Brace for impact How the next market crash will affect your career p.17
Abandoned Can the PATH return to its former glory? p.29
Out of office Pop culture recommendations from six managing partners p.32
The new rules of law and style Winter 2021 $9.95 precedentmagazine.com
The Precedent Innovation Awards People, projects and ideas that are improving the profession
Aliah El-houni, Sima Atri and Leora Smith The Community Justice Collective
EXCLUSIVE ONLINE NETWORKING FOR LAWYERS
The following lawyers were recently featured on the Precedent A-List a-list.lawandstyle.ca The Precedent A-List is your online source for awards, promotions, new hires and other legal news
Weisz Fell Kour welcomes new associate Alec Angle
Ross Nasseri welcomes new partner Jacqueline Cole
Minden Gross welcomes new associate Brittany Collura Stewart
Thomson Rogers welcomes new partner Megan Edmiston
McCarthy Hansen announces Maureen Edwards as a partner
Loopstra Nixon welcomes new partner Jessica Elie
Minden Gross announces Melodie Eng as partner
Dickinson Wright welcomes new associate Pejman Esfandiari
Keyser Mason Ball announces Kevin Fernandes as an associate partner
Minden Gross welcomes new associate Julian Franch
Get more news online at a-list.lawandstyle.ca
Minden Gross announces Rachel Goldman Robinson as partner
Loopstra Nixon welcomes new associate Matthew Irish
Tyr welcomes new partner Sandeep Joshi
Blaney McMurtry welcomes new partner Igor Kastelyanets
Loopstra Nixon welcomes new associate Tahir Khorasanee
Polley Faith welcomes new associate Ryan Lapensee
Kalloghlian Myers welcomes new partner Dimitri Lascaris
Mathews Dinsdale welcomes Jackie Laviolette as counsel
Blaney McMurtry welcomes new associate David Leck
DMG Advocates welcomes new associate Max Libman
Minden Gross welcomes new associate Marco Lippi
Dickinson Wright welcomes new associate Ray Luckiram
WeirFoulds welcomes new partner Lucinda E. Main
Minden Gross welcomes new associate Tamara Markovic
Addario Law Group welcomes new associate Laura Metcalfe
Minden Gross welcomes new associate Adrian Mikolajewski
Burnet, Duckworth & Palmer welcomes new associate Erin Moch
Minden Gross announces Sepideh Nassabi as partner
INQ Law welcomes new partner Ira Parghi
Miller Thomson announces David Pickwoad as C.O.O.
Minden Gross welcomes new associate Navneet Sandhu
Polley Faith welcomes new associate Diane Shnier
Minden Gross announces Brian Temins as managing partner
WeirFoulds welcomes new associate Shawn Tian
Dickinson Wright welcomes new partner Sanjukta Tole
SpringLaw welcomes Flora Vineberg
WeirFoulds welcomes new associate Agatha Wong
Minden Gross welcomes new associate Andrea Wong
Loopstra Nixon welcomes new associate Sarah Wouters
Dickinson Wright welcomes new associate Lydia Yu
To share your news, contact us at alist.support@precedentmagazine.com 416-929-4495
On the cover Photography by Kyle Jeffers
Winter 2021. Volume 15. Issue 4.
“ I know how intimidating it can be to reach out to senior lawyers.”
PHOTOGRAPHY BY KYLE JEFFERS
Gurteg Singh of Ethical Associates, a Precedent Innovation Award winner p.19
Cover story
The Precedent Innovation Awards
In another year of global upheaval, most lawyers found it hard enough to maintain the status quo. But a select few launched forward-thinking projects that are having a profound impact on the profession p.19
PRECEDENTMAGAZINE.COM 5
Contents
17
29
Brief
Debrief
Editor’s Note In the dark days of the pandemic, I discovered the best way to use Zoom p.9
Best Practices Meet the top lawyer at one of Toronto’s most buzz-worthy entertainment companies p.13
The Insider Assessing the damage that the pandemic has inflicted on the PATH p.29
Letters Our readers respond to our summer issue p.10
Opinion If you’re stuck in a career rut, there is a way out p.15
Our People We asked our contributors to tell us their favourite smartphone app p.11
On the Record Once the pandemic-fuelled economic boom comes to an end, what will happen on Bay Street? p.17
Out of Office Managing partners recommend books, music and television shows to help you survive the winter p.32
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PRECEDENT WINTER 2021
Secret Life This Bay Street partner is a gifted skateboarder p.34
On precedentmagazine.com
The most common mistakes that new associates make Every year, junior lawyers stumble into the same pitfalls
IMAGES BY (CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT): STEPH MARTYNIUK, JAMIE BENNETT, SAM ISLAND
34
If you haven’t been in court for a while, your legal wardrobe might need some attention.
B ehi nd the s eams
How to revive your legal wardrobe after the pandemic
T h e g o w n If your gown hasn’t seen the light of day since March 2020, it’ll take a bit of TLC to get it back into court-ready shape. You can start by hanging it in the closet for a few days, but lingering wrinkles or odours call for a visit to the dry cleaner.
T h e w a i s T c o a T Your waistcoat might need some air, so hang it up and hit it with a few spritzes of a gentle fabric-freshening spray. After a few days, store it in a cloth garment bag until your next court date.
Trust Harcourts for high-quality court attire. When it’s time to get ready for your next in-person court appearance, we’re here to help. Book an appointment with our tailor today at harcourts.com/legal or call us at (416) 977-4408.
T h e T a b s The smallest element of your court wardrobe is also the most resilient. Wash your wrinkled tabs in the machine on delicate, before lightly pressing everything except the Velcro. Then you’ll be ready to face the judge.
