I’ve recently blacked out fell backwards and hit my head on the concrete at my job and I woke up convulsing/whole body shaking confused on where I was for a moment, my coworkers seen it happen as well as my trainer. when something like this happens they are supposed to call a CODE GREEN and STOP everything in the warehouse and call the ambulance instead my trainer waited for me to wake up and took me to my OM (team leader) and she proceeded to take me to the in warehouse medical room to question me right after I had just woke up from being knocked out, they then told me I’d have to go home on work comp and would get paid for the day but I was lied to and didn’t was only paid for the time I was there that week, they just cover the hospital bill that they made me drive to. this happen a few weeks ago and I wasn’t sure if I could do something but my coworkers made good point that they never call the CODE GRREN that’s life threatening. i could of never woke up and it make me feel like now I wasn’t treated very fairly

I’m about 10 years into solo practice doing transactional work for SMBs and real estate. I’m basically maxed out for personal output and am feeling like I have just built a well-paying but consuming job, not a business. Meanwhile, I have clients that have slowly but surely grown their businesses over a similar period of time to the point of some scale and leverage. Doing less “in the business” and more “on the business”, as they say. I have two part-time paralegals (one for each core practice area) but it really hasn’t freed up time. If anything I just push more work through, bill some more, but sometimes wonder if the questions, occasional fumbles, and added admin is worth the stress of more volume and marginally more money.

All that said, I may just be doing this wrong. Has anyone figured out a way to scale a small transactional practice aside from the usual model? That being hire paralegals, try to find a promising junior, and basically hand-hold for theoretical gain. Maybe there’s work that scales or leverages well? Subscription models that really work? Fractional GC structures?

I see so many very senior lawyers grinding away with no real leverage into the twilight of their career. Hopefully there’s a better way. Has anyone managed to become an “owner” rather than chief employee of their firm?

Thanks!

What happens when opposing counsel falls off the face of the earth? Case was dismissed (Dec ‘23) because he was supposed to file the paperwork (from Aug ‘23) but disappeared. It’s a custody case. One parent is in OR and the other is ID. Case is in OR. Tyia

What’s the chance of Clarence Thomas retiring before 2029? The supremes may have to decide is POTUS can pardon himself.

Hi all,

I’ve been practicing in my jx for a few years and I’m ready to make a move into a new state. I’m looking primarily at the Chicago area. I’d really like to apply for admission to the bar now so I’m closer to having my license when I’d actually start a job, but I’m spooked by the fact that the C+F questionnaire indicates that they’ll verify my employment history via emails. My firm doesn’t know I’m looking and I’d like to keep it that way.

What have other folks done in this situation? It looks like the file processors’ contact information is posted on the IL bar website; would it be out of line for me to reach out and ask if I can verify my current employment another way (pay stubs, etc.)?

Any other experiences with processing time for admission by motion in Illinois would be welcomed, too!

Is there a document out there somewhere with a master list of ways to describe tasks in time entry software? I feel like there has to be something.

So I am a lawyer with four years of experience. I have two companies on retainer with a very very minimal retainer of INR 15,000 per month where I am handling everything in house for both of them. Any and every legal issue, drafting , vetting and negotiating contracts, internal documents, everything.

It has been 6 months now with these companies. I am a litigating lawyer so 90% of my time goes in litigation with other clients.

Now I want to revise my retainer with them or revise the terms that filing of any cases before court won’t be a part of ny retainer. I know that they won’t agree and most likely they will drop me.

On one hand I like the variety of work and on the other hand I simple don’t care because if they drop me, I will have enough time to concentrate on clients who pay me and treat me well.

My employment contracts a blanket restriction on rendering legal services outside of my job as an associate lawyer.

Keen to move into solo space in the future and want to get experience by doing pro bono and potentially some work on the side.

From experience, how strict are biglaw firms when it comes to doing pro bono or work on the side that’s in a completely different field. I.e I do commercial contracts but would be interested in doing criminal, family or immigration work on the side and covering it with separate malpractice insurance.

