JONES DAY TALKS®: Perspectives and Pathways: From law student to Lawyer

Dave Dalton:

Welcome to Perspectives and Pathways. Today, we're going to cover what I think is a very under-discussed topic in the early career development of most lawyers, the transition from student to practicing professional. Jones Day's Tiffany Lipscomb-Jackson and Josh Pittman are here with practical advice and tips for lawyers embarking on what should be a promising career. Let's call it law school to lawyer, now what? I'm Dave Dalton. You're listening to Perspectives and Pathways, a special edition of JONES DAY TALKS®. Tiffany, Josh, thank you so much for being here today.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

Thanks for having us, Dave.

Josh Pittman:

Thanks Dave.

Dave Dalton:

We do a lot of JONES DAY TALKS® podcasts, many over the course of the year. I like this particular kind of format because we talk about life as a lawyer. A lot of our podcasts will talk about an issue in the law or here's what's trending or here's what clients need to know, but here we drill down in terms of what's it like to be a lawyer in the real world in 2024. These are all enjoyable conversations. I'm glad you're both here. Before we dive into today's topic, which I think is a great one, why don't we talk a little bit about you two? Tiffany, for people who don't know you or haven't spoken with you before, give us a little bit about your background and how you got to Jones Day.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

Sure, Dave. I am the oldest of four girls, first generation college student, first one in my family to go to the Ohio State University is where I went to undergrad and law school.

Dave Dalton:

O-H.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

I-O. And actually, when I started undergrad, I thought I was going to be a doctor because not having a lot of folks in my family who had higher education, I just knew that doctors were people who were important and helped people and were respected. So that's what I was going to do, but then found myself in law school, really enjoyed the experience and had some great mentors there who helped guide me into the field of big law, large law firms, which again was something I was not at all familiar with having no lawyers in my family.

And then ended up at Jones Day because in the course of law school, and for the law students who are listening, if you haven't experienced this yet, you will soon, there's this whole process of interviews and you go to different firms and you meet different people, and I did that. And of all the firms I went to and all the people I met, Jones Day was the firm where I didn't meet a single person I didn't like. And lots of people I met were extremely interesting and seemed like folks that I wanted to learn from and took a real interest in me. That's how I ended up at Jones Day.

Dave Dalton:

And you mentioned you were thinking about a medical school track, biology to law school. But what did prompt that switch? It seems like with a biology degree, you could do a lot of things. What happened?

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

It definitely was driven by my original plan to go to med school, which about end of my sophomore year of undergrad, I decided that I didn't want to go the med school route. I learned a little bit more about what that was and thought that there were other things that might be of interest to me. But I really loved biology. I thought it was really interesting, and to your point, Dave, it's something you could do a lot of different things with. So I kept that while I figured out what the next steps were going to be. And I ended up at law school because I had a very, very good friend who was a couple years older than me who came from a whole line of lawyers and he was getting ready to go to law school and said, "Tiffany, just knowing you, I think this is something you should look at. I think you would enjoy it. I think you'd be good at it."

So I did a little investigation, thought that sounded more interesting than getting my master's in biology and spending the next couple of years in a research lab. So that's how I ended up in law school.

Dave Dalton:

All right. Well, and obviously you are good at it, so we're sure glad you're here.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

And to your point, Dave, for folks who are out there who are thinking about law school, there are a lot of different degrees that can be really helpful to a law background. It doesn't just have to be English, political science, and I work with folks who have biology degrees who use them every day in the work they do, IP work, health sciences work, which is huge right now. If you look at their backgrounds, they have microbiology and biology type background. So if you have a subject matter in undergrad that you're passionate about, don't lose that passion just because you're thinking law school might be something you want to do. It can actually make you a better lawyer and a more attractive both law school candidate and permanent position interviewee.