WINTER 2021. VOLUME 15. ISSUE 4. PUBLISHER & EDITOR
Melissa Kluger SENIOR EDITOR
CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS & ILLUSTRATORS
Maureen Barnes
Artello Jamie Bennett Kelsey Heinrichs Sam Island Kyle Jeffers Steph Martyniuk
ART DIRECTION
IT CONSULTANT
Daniel Fish MARKETING COORDINATOR
Liana Ramos ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT
Brian Morgan Rachel Wine
MacMedics.ca
ACCOUNTING
DIGITAL IMAGING SPECIALIST
Paul Cass
Paul Jerinkitsch Imaging
CONTRIBUTING EDITOR
FACT-CHECKERS
Allison Baker
Martha Beach Catherine Dowling
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS
Jeremy Freed Danielle Groen Matthew Halliday Simon Lewsen Mai Nguyen Luc Rinaldi Conan Tobias Daniel Waldman
Legal innovation
PROOFREADERS
Amy van den Berg Lazarus James Jennifer Marston Anna Maxymiw Sarah Munn
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Precedent Magazine 2 Berkeley Street, Suite 205, Toronto, ON M5A 4J5 Precedent is a career and lifestyle magazine for Toronto lawyers, published four times a year by Law and Style Media Inc. 2 Berkeley Street, Suite 205, Toronto, ON M5A 4J5 416.929.4495 subscribe@precedentmagazine.com precedentmagazine.com DISTRIBUTION
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Please email advertising@precedentmagazine.com for our full media kit. Precedent does not accept financial compensation in exchange for editorial content. © 2021, Law and Style Media Inc. ™Precedent & Design and Precedent are trademarks of Law and Style Media Inc. All rights reserved. No part of Precedent may be reproduced in any form or by any means without prior written consent of Law and Style Media Inc. The views expressed by the contributors are not necessarily those of the publisher, editor or staff of Precedent magazine. Printed in Canada by Dollco Print Solutions Group. Made possible with the support of:
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PRECEDENT WINTER 2021
The only place you’ll find both:
precedentmagazine.com
Editor’s Note
Join the club I’m not looking forward to another holiday party on Zoom, but the platform does have its virtues As we enter the holiday season, I’m struggling to think of a way to celebrate the
PHOTO BY IAN PATTERSON
end of a successful year with the Precedent team. In this uncertain phase of the pandemic, we can sort of get together in person, but that option comes with layers of restrictions, vaccine passports and general anxiety. At the same time, I don’t think anyone would be excited to play a game of online Pictionary or take part in a virtual wine tasting. In fact, the greatest gift you could give a colleague this month might be one less Zoom meeting. Despite my holiday-party angst, however, I have to acknowledge that some things have been better on Zoom. Here’s my best example. Somewhere deep in the midst of a cold and lonely lockdown season, I invited a group of women to join me on Zoom for what I called Money Club. We met on Sundays to talk about subjects like wills, life insurance and investing. These are not the most delightful conversation topics, but, as the lockdown ticked along, I started to look forward to our weekly meetings. We could ask one another for advice, share our frustrations and celebrate our achievements. As our club gained momentum, we invited guest speakers to attend our Zoom sessions. We heard from a wills and estates lawyer, a financial advisor and an accountant. Over time, we managed to cross a lot of items off our financial to-do lists while having some unexpected fun as a group. Money Club could not have existed without Zoom. All of us benefited from the ability to tackle tough topics from the comfort and privacy of our own homes. It made socializing and networking with other women pretty easy: we could get together without finding a babysitter or having to spend a lot of time in transit to meet up somewhere. And Zoom provided our guest speakers with the flexibility to pop in virtually to our call without losing an entire evening. Money Club was Zoom at its best. As we navigate the return to the office, it’s clear that we aren’t going back to the old days. The way we work has changed forever. But the success of Money Club has helped me imagine how we can, and should, bring tools like Zoom into the brave new world of post-pandemic work. Wishing you happy holiday parties in whatever form they take. Have a safe and healthy new year.
The search has begun You might have noticed that we love to celebrate the best of the legal profession. But to do so, we need your help. We’re now accepting nominations for our annual Precedent Setter Awards, which recognize Toronto lawyers in their first 10 years of practice who are passionate about their work and dedicated to the community. If you know any lawyers who fit this description, please put them forward. Visit precedentmagazine.com/awards to nominate an outstanding lawyer today. Nominations close January 14, 2022. We’ll feature the winners in our summer issue.
Melissa Kluger Publisher & Editor melissa@precedentmagazine.com @melissakluger
PRECEDENTMAGAZINE.COM 9
Letters
Think you missed a program? We’ve got you covered!
Check out our replays! Live Chat with your peers while you learn.
DÉJÀ VU
Your recent cover story on American law firms “poaching” Toronto associates (“The brain drain,” Fall 2021) brought me back to 1998, when U.S. law firms first started to actively recruit Canadian law students. Back then, students accepted positions in the U.S. for a range of reasons. Yes, money was a factor, but so was location, the type of work and the desire for adventure. Eventually, many who left returned. After the current wave of American hiring subsides, I expect that to happen again. In the meantime, let’s move past the “brain drain” narrative. Newsflash: there are still plenty of really good “brains” in Canada, both Canadian and internationally trained students and lawyers! Seek them out and welcome them. Gina Alexandris Senior program director, Ryerson University’s Law Practice Program
Learn more at store.lso.ca/ replays
An inspiration Thank you for profiling Gillian Hnatiw in your latest issue (“Fighting back,” Fall 2021). As someone who practises in a niche area (health and regulatory law), I have long been impressed by Gillian’s ability to carry on a broad litigation practice, including health, employment and administrative law, while being recognized as “one of the country’s leading experts on sexual misconduct and violence, as well as gender-based discrimination.” Her career path offers two valuable lessons. First, a keen interest in one area of law can be the basis of a fulfilling career. And second, specialized expertise is not incompatible with a broad advocacy practice. Lonny Rosen Partner, Rosen Sunshine LLP
@LSOCPD Law Society of Ontario CPD
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PRECEDENT WINTER 2021
In your recent profile of Gillian Hnatiw, she explains how she often has to help clients “choose from a range of imperfect legal pathways.” Many advocates are discouraged by our imperfect justice system, but Gillian has found a way to drive positive change through a creative blend of caselaw,
e ducation and policy reform. It’s inspiring to watch. Ava Williams Associate, Thomson Rogers Lawyers
Early in my career, I had the pleasure of working with Gillian Hnatiw. I witnessed firsthand her signature mix of sharp advocacy combined with deep care and compassion for the world. Gillian is a role model to a lot of young women advocates — myself included — who want to build an exciting litigation career while holding strong to our values and life commitments. Lidiya Yermakova Associate, Lenczner Slaght LLP
The hottest stories on precedentmagazine.com Most views America’s largest law firms are poaching Canada’s top associates Most likes This lawyer couple’s Danforth home is full of life Most retweets The corporate lawyer who moonlights as a DJ
Our People
Tech savvy This issue features the winners of the annual Precedent Innovation Awards. So we asked our contributors to tell us about an amazing app that no one else seems to have on their smartphone
“I use an app called Planta, which reminds me when to water each of the 19 plants in my home,” says Mai Nguyen, a Toronto-based freelance journalist, who has written for Maclean’s, the Washington Post and Wired. “I’m pretty sure that’s the only reason they’re still alive.” For this issue, she contributed to our third annual innovation awards, which celebrate disruption in the legal profession (“The Precedent Innovation Awards,” p.19).
Kelsey Heinrichs is an illustrator and art director whose work has appeared in the Walrus, GQ and the Wall Street Journal. In this issue, his artwork accompanies a profile of Jamie Greenberg, the general counsel at the cutting-edge entertainment company Wattpad (“Media mogul,” p.13). As for his favourite little-known app, he’s a big fan of a game called Aerobatic. “It was made by a friend of mine,” he says. “You play as a bat and the goal is to stay flying for as long as possible. For a little bit, I had the highest score on the leaderboard.”