Hey everyone,

I’m currently at a crossroads in my legal career, and I’m hoping to get some advice from others who have been in similar situations. For some context:

I’ve been practicing law for about 5 years, focusing primarily on wills and estates. I’m at a firm now, but lately, I’ve been feeling stretched pretty thin. The workload is tough, and despite being here for a while, there hasn’t been much growth on the admin support side, which means I’m juggling a lot of the day-to-day stuff myself. I’ve reached the point where I’m questioning whether this environment is the best fit for me long-term.

A little backstory: I did briefly start my own firm before joining my current one. I ended up shutting it down after a year or so to get the stability of consistent pay—especially with a newborn at home at the time. But now I’m really thinking about going back to the solo route, with the idea of building a firm that focuses on both estates and personal injury.

On the other hand, I’ve been considering in-house roles as well, mainly for the potential for consistent work hours and a shift toward business law/transactional work, which I’ve become more interested in recently. I’m torn between the flexibility and autonomy of running my own firm, the stability of an in-house position, and the challenges of staying at my current firm and hoping things improve.

Overall, my goal is to be comfortable financially in life and achieve more flexibility to travel and live life.

So I’m curious, have any of you been in a similar spot? How did you make your decision? Any insights on going solo again versus moving in-house or sticking with a firm? What are the pros and cons you’ve experienced?

Thanks in advance for your advice!

I’ve been perusing the PLSF snd student loan subreddits to quell my panic a bit, but man, this election result has me concerned. I enrolled in SAVE a while back and have been in forced admin forbearance because of the injunction.

Any other public interest folks doing anything in particular to plan for the worst or are we just twiddling our fingers and hoping we don’t have to be in debt until we die…?

Hi all, I’m currently clerking for a NJ superior court judge. The judge is super amazing and I’m learning a lot of things. Super grateful for the opportunity BUT the pay is shit. Every paycheck there’s a new deduction and after having 2 breakdowns about it, I really need to figure something out.

Before you shit on my planning or budgeting, please note that I was not aware that there would be so many deductions.

Now, after fighting back panic attacks, I decided that either I’ll need to find a part time job or find a full time job and quit the clerkship. Obviously the latter is blasphemy and career ending so that I don’t want to do. Plus I haven’t been barred yet so there’s that.

How common is to get a part time job? What type of part time jobs can I get or would be better for a law clerk? [my judge is very specific that since I don’t get overtime and such I don’t stay overtime or need to work overtime]

I was the lawyer for the deceased and the heirs are fighting like crazy. They want all the records for every file - but I've got too much attorney work product in there. Now I'm going to have to comb through the files and determine what is privileged.

Gah. I'm going to have to research how to handle this as I've never dealt with it before.

A question posed by another poster about setting up shop in a "small town" jogged this question - which has been rattling around my brain for a bit: who, if anyone, is representing the minority business owners who, it seems, are the true "small business owners" in these small towns (at least, here in the Midwest fly-over country)? Every low to mid-priced hotel in a small town appears to be owned by someone of Indian or Pakistani descent. Same is true for many of the gasoline and convenience stores. Many non-chain restaurants are Mexican food and seem to be owned by those of Mexican descent. Nail salons - Vietnamese. This is NOT a knock on immigrant owned businesses --- indeed, I find many of them to be hardworking and sharp business people. But, in these small towns....the few lawyers that remain in town and local largely are NOT Indian, Pakistani, Mexican, Vietnamese, etc. Is this an under-served market? Are there cultural barriers/differences about using lawyers to help say, form business entities, review leases, assist in transitions/transactions?? What are your experiences and interactions like??

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Like, if i wanted to get one as a fun vacation to an interesting US location/school (I am a US lawyer), then what would I actually do with it? Can i use it to switch practice area, or hone my trial skills, or launch an academic writing career? Or is it just a year of nerdy fun?

I have internships in these practice areas but because of visa issues when I had very less time to find a sponsor I ended up taking an immigration law job. Is anyone here actually willing to give me a job in the above areas because I do have transferable skills. I know it’s very weird to post it here.

I'm wondering if anyone has experience with this, or knows about the process. Obviously it depends on the country, but I'm just wondering if it's actually feasible. What's a common obstacle? Do you pretty much have to start over, or does a US bar license hold some weight? Do other countries have their own versions of an L.L.M.?