Dave Dalton:

That's a great point and it works seven different kinds of ways. Not every successful lawyer was a political science major. For the obvious example, Meredith Wilkes in our Cleveland office, a wonderful IP lawyer, and I'm just assuming she majored in science or something from that side of the brain, right? She was a journalism major in undergrad and she's a top tier IP lawyer, so who knows where you end up? I guess there's no bad experience as long as you chase your academic career with some passion and some interest and it stretches your brain and it makes you more capable. So all good points. Thanks, Tiffany. Let's go to Josh Pittman. Josh, same question. Talk about your background a little bit, how you got to Jones Day.

Josh Pittman:

Yeah, thanks Dave. So I'm originally from Youngstown, Ohio. Like Tiffany, I am a double Buck Eye at the Ohio State University, and it was interesting to listen to Tiffany's story through undergrad because I guess I am the exact opposite. Like you mentioned, I was the political science major. I knew I wanted to be a lawyer sort of, I think, probably since I could walk and talk, I think that was my thing. I don't know if I knew exactly what that would look like. Definitely didn't know what it would look like. But I sort of did some of the prototypical, I want to be a lawyer activities. I was a captain of my debate team in high school. I continue to coach a debate team here in the Columbus area. So those experiences shaped me into wanting to go to law school, be a lawyer. And then one of my first exposures to Jones Day was a clerkship panel at Moritz at Ohio State that my now office neighbor, Marjorie Duffy, Jim Saywell, Jordan Bauman, and I think April Johnson out of our Cleveland office led at Ohio State.

This was pandemic time, so I believe it was virtual, so I think they were all probably in their different offices. But at that time, knowing very little about the firm beyond the webpage and the recruiting sites that you go on when you're job searching in law school, it really struck me how these folks from all these different offices seemed to actually know each other, like each other, get along in a way that felt organic and natural. So that was one of the early experiences that made me think that this was a place that I'd like to be at.

Dave Dalton:

I was going to ask you, I noticed you're still coaching a high school debate team. Tell me about that.

Josh Pittman:

It's a time commitment like any other commitment that you... I'm fortunate that Jones Day makes something like that possible for me. I've had candid conversations with Tiffany about how to manage the professional obligations and then outside community activities that associates get involved in. Having a resource like that makes navigating something like that possible because without it, you're always wondering, am I doing too much on one side or the other? Or strategies for how to manage chasing personal pursuits that aren't directly related to the work that we're doing. So I think having those resources goes a long way.

Dave Dalton:

We're going to talk about work-life balance in a little while, but I'm glad you brought that up already because I think it's so important, likely with the audience that's hearing this program right now. Let's talk about landing that first job, high pressure proposition. No matter who you are, no matter how prepared you are, no matter how good you are, getting that first gig, especially in a competitive profession like the law has got to be tough. Josh, you went through this most recently. Talk about your experience in terms of planning your career track, trying to get to somewhere where you're able to start your career and prosper. What'd you do?

Josh Pittman:

My experience for lawyers or for law students now would be a little bit unique. So I was part of the COVID class years, so the bulk of my OCI and an interview process was all virtual. In fact, the first day I had been to our Jones Day Columbus office was when I walked in for day one of our summer associate program. As much as you're trying to land the job, you're also trying to find out if the place is a right fit for you. And in particular, I think the people that you're going to interact with, whether or not they are a good fit for you. I mean, there's a lot of places you can practice high quality law, and the dynamics you see in the interview in particular are something that stands out to me. So my first OCI interview happened to be with Tiffany and an associate from our Cleveland office.

So I did the law student thing, I read their bios, knew where they went to school and all these interesting facts. I did the pre-work and all that to go into the interview. But I think the thing that struck me the most was that Tiffany was a partner this time and is a supervising attorney to the associate, but it came through to me very clearly that Tiffany had trust in the associate to have a meaningful part in the interview, both responding to my questions and developing and getting... I was almost going to say developing the records in deposition mode, but getting information out of me that she wanted to evaluate me as a candidate for the position. That particular dynamic did more to express the trust that the firm has in associates more so than any article or statement could convey. So that was something that really stuck out to me and made me think, hey, this is a place that I might like to be.

Dave Dalton:

Interesting. And not only finding the right job but the right fit. I think you're talking about maybe culture there, that kind of thing. How did you know? You don't need to say Jones Day in particular, we're all glad it worked out for you here of course, but what gave me that warm feeling like, "You know what? I could work here. I could probably succeed here." When did you know? How did you know?