H O L I D AY SHOPPING S TA R T S N O W Fi nd Favou ri t e s t hat Shi ne
USE CODE: PRECEDENT F O R 30% O F F “For the past four years, I’ve used an app called inSquarer,” says photographer Kyle Jeffers. The program lets users add custom white borders to images before posting them to Instagram. For this issue, he photographed the winners of the Precedent Innovation Awards. His artwork is bold and full of colour, a befitting way to capture some of the profession’s most audacious lawyers.
*OFFER EXPIRES J A N U A R Y 15 T H 2 02 2
foxy origina ls. co m PRECEDENTMAGAZINE.COM 11
Luis Quail, Michael Warfe and Richard Kreder are pleased to announce their partnership. QWK was established to help people who have been injured, disabled or lost their job achieve their best possible physical, mental and financial recovery. Luis, Michael and Richard have litigated cases at every level of court and look forward to leveraging their combined experience at the firm. Referrals are welcome. Contact QWK to learn about our lawyer referral program.
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As we celebrate our first decade of service to clients in the health and regulatory sectors, we thank our clients, colleagues, friends and families for their support.
10 www.rosensunshine.com
416 223 4222 • info@rosensunshine.com
Brief
THE LATEST FROM THE LEGAL WORLD
BEST PRACTICES
Media mogul As Wattpad’s general counsel, Jamie Greenberg is using his legal skills to help disrupt the entertainment industry by Luc Rinaldi illustration by Kelsey Heinrichs
“ What goes up must come down.” Jeremy Fraiberg on what lies ahead in the booming corporate economy p.17
The late 2000s were a thrilling time to work in the Canadian telecom industry. BlackBerry was the country’s hottest company, the smartphone had revolutionized mobile technology and bold upstarts — Mobilicity, Wind, Public Mobile — had declared war on Goliaths like Bell, Rogers and Telus. Jamie Greenberg had a front-row view of the action. In 2009, he launched his legal career at the CRTC, where he worked as an articling student and, briefly, as legal counsel. During his tenure at the commission, he was part of the regulatory team that oversaw the merger of Shaw and Canwest and the entry of several new telecommunications firms. “The more I learned about these companies,” he recalls, “the more I thought they would be a really interesting place to land.” At the end of 2010, Greenberg joined Public Mobile. He worked in a bevy of practice areas — corporate, regulatory, privacy, IP and more — until the
PRECEDENTMAGAZINE.COM 13
Brief company was acquired by Telus in 2014. He could have stayed on at Telus, but the thought of climbing the corporate ladder didn’t excite him. “I didn’t see myself working in a 40,000-person company,” he says. Instead, he wanted a fast-paced, hands-on challenge. So he left the world of law to cofound Facet4 Media, an entertainment production and distribution company, with his father and aunt, both long-time TV executives. In addition to serving as general counsel, Greenberg scouted for television shows, developed scripts, pitched networks and coordinated production. He had no idea at the time, but that experience — seemingly peripheral to the legal profession — would help him land the best job of his career. In late 2018, Greenberg learned that Wattpad was looking to hire a lawyer. The buzzy Toronto-based company had started in 2006 as a platform for writers — from amateurs to Atwood — to share fictional stories directly with audiences. The business made money by running ads. As it grew, the company worked with writers to adapt the most successful stories into books, movies and TV shows, giving the writers a way to monetize their creations. To date, more than 1,500 Wattpad stories have found a home on bookshelves, in film and on television, including the popular After movie franchise. Wattpad wanted to hire a lawyer with in-house experience who also knew the ins and outs of media, tech and entertainment law. Greenberg ticked every box. “Jamie came in with such unique experience,” says Jeanne Lam, the president of Wattpad. “He was an obvious unicorn.”
“Was it hard? Yeah. But it was the most fun I’ve had in my career.” Jamie Greenberg
As the company’s general counsel, Greenberg has a wide-ranging job description. He helps formulate the terms and conditions for Wattpad’s 90 million users. He helps ensure that the company abides by the privacy requirements of more than 150 countries. He also handles internal employment law, contributors’ contracts and NDAs, and the legal details of Wattpad’s partnerships with Hollywood studios like Sony Entertainment and publishing giants like Penguin Random House. Tapping into his TV background, he even signed on as executive producer for the film Float, a teen romance based on a hit Wattpad story. “It’s an incredible feeling,” says the 37-year-old, “when something is
on your desk one day and on the cover of Variety the next.” His most demanding task to date was stick-handling Wattpad’s approximately US$600-million sale to Naver — a tech behemoth sometimes called the Google of South Korea — which started in December 2020 and closed in May 2021. Greenberg led dozens of mostly external lawyers, ensuring that Wattpad’s investors and bankers were satisfied with every aspect of the acquisition. “Was it hard? Yeah,” he says. “But it was the most fun I’ve had in my career.” That sunny attitude continues to impress Lam. “Often, legal counsel is called in when things are not going well,” she says. “But you can always look forward to a conversation with Jamie.” Lam says that Greenberg understands not just the law, but how to manage people, relationships and the company’s strategic goals. “I would work with Jamie for the rest of my career if I could.” Once the sale to Naver was complete, Greenberg caught up on lost time with his family — he has two young children with his wife, Angela Greenberg, the manager of professional development at the Advocates’ Society — and shifted his focus to Wattpad’s expanding Paid Stories program, which compensates the platform’s most popular writers for their work. So far, the program has paid out more than $1 million to hundreds of writers, but it also raises tons of legal questions: What rights do authors retain? What are Wattpad’s obligations? “There’s no legal textbook that tells you how to do these things,” says Greenberg. “We’re doing stuff that hasn’t been done before in traditional publishing and entertainment.”
Jamie Greenberg General counsel, Wattpad Year of call 2010
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PRECEDENT WINTER 2021
2003: Greenberg begins a joint undergraduate honours degree in political science and religious studies at McGill University.
June 2010: After getting called to the bar, he joins the CRTC as legal counsel.
Acceptable Risk, premieres two years later on Super Channel and Acorn TV.
2006: He starts law school at Osgoode Hall.
September 2010: He moves to Public Mobile as a manager of legal and regulatory affairs.
July 2009: Greenberg articles at the CRTC. “The commission was always in the news,” he says, “so I was working on files that were making headlines at the time.”
2015: After Telus buys Public Mobile, Greenberg co-founds Facet4 Media. The company’s most notable production, a Canadian-Irish thriller series called
2019: Greenberg joins Wattpad as general counsel. His first two years at the company involve a pandemic, a US$600-million-or-so sale and the birth of his second child. “Hopefully, my next year will be a lot more vanilla.”
