMan99]

There is always one answer to any "dream job" with regards to legal employment: law professor. 2-3 hrs per week for six figs. I think you'd have enough flexibility to fit in some orchestra practices in there.