Josh Pittman:

That dynamic left me sort of curious. And by dynamic I mean the interaction between Tiffany and the associate who was in the interview with me. And then when I went to my callback interview, it felt very connected. It didn't feel like a sort of spin cycle type interview where you go from one to another to another to another, and sort of five different interviews all in one. It felt like one sort of continuous process of getting to know me. It felt like everybody who was participating in that interview process was sort of building on prior conversations that I had, and it made me feel like this was a cohesive place and it made me just sort of trust what I was hearing.

Dave Dalton:

I'm going off script here, but your peers from law school who were going through the interview process at the same time, did they have similar experiences with other firms? Is that a typical experience or were other people not as welcomed, I guess?

Josh Pittman:

I would say in particular in the OCI process where it's a little bit more fixed, I think there's a certain amount of law students that are interviewed in a given slot. I think for those interviews in particular, they could feel a sort mechanical, I've heard, or sort of that they were just going through the roster of folks that they had selected to interview, and that's why that dynamic in the first interview really stood out to me. This is the time where the red carpet, so to speak, should be rolled out the least, and I still felt welcomed and saw that dynamic playing out between Tiffany and the associate who's doing the interview. It's one thing to welcome me as the prospective law student who's joining the firm, but also how do you treat mid-levels and juniors who are doing work for you? That experience really shone through in that first OCI interview.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

And I'll sort of jump in. I think I've been someone who sort of went through the process in a more traditional sense, even though it's dated, and I won't tell you how dated. Look up bio and do the math yourself. To Josh's point of what he was seeing in the dynamic, even in a virtual interview, is something that no matter what law firm you go to, now that we're back to in-person, you can try to find in the way that lawyers are interacting with people who aren't part of the interview process. Best advice I ever got when I was interviewing was watch and see how the lawyers talk to their assistants. How do they talk to the administrative staff? How do they talk to reception? Because those aren't lawyers, right? They're staff, but they're vitally important to law firms and they're also just people and they're people that you have to work with at the firm, and to me that tells you a lot about a firm's culture. So when I was doing the more traditional interview process going in and out of different firms, I kept an eye out for that.

And there were some places where I saw really positive interactions, there were some places I didn't, and for me that was really important because it gave me some insight, I thought, into how the interactions might be between supervising attorneys and more junior attorneys like myself. But I'm a very people-oriented person. One of the key things about all the advice we're going to give you today and that you'll get from everybody about this is know thyself and what is the most important thing for you. Is it a firm where you get the interaction and comfort that Josh is talking to? I think for a lot of people that's important. But that might not be your driver. Your big driver might be a particular type of work that you want to do, a particular type of client that you want to have, and there are specialty areas in the law where if you can get in with a certain firm, it makes that path easier. So the first thing you really have to do when you're thinking about career planning is what do you want it to look like, as best as you can tell?

Dave Dalton:

Sure. How does a twenty-four-year-old know for sure? Is that a lot of soul-searching, introspection, talking to your peers? How do you make sure you know what's important, Tiffany, at that point?

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

You can do the best research you can, but you also have to be flexible, and you have to understand that those ideas might change. So like anything in the world, and we do this when we practice, you can only work with the information you have. And so at 24, you might have an idea about what your life is going to look like and then you meet the love of your life or you decide all of a sudden that you live in Ohio, but you can't stand winter anymore and you've just got to move and that takes a different priority. Things happen, things change. I try to always go back and revisit this every three or four years. Maybe that's too long when you're young. I'm older now, and so there's less change that happens, but you go back and revisit it. And if you really don't know, if you're really not sure yet, go to the path that keeps the most doors open for you.

That's probably, for me, how I ended up in big law versus something else. Once I knew I wanted to go to big law, it was the people and the place, and that's what led me to where I landed at Jones Day to make the decision initially to go to big law versus government or a nonprofit or something that's not even a legal title. I was that young person who wasn't quite sure what she wanted to do, but to have options, and going into big law first, you can go kind of anywhere from there. It's harder sometimes to go from other places into big law, and there are other things like that too. The path to get there is more narrow, but the exits can be quite broad. So if you don't know, maybe think about, what's the route that gives me the most options in two years when I might know myself better?