PHOTO: NECHAMA LAITMAN
Timeline of a general counsel
Brief OPINION
Breaking free Does it feel like you’re languishing in your career? There is a solution by Daniel Waldman illustration by Artello
One of the best lawyers (and mentors) I know has had plenty of opportunities to walk a traditional career path. With her skill set and reputation, she could have parked her practice at one workplace and stayed at the top. Instead, she’s worked at a wide range of firms and organizations, repeatedly finding great success. At one point, I asked her how she had come to lead such a nomadic career. In her telling, the answer was simple: she had taken each of her previous roles as far as possible. “I started to feel like I was in a pie-eating contest,” she said, “but the only prize was more pie.” That colourful soundbite captures a dark truth about the legal profession. Once we settle into a role, we can get stuck in an endless loop of similar files on behalf of identical clients. What began as creative becomes routine. We lose our motivation. And we stop finding joy in our work. If you’re living out some version of this narrative, you might be struggling with what mental health professionals call languishing. According to the psychologist Adam Grant, “languishing is a sense of stagnation and emptiness” that can make you feel like you’re “looking at your life through a foggy windshield.” So how can you break out of the funk? The first step is straightforward: devote time to activities that have nothing to do with your career. Over the past year, as the pandemic made my own life pretty monotonous, I tried hard to put this advice into practice. I took on a more challenging fitness regimen and started watching The Wire for the first time. This helped me escape the daily grind. Despite having an active life outside of the office, some of you will still feel suffocated by a stagnant career path. In that scenario, take a step back and examine the problem. Once you honestly probe the source of your professional malaise, you might conclude that
you no longer feel too connected to your clients, caseload or organization. Be brave and confront those uncomfortable facts. Ignoring them will only make it worse. Let’s say you decide to make a career change. Before you hand in a letter of resignation, find out if you can tweak your current role to make it more satisfying. Ask your boss or mentor if there’s an opportunity to move to a different practice group or to take on a new file outside your area of expertise. Now, this might not solve the problem. In that case, the best course of action might be to leave your current position. You should
still move slowly, taking the necessary time to chart a path forward. But you have every right to inject passion into your working life by trying something new. Most importantly, remember that you have options. Whether you choose to shake up your existing role or find an entirely new job, take control of your career. After all, you don’t want to wake up every day to a slice of the same pie. Daniel Waldman is an associate in the litigation group at Pallett Valo LLP. He writes about career satisfaction and business development for Precedent.
TURNING PROBLEMS INTO PRECEDENTS.
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PRECEDENTMAGAZINE.COM 15
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Brief ON THE RECORD
Ready or not How to prepare your legal practice for the next market crash by Conan Tobias illustration by Jamie Bennett
The largest law firms in Toronto have spent most of the pandemic making a lot of money. As companies struggled to make sense of new safety regulations, wage subsidies and the rules that govern mass layoffs, lawyers saw their billable hours skyrocket. Low interest rates and stimulus funds, meanwhile, have led to a surge in transactional work. “The stock market and real estate have been high-flying,” says Jeremy Fraiberg, chair of the mergers and acquisitions group at Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP. “Once the pandemic started, we didn’t in our wildest dreams think we’d end up having record levels of activity.” And yet, he knows the soaring economy won’t last forever: “What goes up must come down.” Fraiberg is speaking from experience. He launched his legal career at Torys, back in 2000, just in time to enjoy the tail end of the dot-com bubble — and to watch it burst. Seven years later, he was a partner at Osler during the global financial crisis. Based on what he saw during those downturns, he has a sense of what the next one might look like inside the largest law firms on Bay Street. If there’s a sharp drop in the demand for legal advice, one of the most obvious consequences will be a sudden decline in morale. “The only thing worse than being too busy is not being busy enough,” says Fraiberg. “The mood isn’t good. You’re worried about not hitting your hours target or getting your experience.” Associates will have to adapt to the shifting economic landscape. At the peak of the dot-com era, Fraiberg had expected to become a technology lawyer. “I thought I was going to get all these IPOs to do and meet all these young founders,” he recalls. Then the internet economy collapsed. After the shock subsided, he revised his career plan and, eventually, transitioned from representing emerging companies to a more general corporate and M&A practice.
If the favourable deal-making environment that has buoyed the M&A market comes to an end, today’s corporate associates are poised to suffer the most severe drop in billable hours. At that point, they could either ride out the trough in the business cycle or pivot to other areas of law. A pullback in corporate work could, in fact, lead to gains in other areas. If central bankers increase interest rates significantly in response to rising inflation, for instance, a spike in bankruptcies could follow. “If you’re a corporate lawyer and you work at a firm that has an insolvency department,” says Fraiberg, there might be opportunities to “help with those transactions.” Allan Hutchinson, a professor at Osgoode Hall, is emphatic that law firms also have to be agile. “Firms that have all their eggs in one basket will be troubled when economic conditions change,” he says. “A nimble law firm will always do well.” So when might an economic pullback take place? There’s no way to know for sure. But
Walid Hejazi, an associate professor of economic analysis and policy at the Rotman School of Management, thinks it could take a while. To justify that prediction, he points to the re-election of Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government. “Trudeau now has a mandate to continue doing what he’s done,” says Hejazi. “I think that it’s going to be a mandate for the government to continue spending more than it would have had there not been an election.” Fraiberg is comforted by the fact that, during the last two downturns, Canadian law firms avoided a wave of layoffs. “We try very hard to make sure we’re always right-sized,” he says. “You want to make sure you’re judicious in your hiring so you don’t overbuild.” In his view, there’s no reason for lawyers to be filled with anxiety. “The music does stop at some point, and lawyers will have to adapt,” says Fraiberg. “But that doesn’t mean you’re in for some kind of impending doom. It’s just the business cycle.”
PRECEDENTMAGAZINE.COM 17
WINNER 2021 Precedent Innovation Awards
FAST TRACK THE FINE PRINT A 2021 Precedent Innovation Award winner, Gowling WLG’s Contest Creator application helps businesses automate the development of complex contest rules, saving them time, money and worry in the process. Email innovate@gowlingwlg.com to learn more.
