Practice Tips

PRACTICE TIPS By: Brandon M. Allen

London Amburn

FIVE PRACTICE TIPS FROM A SECOND YEAR ASSOCIATE

It’s fair to say that I lost some interest with the catchy headline used for this month’s column. As a millennial (although on the very edge of making the cut, I’ll let you decide which edge), I rely on YouTube reviews for nearly everything I purchase. When conducting these reviews, you’re certain to run across the “Top 5 reasons you should buy this product”, or the “Top 5 reasons you should not buy that product.” Based on the success of these influencers, let’s give this a shot with our “Five Practice Tips from A Second Year Associate.”

Tip Number 1: You are likely to practice in many areas before you’re able to drill down into the area that best suits your goals. It’s true, I can competently file a detainer warrant in general sessions court in the morning, draft a motion for chancery court before lunch, and appear for a conference in federal court before the end of the day. This is how you build skills as a new attorney. I have always welcomed delegated work from others in the office who have developed and honed in on a particular practice area and prefer to stay in that lane with their practice. As a non-traditional law student, I was well aware of the fact that much of your education takes place on the job. I’m not sure I would be able to handle it, nor would this profession hold my interest, if there wasn’t something new to be learned every day at the office. It’s important to learn from those around you, and imperative to keep in mind that there is often more than a single way to approach many of the issues that we encounter on behalf of our clients. Work with the attorney who has delegated the task to ensure you are on the same page with her approach, as this can save you some work on the back end when you turn over the finished product.

Tip Number 2: Find a mentor and/or a sponsor. A speaker at a CLE I recently attended offered a great presentation on the difference between a mentor and a sponsor. I won’t dive into that here, but I would suggest you take a look at it if you’re able to find it on the KBA website or reach out to me and I will send you materials. Either way, it is crucial to build relationships and find these mentors and sponsors along your way. I’m surrounded by knowledgeable attorneys at my firm, and when I step into practice areas outside of their breadth of knowledge, I call an outside friend and mentor from my prior firm to obtain guidance from there.

Tip Number 3: Be flexible. You aren’t going to have maximum control over your calendar for a while. The delegation of tasks I mentioned above also means that hearings, meetings, and other commitments are being added to your calendar daily. Look at this as job security, and an opportunity to show that you’re able to manage multiple tasks consistently without reminders and the need to have someone manage your time for you. Speaking of time management, learn to bill efficiently. If you do not bill in your practice, congratulations. If you do bill, use your time management system, develop a spreadsheet, or formulate a system in which you can keep track of time as you bill it. You will thank yourself at every opportunity once you have trained your mind to become an efficient timekeeper. Tip Number 4: Become organized and keep it that way. These tips are connected! Unless you have a superpower, there is no way you will be able to keep up with work from multiple partners from memory. You don’t want a phone call from the bench with your presiding judge asking where you are for your hearing that was scheduled at 9:00 am. While this is no fun for any attorney, it is potentially worse for an associate! Not only are you answering to the Judge and your client, you’re also defending yourself in front of the partner whose client just texted them to ask why they had no representation in court. This goes for depositions, conference calls, and any other meeting or deadline that becomes your responsibility once it has been added to your plate.

Tip Number 5: We all have similar issues, regardless of what you hear from the community. Attorneys are confident. Our clients retain us to represent them and be confident in our actions. On occasion, this spills over to our personal lives and creates an environment in which our friends and peers feel as though they cannot admit they had a bad day or admit to the stress that they have been experiencing. Mental health and work/life balance have come a long way in recent years within our profession, but we aren’t there yet. Whether you’re working as a transactional attorney and trying to get an agreement turned and back to your client before she becomes frustrated, or you’re bracing yourself to appear in federal court where you are unfamiliar with your surroundings, it all comes with a certain level of anxiety. I believe that some of this anxiety can be channeled in a healthy manner. It keeps you on point and prepared to represent your client. Try to find that level of usefulness for yourself, and then also remind yourself that anything in excess of that benchmark isn’t going to do much in assisting you to get through your day.

If you’ve made it this far, I hope there was some piece of information you could extract to help in your practice. I feel like I should also say, be sure to like and subscribe, only because that’s how the influencers do it.

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