Dave Dalton:

Savvy advice, savvy advice. In terms of career direction, counseling, how much help do you get on campus? I thought what you said, by the way, Tiffany, was brilliant, the path that leaves the most doors open for right now. So obvious, but I've never heard anybody articulate that. And you've invested so much into your education, in your career planning, you know what? Maybe if you're not a hundred percent sure, go somewhere where you might have some flexibility, some options. Where do you hear that if you're a young lawyer?

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

I actually did get that from the career advisors. And I do think that advisor career advisors do their best, but the quality of the vice is going to vary depending on where you are. And again, so much of this can be very specific to you as a person, but I happen to have an amazing counselor at Ohio State. She started by explaining to me all of these different options, which, again, I didn't know going in. I had no idea. I watched Law and Order, that's what lawyers did. I just had no idea what else the options were. She took the time to explain the options to me, and then she said it to me pretty directly, big law lets you make other choices later, and a lot of other choices, and some of these other paths, you can go there from big law, but if you decide on that later, it's harder to go into.

And that's the way she said it. And I've found that to be true, not just for myself because I went and stayed, but I have friends from law school. I've seen other law students who have picked different paths that maybe had more narrow exit strategies and it has changed what their life could look like.

Dave Dalton:

Sure, sure. As we speak here this afternoon, there's a young aspiring lawyer out there somewhere and she or he is hearing this and maybe the job search is a little tough right now. It's not going the way she wanted. It's not going the way he expected. What do you do? How do you retrench? How do you tell them to regroup and say, "You know what? There's something good coming." But what do they do right now if they're in a rut?

Josh Pittman:

Picking up on what Tiffany said earlier about the career service office, the Moritz Career Services does an absolutely tremendous job of helping law students navigate both this situation where maybe you're past the OCI period where you're into your three L year and you're still trying to figure out exactly where your fit is. Spending an hour with one of the folks in the career services office to figure out what your options are, how to repackage, repurpose some of the application materials that you've been putting out, maybe some alternative strategies as well. I mean, like Tiffany said, the work is obviously vitally important, but you might not have an idea of what work you want to do by the time you're a three L. And so one thing you can use as a sort of criterion would be to find people that you connect with, whether this is a bar association happy hour or going to one of the happy hours that firms sponsor or other events, sort of get to know attorneys in your area.

There are things you can do to sus out who the types of people that you want to work with and work alongside. And also just the alternative pathways and things that are available. Now that we're, knock on wood, outside of the pandemic and those opportunities are available, you should absolutely seize them. You can gain a wealth of information through avenues like that.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

I really want to echo the networking piece that Josh talked about and emphasize something that I didn't really understand as a law student I've really only come to appreciate probably in the last five or so years. The legal profession is still predominantly about relationships. And I mean that in a really good way because again, I'm a people person, I like to know people and to understand things on that level, and so it's great that that's part of what I do, but it's also a lot of how you find out about what those opportunities could be. And so staying in touch with the folks at your law school, the folks that you graduated with, if you've happened to meet lawyers in the community through law school, stay in contact with them, have a coffee with them. It's not about an ask for a job, it's having a conversation about what do they know about, right? Because sometimes the bar association's hiring but they haven't had a chance to post it yet, and you can sort of get in in the ground floor.

I know a lot of folks who got courtships because judges retire and somebody new gets appointed and it's not sort of a flashy one that's making all the news, so nobody's really paying attention and all of a sudden they have to put together chambers in a week because they're getting a full caseload and they've gotten opportunities that way. Similarly, the courthouse, the person who's been there for 20 years is retiring. You find out about a lot of that stuff by talking to people, not because it's an insular profession, but because we're relationship based and we talk to each other, we tend to know about things before they come out publicly and use those relationships to make connections. It doesn't guarantee that you're going to get it, but it at least gives you different avenues, different paths to explore as you're trying to find that first foot in a door job.