Gowling WLG (Canada) LLP is a member of Gowling WLG, an international law firm which consists of independent and autonomous entities providing services around the world. Our structure is explained in more detail at www.gowlingwlg.com/legal
Th e Precedent Innovation Awards
In the past year, the legal profession has adapted to a world in constant flux. As the pandemic raged on, lawyers mastered new technology that allowed them to attend court, meet with clients and file documents without leaving their living rooms. That’s no small feat. But some lawyers went further and disrupted the industry well outside the realm of remote work. Relying on machine-learning technology, litigators used data to predict the likelihood of certain judicial outcomes. Civicminded lawyers came together to offer legal support to community organizations. And the profession found new ways to mentor students and junior associates. This year’s Precedent Innovation Awards celebrate those achievements. Turn the page to find out how the legal world is changing for the better.
by Matthew Halliday, Simon Lewsen and Mai Nguyen photography by Kyle Jeffers hair and makeup by Alanna Chelmick
PRECEDENTMAGAZINE.COM 19
Leora Smith The Community Justice Collective
Sima Atri, Aliah El-houni and Leora Smith
The Community Justice Collective A legal non-profit that proudly supports progressive social movements After graduating from Harvard Law School in 2017, Leora Smith, who grew up in Toronto, worked as a freelance investigative journalist with ProPublica. For two years, she reported on police misconduct, prison conditions and discriminatory housing systems that enabled landlords to exploit their tenants. Almost everywhere, she encountered poor and working-class people up against affluent, well-connected opponents or police departments with deep pockets and political power. But she also saw them fighting back, often in groups, with lawyers at their sides. Perhaps, she thought, there was space in the legal industry for somebody like her — a lawyer with a deep commitment to social justice. In 2019, Smith returned to Toronto to article at the Human Rights Legal Support Centre, where she represented clients who’d experienced injustices like workplace discrimination or racial profiling by the police. Immediately, she noticed a stark difference between Canadian and American legal culture. In the United States, there is a large coalition of “movement lawyers” — that is, lawyers who support social movements by offering legal assistance to entire groups, seeking not just one-off court victories but systemic change. Though Canada has a long tradition of human-rights-oriented advocacy, Smith noticed that only a small number of practitioners have embraced the movement-lawyer philosophy. The profession tends to pursue justice on a person-by-person basis, as opposed to providing legal support toward the broader collective and political goals of the movement. As a result, grassroots community groups struggle to find affordable, broad-based legal advice. “There was a lot of community organizing going on,” she says, “but little by way of politically aligned legal support for it.” In 2020, Smith and her fellow Torontonian and Harvard alum Sima Atri, who was working as duty counsel in Brampton, decided to
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launch a non-profit dedicated to movement lawyering in their hometown. The first step was to secure funding for the idea. The duo submitted a grant application to Harvard, which came through with the money. That summer, the Community Justice Collective was born. Additional support — provided in part by foundations and a growing number of monthly donors — has since helped fund the salary of a third member, Aliah El-houni, a recent law graduate from McGill University. From the beginning, the CJC had a clear mission: to practise pro bono in partnership with community organizations and other like-
minded lawyers, enabling marginalized people to push back against powerful institutions. And they would refuse to adopt a guise of phony neutrality. “People feel that if you’re a lawyer, you’re not supposed to have political opinions that interact with your work,” says Smith. “That’s not how we practise.” Over the past year and a half, the team has offered support to a range of progressive groups: gig workers seeking collective- bargaining rights, Indigenous land defenders who’ve been arrested while protesting and people who’ve experienced police violence and are demanding accountability.
In one case that illustrates the power of the movement-lawyer model, the CJC represented 30 high-rise tenants in Toronto’s East York who were facing eviction. The story begins at the start of the pandemic, when two cohorts of residents launched tenant associations that could advocate on their behalf with two corporate landlords in the neighbourhood. Around the same time, many tenants suffered COVID-related financial setbacks and fell behind on their rent. Throughout the fall of 2020, eviction notices started to arrive. Sima Atri The Community Justice Collective
The CJC and its clients decided to ask the Landlord and Tenant Board to let them fight the eviction of every member of the tenant associations at a single hearing. The plan was to argue that the landlords had targeted these residents in retaliation for trying to bargain collectively. In an unusual move, the board agreed to this request. At this point, one landlord pretty much stopped litigating. It’s been more than a year since the case began, and, as far as the CJC is aware, the landlord seems to have given up on the evictions. The other landlord did show up
for the hearing, where its legal team argued that the evictions were not retaliatory. After all, it had sent notices to all tenants in arrears, regardless of their membership status in the association. What took place after it filed the eviction notices should therefore be irrelevant. That turned out to be a losing argument. As the CJC proved at the hearing, the landlord had been willing to work with individual tenants on a repayment plan. But when negotiating with residents who had joined the tenant association, the landlord adopted a harsher position, making it difficult to agree on a path forward. The threat of eviction continued to hover over the tenants. Ultimately, the L andlord and Tenant Board ruled that this behaviour amounted to unlawful “differential treatment.” The last step is for the board to determine precisely which tenants were subjected to the landlord’s harsh negotiation tactics. But Atri doesn’t think that will be necessary. She anticipates that the landlords will now work with the tenants on a fair resolution, which might involve a combination of scheduled repayments and rent forgiveness. (Neither landlord responded to a request for comment.) This was a big win for the tenants — and for the CJC’s community-based approach. Had the tenants retained individual counsel, El-houni explains, it would have been nearly impossible to mount a consistent legal argument: “It’s possible some tenants would’ve stayed and some would’ve been evicted. A group of people who’d taken action together would’ve seen their numbers gutted. Where’s the justice in that?” There have been other meaningful alliances. Early in the pandemic, when unhoused people
“We’re giving people opportunities to push back collectively against what’s wrong.” Sima Atri The Community Justice Collective
in Toronto began fleeing overcrowded shelters for makeshift tent communities in public greenspaces, the CJC helped these residents petition councillors to repeal the bylaws that criminalized their encampments. Few pro bono practices provide this sort of strategic advice. In July and August, with the bylaws still in place, Toronto police dismantled these communities, charging residents and their supporters for trespassing or resisting arrest. The CJC came immediately to their defence. The current goal, says Atri, is to fight the criminal charges while also enabling former
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Aliah El-houni The Community Justice Collective
Gurteg Singh
The 101 Series An online speaker series that connects law students and junior lawyers to the profession’s seasoned veterans
encampment residents to continue their campaign for safe housing. “We’re giving people opportunities to push back collectively against what’s wrong,” she says. This involves showing up at bail hearings to represent detainees. And it means trying to convince the Crown to drop the charges altogether — an argument Atri makes every chance she gets. In late September, at a preliminary Zoom hearing for five defendants, Atri spoke of the many reasons the Crown might abandon the charges. She offered sympathetic words about the accused: “Our clients are people who are
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involved in community-support efforts for unhoused people in the city.” She invoked core democratic principles: “There’s no public interest in prosecuting unhoused people and those who supported their right to housing.” And she reminded the Crown of the various Charter violations the police had allegedly committed during the evictions, including arbitrary arrests and denials of the right to counsel. She was making a legal argument and outlining a set of values: due process, prosecutorial discretion, decriminalization. She spoke for her clients. And for the movement, too. — SL