To clarify, I'm not talking about just being transferred to to an international branch of an American law firm; I am talking about having US bar admission, literally moving to another country, getting licensed as an attorney in that country, and practicing law there.

Any advice? How should I triage? Best organizational tips? How do I make sure as little as possible slips through the cracks? I’m unbelievably overwhelmed and don’t know where to start

I've been making solo practice posts from when I first started my practice about eight years ago on r/lawyers. r/lawyers unfortunately is a lot less active, so going to post here and on r/lawfirm. I originally started my practice just based on posts that I read on r/lawyers and r/lawfirm, so I thought it would be fun to make periodic posts to give updates on my practice and hopefully motivate others to make the jump.

I started with zero clients and a few months worth of legal experience (definitely don't recommend my path). I have been extremely, extremely fortunate and have done very well financially. I'm always happy to talk shop and help others with start/grow their practice.

My practice is entirely transactional. I refer out all litigation cases. Most of what I do is estate planning/elder law. I see a ton of posts on here about switching to EP work or starting an EP firm. I always think it's best to start a practice in what you know how to do, whether it's litigation or transactional. EP work is not easy and it is very hard to make a good living doing EP work since there are so many "EP attorneys." There are many EP attorneys who do some pretty terrible work and don't really know what they're doing. Please don't be that attorney just doing simple wills for people. You're really doing the vast majority of clients a disservice.

Anyways, about 60% of my business (or more) comes from the website (SEO). 40% referrals/word of mouth. I spend a lot of time writing content/articles for my website and the website has generated over 50k clicks over the past year.

Income/Expenses

2024 Income: I'm projected to hit about $750k in gross income this year. Topped last year by about $100k. I'm basically maxed out for a solo, so would need to hire someone else full time to hit $1m gross. Really have no desire to do so.

My 2024 goal was to make less money with the firm, but the phone keeps ringing and the business keeps rolling in. So I am working on creating a more efficient system where I can work less and still help as many people as I can.

2024 Expenses: ~$150k. I have one full time paralegal who lives/works remotely from overseas (he's a lawyer in Argentina). He is my biggest expense each month. Then I spend about $3,000/month on SEO, which is worth every damn penny. The rest of the expenses are in rent/supplies. I run a very lean practice and I rarely work from the office.

Rental Properties

My business partner and I started buying rentals back in 2021. Our goal from the get go was to buy two properties a year. We're now up to 12 rental properties and over 20 doors. Most are airbnbs/vrbos and we self manage them. I have about 15 properties total if you include the 12 rentals.

We target older properties that need a ton of love/work. We do most of the updating ourselves...electrical, flooring, painting, etc. We're on pace to gross about 300k this year from the properties.

Will likely be buying a home in Italy with a close friend and will eventually transition to spending 3-4 months of the year working from Italy/Mexico.

Other Business Ventures

Recently started an IT business with a close friend and we were able to pick up some lucrative contracts. We're on pace to gross about 1.5m (probably net about half) this year, and we're hoping to triple that number in the next couple of years.

2025 Goals

2024 was a great year. Wife and I had our first child who is now six months old. Being self-employed has allowed my wife to stay home and has given me the complete flexibility to work when I want and where I want. I am rarely in the office, and when I am I will stack all of my client meetings for that specific city for that day.

I am really going to try and slow down for 2025. So my goal will be to create processes/systems to become more efficient. 2021 through the end of 2023 were absolutely insane -- covid, working two full time jobs, etc. I completely burned myself out. So I'm going to focus more on myself (hobbies), my family/friends, and spending time traveling.

I'm always happy to talk shop, whether it's law firm stuff or rental properties. I really enjoy seeing others start their practices and become successful, so feel free to reach out. One of the coolest parts about building a law firm is that there are a million ways to do it, so I learn a lot from talking with others and hearing about how they run their practice.

Cheers. And if you're thinking about going solo, do it.

So, I recently changed over from civil private practice to criminal prosecution, because I want to bank some trial experience. But after a few months of this, idk if I'm delusional enough to fit in.

There was recently a trial that I attended, and when the defense got a not-guilty jury verdict, everyone lost their minds. And then I said, "well, maybe he didn't do it." I got some of the most nasty stares imaginable.