Dave Dalton:

Good stuff. Really, really good stuff. I guess the notion is stay out there. All right, let's say things work out, or they will work out sooner or later. Congratulations. There you are. You got your gig. However you did it, you're there. There's your desk, there's the bathroom. Here's your pencil sharpener. Let's go get it. All right, all that said...

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

Wait, Dave, do you still have a pencil sharpener on your desk?

Dave Dalton:

I'm aging myself. Wait, no. Now we just use a Bowie knife up here in Cleveland too. All right, so here you are. Tiffany, think back. You're starting at Jones Day. You're a real lawyer. You passed the bar and here you are. Talk about how you felt. How do you show that you've arrived and assimilate and feel comfortable in your role?

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

I started in Jones Day's DC office. So this is the first time I left Ohio. So I'm in a new city starting at this big fancy law firm, little girl from rural Ohio who didn't know any lawyers. So I was really anxious and stressed and had a lot of concerns that somebody had made a mistake and somebody was going to wake up and be like, "Oh wait, this was not what we meant to do."

Dave Dalton:

There's a term for that, it's called imposter syndrome.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

Exactly.

Dave Dalton:

You had imposter syndrome.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

I did. But that's what I want to tell all you law students out there who get that first job, is as much as you can remind yourself, you belong there. You got that job for a reason. They would not have hired you for that job if they did not have the faith that you could do it. And it's a mantra you have to tell yourself when you look in the mirror. So I'm going to date myself, but there used to be a skit on Saturday Night Live with this comedian who was a motivational speaker and he used to look in the mirror every morning. He's like, "I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and gosh darn it, people like me." Do a version of that in the mirror. You belong there. You can be a lawyer, you will be a lawyer. You need to have some of that confidence, but you have to temper it with understanding that there's a lot you don't know and neither do all the other people who are starting.

So what does that mean? That means you're going to make mistakes and that's okay. We all do it. Don't get down on yourself when you make that first mistake that's going to happen. You still belong there. But it also means that it's incumbent upon you to ask questions and start making connections with the folks who are your year, the folks who are a little bit older than you, who were you two, three years ago because they remember all the mistakes that they made and they can help you, and then also with more senior lawyers who can give you some of that bigger picture advice. You have to start building those relationships in the firm to understand how best to assimilate. How do we do the thing that we do? What's the special sauce that we as a firm have for the client? Because every firm has it, right? They've got their way in which they present to clients as to here's why you hire us over this other firm, to figure out what that special sauce is and how you add that into the way that you practice.

You've got to make those connections with folks in the firm and again at different levels because they'll each tell you a little piece.

Dave Dalton:

Well said. So the secret sauce in terms of where the firm adds value, here's our proposition, here's why we're good, and how do you add to that? Well, how can you bring something to the table that makes it even better? Josh, what was toughest for you as a new lawyer starting out?

Josh Pittman:

Yeah, Dave, I think I resonated a lot with Tiffany's remarks about imposter syndrome. I think that is a bubbling under the surface for a lot of law students and new lawyers. And just to add on to that, the hardest part is probably the self-imposed pressure as a young lawyer, as a law student. We really are our greatest critics and perhaps a more harsh critic than actually exists out in the world. So I think we're more sort of attuned to what we perceive as our faults and we recognize things and they look to us like glaring errors, and to maybe a supervising attorney it's a small speed bump. Approaching that with some grace as well. Like Tiffany said, you were selected for this role for a reason. The people who selected you have a criteria in mind. You fit it. You deserve to be in this place. It's really important to remind yourself of those things. And then just to approach your work with some grace and some humility.

Like Tiffany said, you're going to make mistakes, it's about taking ownership of your mistakes and sort of figuring out how to best move forward to deliver service for the client. But I really think that self-imposed pressure is truly the worst. It's that nagging voice in the back of your head that is hyper-tuned to your small issues and sort of blows them up. So just approaching the work with some grace.