The early days of the pandemic were disproportionately cruel to recent law graduates. Those on the job hunt could no longer network at legal events and conferences. Articling students and junior associates, meanwhile, fell out of touch with their mentors, as informal conversations over coffee and lunch came to a halt. Amid that turmoil, Gurteg Singh wanted to help the newest members of the legal profession stay connected with the most seasoned veterans. “I’m a new call myself,” says Singh, a junior associate at Ethical Associates, a small Toronto law firm that specializes in human rights and dispute resolution. “So I know how intimidating it can be to reach out to senior lawyers.” In the spring of 2021, Singh launched The 101 Series, an online monthly event targeted at law students and new lawyers. During each event, which anyone can attend for free, a senior practitioner delivers a short presentation on a different area of law. After that, Singh moderates a lengthy question period. The first event in the series introduced Harpreet Saini, a 17-year veteran of the criminaldefence bar, to more than 150 students and junior lawyers. During the Q&A session, those in attendance peppered Saini with general questions about his career path, how to land clients and how to act in the courtroom, as well as specific queries about the criminal-trial process. “New calls could ask silly questions,” says Saini. “They didn’t have to be embarrassed about it.” Jennifer Philpott, an associate at Goulart Workplace Lawyers in her second year of call, attended a recent session on insolvency law. The event provided a unique opportunity to learn about an area of law that sometimes intersects with her own practice. “These sessions are especially helpful for new calls who want to network,” she says. “They are great opportunities to open doors for conversations.” Looking to the future, Singh hopes to get each session in The 101 Series CPD-certified. “I’m passionate about this,” he says. “I like helping new calls and filling holes in the legal profession.” — MN
Gurteg Singh Ethical Associates
Paul-Erik Veel Lenczner Slaght
Lenczner Slaght
The SCC Leave Project A machine-learning tool that predicts the likelihood that a case will be granted leave at the Supreme Court of Canada In 2015, Paul-Erik Veel, an associate (now a partner) at the litigation boutique Lenczner Slaght, was preparing a client to take the stand in a medical-malpractice case. “I told him about the kinds of conduct that juries respond well to,” says Veel. The client, who came from the world of peer-reviewed studies and double-blind trials, asked Veel if he had empirical evidence to back up his advice. Veel’s response was blunt: “No, that’s not how the law works.” Lawyers consider themselves custodians of a bespoke profession, rooted in intuition and experiential knowledge. The tactics that litigators deploy in court — to persuade judges, influence juries and rhetorically outmaneuver opposing counsel — are often the product of conventional wisdom that senior practitioners have passed down through anecdote. When Veel disclosed this fact to his medical client, he was bothered. Tradition has its virtues, but empirical questions frequently arose in his work. Shouldn’t he give empirical answers? Today, Veel is working hard to inject a bit of science into the art of litigation. At Lenczner Slaght, he has overseen the creation of the Supreme Court of Canada Leave Project, a machine-learning tool that can determine the likelihood of a given case to be granted leave at the nation’s top court. As a starting point, the probability is always pretty low. Over the past decade, the court has reviewed an average of 532 leave applications a year; in most years, it has accepted less than 10 percent of them. Still, some long shots are longer than others. When clients are contemplating the time and money necessary to apply for leave at the Supreme Court, they typically want to know whether their odds are decent or straight-up terrible. By launching the SCC Leave Project, Veel is able to answer that question with more authority than ever before. To create the tool, Veel and his co-workers first built a database of every leave application filed at the court since January 2018, just after
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Richard Wagner took over as chief justice. Katie Glowach, an associate at the firm with a background in computer information systems, designed a data-input portal, making it as straightforward as possible. Using drop-down menus that she created, Veel and an intern sorted each application into a broad range of categories, including the type of case, whether leave was granted, whether the case generated dissents in lower courts and whether the client was an individual, a company or a government. Once the data entry was complete, Veel designed the machine-learning algorithm with
an open-source application he found online. The program could then review a new leave application and, based on its knowledge of what the court has accepted in the past, determine its chance of success. Each week, between Monday (when the Supreme Court discloses which leave decisions it will announce) and Thursday (when it actually makes the announcements), Veel runs the pending cases through the algorithm. The program then assigns a probability of success to each case. Finally, Veel sorts them into four categories: “long shots,” which have less than a 1-percent chance of success; “unlikely
Katie Glowach Lenczner Slaght
ontenders,” which sit in the 1-to-5-percent c range; “possible contenders,” where the odds are between 5 and 25 percent; and “cases to watch,” where the probability of getting leave exceeds 25 percent. These predictions are then published on the Lenczner Slaght blog in advance of the final announcement. This allows readers to see for themselves whether the algorithm is doing its job. So far, the team has a lot to be proud of. Among the first 123 applications that the SCC Leave Project has analyzed, 50 percent of the “cases to watch” received leave, compared with 17 percent of the “possible contenders,” 3 percent of the “unlikely contenders” and none of the “long shots.” “That gave us confidence,” says Veel. “On average, our model was getting things right.” Veel has also been able to fact-check the conventional wisdom of his field. Historically, litigators have assumed that the nation’s top court favours criminal and constitutional cases, as well as applications from the federal government. Armed with data, Veel put those theories to the test. As it turns out, government applications do have a competitive advantage. (As an elected institution, Veel explains, it seems to enjoy priority status.) The court does not, however, have a bias toward criminal and constitutional files. (According to Veel, such cases are slightly overrepresented at the Supreme Court, but that’s not because leave applications in these areas have an intrinsic upper hand. The real reason, he points out, is that criminal and constitutional matters often arrive at the court through alternative judicial pathways like an automatic appeal or a request by the federal government for an opinion.) The goal of the SCC Leave Project isn’t just to wow people with its predictive capabilities. The idea is also to serve clients. Any litigant who retains Lenczner Slaght can now get a data-based estimate as to how strong a leave application might be. “If the model goes to the one-, two- or three-percent range — as it often does — I can confidently say to the client, ‘It’s not worth it,’” says Veel. “If we’re into the 15-, 20- or 25-percent range, I can say, ‘This is a case the Supreme Court will look at hard.’” Ultimately, the client must decide what to do based on gut instinct and tolerance for risk. But that’s okay. “We’re not seeking to replace legal experience and intuition,” says Glowach, “but rather to supplement it.” Monique Jilesen, a partner at the firm who has supported the team in this move toward a more empirical approach to advocacy, concurs. “As lawyers, we’re in the judgment business,” she says. “Experience matters deeply. But experience supported by data is more powerful still.” — SL
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Gowling WLG
