In a legal mood

Originally posted 2006-02-07 15:13:25. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

We blogged a little while ago about Doug Litowitz’s new book about how law firms chew up young lawyers. He makes it sound like a bad thing! With a slightly (you can judge how much) different point of view, Bruce MacEwen writes on his Adam Smith, Esq. blog dedicated to the economics of (big) law firms:

Consider that lawyers are socialized unlike members of any other profession or followers of any other discipline:

Martin Seligman [writes] in his book AUTHENTIC HAPPINESS: “Lawyers are trained to be aggressive, judgmental, intellectual, analytical and emotionally detached. This produces predictable emotional consequences — he or she will be depressed, anxious and angry a lot of the time.”

Or, consider a psychographic test measuring “sociability,” with the median American defined as scoring 50 on a 1-100 scale: Lawyers’ mean score was 8. Put 250 Type A’s with that personality profile in charge of a $100+ million/year enterprise, and you should not expect a touchy-feely environment to spontaneously emerge.

That’s why we started turning down clients at the Coleman Law Firm around the $85 million mark, by the way. We value our quality of life here a bunch. But you can still get on the waiting list!