Dave Dalton:

Well said. Nobody gets into law school by accident. Nobody graduates from law school by accident. Nobody gets hired by a law firm, especially a big law firm or a prestigious firm by accident. There's a reason you're there. Josh, can you talk about some of the resources that firms have in place to help lawyers transition from law school into a career as a lawyer, peer counseling, mentoring, affinity groups, formal training, that kind of thing? How can a firm help a young lawyer?

Josh Pittman:

Out of all of those resource, and I think Jones Day does a really good job of putting real support behind each of those resources. The thing that has made the difference for me so far would be the affinity groups that the firm sponsors. I have particular experience with our black lawyers group and I was fortunate enough to join a highly diverse firm. If you were at a firm that maybe is less diverse, groups like this can make a big place feel accessible, feel like you have people that you can relate to and go to who perhaps relate to you on a deeper level than some others may or may not. The supports that the firm puts behind those groups as a tremendous investment and really pays dividends. It's welcoming to know that you have someone to go to whatever office you're in, whatever practice you're in or whatever year you are in the firm who sort of relates to your experiences and you can connect with. So that's been a huge help to me onboarding as a young associate.

Dave Dalton:

And I might say a plug for the home team here. Jones Day has seven affinity groups, which I think is leading the AmLaw at 100. And I didn't realize how active they were, how involved they were and how interwoven in the firm culture they are. Tiffany, this might be a nice segue to talk into mentoring, both formal and informal, structured inorganic, how our mentor relationships come about. They can be very, very valuable in terms of the development and the acclamation of a new lawyer.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

Absolutely. I don't think you can overstate the importance of mentoring relationships. And having multiple mentors is important because you have mentors who can help you with different things. There are mentors who do the type of work that you want to do, and so they can help you substantively, but they may not be the best person to help mentor you through things like the work life... I hate the phrase work life balance. I know we're going to talk about it later. I like to call more juggling, which I can explain later. But that might be somebody else, right? Because given there are other people who share your background, I have two children, the conversation that I like to talk with other people who have children and how do you balance with back to school day and there's a hundred different activities over the next two weeks and how do you balance that with the work? So that might be a different mentor. And it might be another mentor if you have a really big interest in being involved in your community.

So how do you do that kind of work? How do you make those connections? So identifying mentors who can serve those different roles can be really helpful, particularly when you're young. Organic mentor relationships tend to work better than the more structured ones. You'll walk in, your firm will give you a mentor probably, maybe two. It's a little bit luck of the draw. Sometimes there's chemistry there and sometimes there's not. But when I say organic, that doesn't mean accidental. The people that I have made mentors, many of them are people that I sought out because of one of those needs I wanted to fill and started the conversation and then we grew the mentor relationship from there. So don't mistake the idea of organic mentoring with not having to be purposeful. Everybody has a limited amount of time, you will have a limited amount of time, the people that you want to mentor you will have a limited amount of time, so you need to be thoughtful about how you want to spend that time.

Dave Dalton:

You've mentored many lawyers, I'm sure, at this point. How does it help you, Tiffany? Flip it for a second.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

They have so much energy and excitement. I mean, you mentioned earlier, Dave, about sometimes the hard days when you're doubting yourself and reminding yourself, there are also days where... I mean, this job is tough. Nobody should go into big law, if you decide that's where you want to go, and think that this is going to be a cakewalk. The nature of the business is just challenging. It is a service industry and you need to provide a high quality service to your clients. There's a lot on the line for them. So sometimes that's really stressful and sometimes that can be a little bit of a grind. One of the things I love about mentoring is when people come into it, they have so much energy and there's an excitement to this because they haven't done it, and that re-energizes me. I'm getting old enough now where the experiences of those folks have allowed them to bring different perspectives, cultural perspectives to things that sometimes I've missed, right?

Because I'm not in the weeds all the time with what's going on, and sometimes it's very important, particularly if you're thinking about getting ready for jury trial and what is on the consciousness of Americans these days. They may have some insights that I don't have, so I love mentoring.