Contest Creator An online application that helps companies run promotional contests in accordance with the law To the customers in line at McDonald’s, the Monopoly contest looks pretty simple: buy a hamburger, and you might win a prize. Behind the colourful advertisements and snappy slogans, however, lies a thicket of fine print. The simplest corporate giveaway is subject to an immense web of federal and provincial laws. According to the Criminal Code, for instance, no business can force a person to buy something to enter a contest. That would amount to an illegal lottery. To lawfully operate its Monopoly promotion, McDonald’s lets people request a free entry through the mail. The Competition Act also includes a battery of laws that govern the world of promotional contests. A company is allowed to allocate a fixed number of prizes to certain regions of the country — say, two to Ontario and three to Quebec — but this has to be crystal clear in the rules. Some contests, like a photo competition, have a judging component. In those cases, the rules must disclose the criteria that the company will use to evaluate submissions. Before launching any contest, most businesses hire a lawyer who can write the official rules. But Daniel Cole, who leads the advertising practice group at Gowling WLG, noticed a flaw in this arrangement. “If you’re only giving away $250 in swag,” he says, “it doesn’t make much sense to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars to write the legal rules.” Five years ago, Cole came up with a possible solution. He imagined a software program that clients could use to quickly check whether a new contest was compliant with the law. Cole took the idea to Neota Logic, a technology company that helps lawyers design new software to better serve clients. Eventually, he created an online application that could guide
users through a series of questions about an upcoming contest: Who is eligible? In what jurisdiction will the contest take place? What is the prize? The program could then spit out a set of rules, along with any red flags that needed further review. At this stage, it was only a prototype, so he couldn’t start sending it to clients. Then, in 2019, Ginevra Saylor, a lawyer with decades of experience in legal technology and knowledge management, joined Gowling as the director of innovation and knowledge programs. Once she saw what Cole had built, she understood the application’s potential. As she recalls, “We looked at this and said, ‘This is fantastic. We’ve got to get this out now.’” To take the project to the finish line, Cole and Saylor joined forces with René Bissonnette, another partner in the advertising group, and Shannon Uhera, an associate. Working together, the team was able to refine the technology. The final product, called Contest Creator, is now in use among the firm’s clients. One early adopter was RBC, which collaborated with Cole’s team to develop a customized version of the application. The bank now uses the program to run about 200 contests a year. “It’s really important for us to leverage new technology,” says Diana Drappel, senior legal counsel at RBC. Approving the rules for a new contest used to take up to four weeks. “Now, it can be same day.” Cole is proud of what he’s accomplished. “One of my former senior partners used to say, ‘Good, fast and cheap is a three-legged stool. You can only ever have two,’” he says. “But I think we’ve found a way to have all three.” — MH
Ginevra Saylor Gowling WLG
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Debrief LIFE BEYOND THE LAW
“ Sacrificing one’s mental health is not an acceptable cost of winning.” Kimberly Whaley on the core lesson of Netflix’s Naomi Osaka docuseries p.32
THE INSIDER
The first time Sara Erskine stepped foot in the PATH, she got hope-
The lost city
lessly lost. The year was 2000, and she had travelled to Toronto from Kingston to interview for several articling positions. “It was hot, and it was the summer,” she recalls. “I kept having to resurface to navigate by the streets.” With 3.7 million square feet of retail space and corridors that span 30 kilometres in length, the PATH is the world’s largest underground shopping mall. Arriving late to a meeting after taking a wrong turn in this subterranean maze is a rite of passage that will be familiar to anyone who has worked in the downtown core. Over time, though, most office dwellers learn how to navigate these halls with ease. Once Erskine began articling at McCarthy Tétrault LLP, she soon felt right at home in the PATH. After a short escalator ride underground, she could enjoy a stress-free walk to almost any Toronto landmark, while picking up her favourite blueberry scone along the way. “It’s by far the most efficient way to get around,” says Erskine, now a founding partner at the litigation boutique Weintraub Erskine Huang LLP. “And it’s the warmest way to travel in the winter.”
The pandemic has laid waste to Toronto’s sprawling underground retail complex. Will the PATH ever be the same? by Jeremy Freed Illustrations by Sam Island
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Debrief
clothes to clients’ doorsteps for at-home fittings. (He continued to operate his location in Yorkville, where pedestrian traffic hasn’t been nearly as hard hit.) This fall, he decided to reopen his store in the PATH. “I think it’s going to take a couple of years to get back to pre-pandemic numbers,” he says. “But I’m committed to rebuilding my business and getting it back to where it was.” The road back to prosperity will be especially hard in certain sectors. Consider the restaurant industry. Before the pandemic, the average take-out joint enjoyed a razorthin 4.3-percent profit margin. The slightest dip in foot traffic, or a single week of lacklustre sales, could put these businesses at risk. Unless the vast majority of workers return to the office, few cafés or lunch spots will have any chance of survival.
“I never thought I would see the PATH this way, not unless it was past midnight and before 6 a.m.” Leila Rafi Partner, McMillan LLP
But the PATH offered more than a convenient way to move around. For Erskine and the broader legal community, the plethora of cafés and restaurants made it an ideal place to refuel in the middle of a chaotic workday. Before heading home, she might drop in at the bank or pick up milk and toothpaste. And she often bumped into friends and made new connections. During the COVID era, however, that vibrant culture has suffered a tragic blow. Throughout the pandemic, Erskine never
stopped commuting downtown. (Her current office is located at Bay and Richmond.) As a result, she witnessed firsthand the PATH’s transformation from a lively weekday hub to a ghost town. Restaurants and retail stores shuttered before her eyes. Easter displays, put up in March 2020, gathered dust through the summer and fall. “It felt like an apocalypse,” she says. “Everything was frozen in time.” Workers have started to trickle back to their downtown offices, but the PATH remains a shadow of its former self. “It used to be bustling with energy as professionals scurried around the various small businesses to get errands done and make deals with clients,” says Leila Rafi, a partner in the securities group at McMillan LLP, who has started to work more regularly out of her office at Bay and Wellington. “Now, it’s
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eerily empty. The small businesses have been crushed.” At Mucho Burrito in Brookfield Place, Rafi’s favourite taco restaurant, 20- to 25-minute lunchtime lineups were once the norm. The business is now shut down. Her preferred Starbucks, also in Brookfield Place, used to be so busy that Rafi would joke that it might as well be printing money. Today, it’s closed. And so, too, is the hair salon she’d regularly visit for blowouts. “I never thought I would see the PATH this way, not unless it was past midnight and before 6 a.m.,” says Rafi. “And even then, you’d usually see some folks burning the midnight oil or walking to a cab or the subway. The liveliness and community spirit is gone.” One person watching the PATH’s transformation from the other side of the glass is David Seligman, the owner of Options for Her, a women’s clothing boutique in the TD Centre. For more than three decades, Seligman and his staff have served everyone from university students buying their first suits to lawyers and accountants updating their wardrobes for the new season. “Many of our clients have been shopping with us for 35 years,” says Seligman. “We know 90 percent of our customers by name. We know their kids. It’s always been about building relationships.” When the pandemic hit, Seligman pivoted to an online business model, delivering
At least one expert is bullish on the future
of the downtown core. “I don’t have a crystal ball, but I’ve been downtown pretty much every day since the pandemic hit, and I’m finally starting to see lineups at lunch again,” says Graham Smith, a senior vice-president at the commercial real-estate giant JLL. “It’s probably only 15 percent of pre-COVID levels, but it’s a nice visual indication that bodies are getting back downtown.” In his view, an economic recovery could be complete by the last quarter of 2022. He justifies that optimism, in part, by pointing to the strong vaccination rate in Toronto. He also predicts that the mandatory vaccination policies in place at many large companies, including the biggest law firms, will make a growing number of workers feel comfortable about a return to the office. It’s certainly true that plenty of lawyers miss the PATH of yesteryear. “I was part of a community downtown where I often ran into friendly faces and knew many of the smallbusiness owners,” says Rafi. “There was a sense of being in it together, which was especially important with the gruelling hours for Bay Street professionals.” Erskine, for her part, misses the ability to dart underground with a colleague to grab a quick coffee. “Those were opportunities for us to escape the office to get to know each other better,” she says. “It was a camaraderie thing. That’s what the PATH was really good at.”