Meanwhile, at bond hearings, these people will take up an hour of our time bringing in all this testimony about the facts, and I typically stay limited to only those factors relevant to likelihood of the defendant to show up to proceedings, and potential for re-offense during pendency. Those are literally the only relevant policy factors at a bond hearing, but I get criticized because I'm not raking a defendant over the coals for as long as possible just to try to milk an emotional response.

Am I just literally not meant to be a prosecutor? I just want to find actual justice, I don't care about the fucking scoreboard because these are real human lives we're dealing with.

How reasonable would it be to offer transactional legal services for mid-market, owner operated type businesses and make a decent living in a small town? Where might you look for associates experience for this or just exposure as a law student.

I have no idea what’s going to happen now, but I know I don’t want me or my child to be subject to the whims of a red state in the next few years.

Anyone had luck with moving to another jurisdiction and just becoming a paralegal? How did you it? Can you recommend any resources?

A clerk asked me for my “wet” signature…I guess as opposed to docusign. I’ve heard it before too. But I used the term with clients the other day and they’re like wtf r u talking about wet?

Currently at a defense firm working 90% remote (been here about 10 months) and I started looking for jobs in-house or government for more work life balance since billables are crushing me. Landed an interview with a university but not sure if I should continue with a second interview which I was just offered… I originally applied for a deputy general counsel role (seeking approximately 7 years experience and I have 5.5). In the email informing me of the invitation for a second round (in person), they asked if I would like to be considered for a different (unposted) associate counsel role. The job description attached says seeking 3-5 years experience and has a significant salary difference. The top end of the pay scale would be more than $40k cut than what I make now. It also says hybrid eligible after a probationary period, whatever that means.

I am still being considered for the role I applied for, and that salary range goes $30k higher than where I’m at now.

It’s a small department and I just don’t know if it’s even worth making a jump and therefore taking a second interview. In my mind they probably favor me for this associate counsel role. Also I’d have to essentially take off 4 hours to make it there in person given traffic and timing. I’m also not sure if it’s bad form to decline an interview at this point.

Thoughts?

Thinking of making a move from Florida for personal/ obvious reasons but work in personal injury. I have a lot of family in Virginia but I know it’s hard to beat the opportunities in FL for personal injury. Anyone have some insight?

Hello. I'm looking at a state job that is concerned with unemployment claims. Does anyone have experience with this area of law? It seems like it's mostly informal, admin. law sort of hearings, but I would like to know more. Thanks for your help.

Not that it's required, but I like to have a paper copy to see the weight of the paper, binding, etc.

Anyone here have experience/advice/ideas about finding work in another country with a U.S. JD, whether practicing or JD advantage?

Edit: Or a remote position that could be done from another country?

So, in my practice we get default judgments a lot. We always ask for pre-judgment interest, and always submit documentation clearly telling the Court the amount due "as of this filing" and the amount it will increase by per day until the entry of judgment.

In our jurisdiction, and because of the types of cases we're handling, hearings are basically never required, so we submit a proposed order immediately. The proposed order always has the pre-judgment interest (and total judgment) as of the date it's submitted. And naturally, a few days/weeks later the Court will enter judgment with exactly the amounts we put in the proposed order, without adjusting it one bit. Normally this is a "who cares" thing (might be $1-2 per day) but occasionally it can be a few hundred total the client is missing out on.

I've considered a few ways of addressing this.

• In one case (dealing with a number of days for compliance with the order) I left a blank for the Court to write in a number. The Court just left it blank and signed the order...
• I've considered highlighting the need to adjust the amount in the cover letter, but suspect the Court won't catch that (we'd done that in the previous case and the Court just ignored it and left the line blank).
• I've considered submitting a spreadsheet with the amount of interest and total judgment if the judgment is signed on 11/7, 11/8, 11/9, etc.
• I've considered asking for an amended judgment where the interest is incorrect and for a significant amount.
• I've considered setting default judgment motions for hearing, but would prefer not to do that since it's important to lock in the judgment rather than risk the defaulted defendant appearing and moving to vacate.

Also please note that this is for state court. I have never had this problem in federal court (they almost uniformly ignore our proposed orders lol).