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Debrief OUT OF OFFICE
In the queue We asked six managing partners to tell us what they enjoyed watching, reading and listening to over the last year of partial lockdown
A musical that satirizes itself
The Bomber Mafia by Malcolm Gladwell Recommended by Allan Ritchie, managing partner at Loopstra Nixon LLP
Schmigadoon! Recommended by Dominique Hussey, vice chair and Toronto managing partner at Bennett Jones LLP
“I’m a sucker for anything that Malcolm Gladwell writes. This is an awesome WWII account of the development of the Allies’ aerial-bombing strategy. I love books that combine a new take on history with a compelling adventure narrative. This one kept me up way too late trying to pack in a few more pages.”
“In this series, two Grey’s Anatomy-type doctors seek help for their stale relationship at a couples retreat but get stuck in a live musical. Starring Keegan-Michael Key and SNL’s Cecily Strong, Schmigadoon! is a send-up of and homage to classic musicals like Oklahoma, The Music Man, Brigadoon (obviously) and many more. The show is campy, self-aware and delightful — if you enjoy medical drama, appreciate the Lorne Michaels oeuvre and have been missing Broadway musicals to a point that feels physical. If that does not sound like your thing, consider this: in the three hours it takes to watch the entire series, you will be either too engrossed or cringing too hard to think about work even once. Worth it.
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A candid look at the darker side of sports fame Naomi Osaka Recommended by Kimberly Whaley, founding partner at WEL Partners
“I’m hardly an expert on tennis (if you saw me play, you would know what I mean), but when I saw the Naomi Osaka docuseries pop up on my Netflix suggestions, I was intrigued to learn more about the young woman who defeated Serena Williams. The series is raw, honest and intensely personal, with some of the scenes shot by Osaka herself. Though Osaka is a champion who has thrived in highpressure environments, she has also struggled with adversity off the court. Her story makes it clear that sacrificing one’s mental health is not an acceptable cost of winning.”
NAOMI OSAKA PHOTO COURTESY OF NETFLIX
A history book that reads like a thriller
Debrief
GAME OF THRONES PHOTO COURTESY OF HBO, ALBUM COVER COURTESY OF DIJAHSB
A bingeworthy tale of espionage Tehran Recommended by Brian Temins, managing partner at Minden Gross LLP
“This spell-binding series captivated me from the start. The show centres on Tamar, a Jewish-Israeli woman with family roots in Iran, who is also a member of the Mossad. She infiltrates Tehran on a secret mission to disable the power grid in advance of an Israeli air assault. Thanks to a steady flow of plot twists, I never left the edge of my seat. The first season has eight episodes, making it the perfect series to watch in one weekend, which is exactly what I did.”
A rap album by an artist on the cusp of greatness Head Above the Waters by DijahSB Recommended by Rob Centa, managing partner at Paliare Roland
“The challenges faced by a Black, non-binary rapper remain daunting, but this artist is about to take their career to a completely different level. In mid-2021, DijahSB released Head Above the Waters, which was shortlisted for the 2021 Polaris Music Prize. The album pays meticulous attention to the groove. Fat bass, spare guitar and bright synths evoke an earlier, more danceable age. DijahSB settles comfortably into the pocket and drops lyrics full of humour, vibrant imagery, and deep-cut sneaker and basketball references. You will love it.”
A world-famous fantasy epic Game of Thrones Recommended by Maria Scarfo, managing partner at Blaney McMurtry LLP
“The pandemic added a lot of stress, but it also cut down on my evening and weekend commitments. I’ve spent this newfound downtime consuming television shows that I’d missed out on over the past decade. Case in point: I finally watched Game of Thrones. To be honest, I’ve forgotten a huge portion of the complicated plot. But I was thoroughly entertained. The sweeping fantasy series was a thrilling timewaster during the lockdown.”
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Debrief
SECRET LIFE
Loving the grind by Danielle Groen photography by Steph Martyniuk
When Matias Milet was maybe 10 years old, a boy from California carrying a state-of-the-art skateboard transferred into his Montreal classroom and sparked a deeper love for the sport. Milet had dabbled before in department-store skateboards, but this board was far better — and way more fun. It felt like gliding on asphalt. He began riding everywhere: empty swimming pools, crappy skateparks, ramps built out of found (or pilfered) plywood. A couple years passed, and Milet, tired of skateboarding’s bro-y culture, dropped the pastime; more time went by, and he went to law school before practising tax law at Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP, where the 55-year-old is now a partner. Then, in 2020, the pandemic hit, and Milet’s gym shut down. He needed to stay active. His 12-year-old daughter, captivated by the Instagram videos of the young British skateboarder Sky Brown, decided to give the sport a try. “It was just happenstance,” says Milet. “But it completely revived skateboarding for me.” At first, he joined his daughter twice a week. But Milet concedes he’s a little obsessive, and now he’s at Toronto’s Underpass and Ashbridges Bay skateparks, with or without her, four to six days a week. He’s often absorbed in technical tricks like heelflips and kickflips, moving on to a new skill only after he’s mastered the previous one or finds himself so stymied that the wisest counsel is to try something else. Milet also logs time in front of YouTube, watching videos not just of people doing tricks right but also doing them wrong, so he can understand where he’s gone wrong, too. In that respect, skateboarding isn’t altogether different from tax law: “You’re very engrossed in a problem, and you have to find a solution,” he says. “Luckily, I find solutions in law faster than in skateboarding.” But when he lands that kickflip? “It just fills me with a really intense pleasure,” Milet says. He’ll drive home from the skatepark with his daughter, music blaring, high on the adrenaline of nailing their respective tricks. “We just turn to each other and grin.”
Matias Milet Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP
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