Dave Dalton:

Everybody wins, right? It was done right, for sure. And these JONES DAY TALKS®, Perspectives and Pathways podcasts, we talk about issues that are relevant to lawyers from diverse backgrounds or from underrepresented backgrounds. So let's get into that a little bit. Are there different challenges for diverse lawyers coming into the practice of law or a big law firm for that matter? Josh, what's your take on that?

Josh Pittman:

Yeah, thanks, Dave. Tiffany said something earlier that really resonated with me, which was that Law and Order was sort of law school 1 0 1. I relate to that because my view of what a lawyer was was largely driven by what I saw and I didn't have lawyers in my immediate family growing up. So it was getting into law school and sort of getting acclimated to that culture. There's a few bumps along the way and I think a few things that are additional thoughts or sources of self-doubt that you might have as a diverse lawyer, but I think when you find a place where you fit in and you find people that can relate to you on that, it becomes a lot less daunting. You realize that it's not just a you challenge, it's something that, in my case, and Tiffany's gone through before, other attorneys of the firm have gone through before, so it makes it feel a lot more of a solvable problem, something you can make it through and not a roadblock, just a speed bump.

Dave Dalton:

Tiffany.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

Yep.

Dave Dalton:

You're a diverse lawyer, woman lawyer from rural Ohio and they just throw you right into the beltway. How did that work out? Obviously it worked out fine, but talk about being a diverse lawyer in those circumstances. That's not an easy hand you were dealt, I'd imagine.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

Some of the things that we've talked about, the imposter syndrome, challenges in connecting can sometimes be more for diverse lawyers than other lawyers. It's the same challenges, they're just amplified or they have a slightly different bend to them. And on the connection piece in general, for a lot of diverse lawyers, particularly lawyers of color, the way in which you're raised to sort of keep your personal life separate from your work life and we don't talk about personal things at work as a way to show professionalism can sometimes be a barrier when you're trying to make connections, when you're trying to get mentored. The things that we were talking about earlier that are so important because one of the things about lawyers and the relationship nature of our work is they want to know you. They want to understand who you are. They want to feel some authenticity in what they're doing.

And so to do that, you have to reveal a little bit more than maybe folks thought if you came up in a household where it was very home is home, work is work. Nobody's saying you have to go out there and tell everybody all your business, I don't recommend anybody do that, but you do have to figure out how you can comfortably show the firm who you are and that you're invested in being a good lawyer there, you're invested in the work that they're doing because that's how people want to make an investment in you because you show that you are invested in what they care about. And if you don't make those connections, it can be really hard for people to decide when they're looking at that limited amount of time they have to mentor folks that you are going to be one of the people that they mentor.

Dave Dalton:

What about with clients? Is it different for a young diverse lawyer?

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

I actually think a lot of times it's different in a good way. I have actually had conversations with some more senior white male partners about certain clients that love me. They just love talking to me. I don't know why. And some of them are younger women, some of them are not necessarily, but maybe it's a generational thing or what have you, but it gives the firm more options in how we can connect with clients because we have more different folks that might resonate with them. So when everybody looks the same and they had the same background, the conversations tend to be the same. Our clients now do not have all the same folks in-house, and so we now have more opportunities to make those connections. That doesn't mean it's not. There are times when I have to remind folks that yes, I'm a partner, I've been mistaken for the court reporter, I've been mistaken for the assistant, I've had all those things. Right, exactly. Am I the secretary calling, even using the word secretary is like, oh wow, that happens.

You have to make sure that you give people grace. Don't just give yourself grace, you have to give clients grace, but you have to stand up for yourself and you have to be able to show them that no, you are authoritative on this topic. They're hiring you because you know what you're talking about.

Dave Dalton:

You've told me that story about being mistaken for someone who might have a different role at the firm, and every time I hear it, I cringe a little bit. So sorry, I will get used to it.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

And I do think it's important for folks to realize that the profession has come a long way even in the time that I've been in it, but it's still got a long way to go and you have to understand that so that you can power through those cringey moments.

Dave Dalton:

Sure, sure. You were talking about connections and so forth a second ago, which is a nice segue into what I want to talk about that, and that's networking. And networking has nearly become a cliche. Oh, everybody network, it's so important to network and you guys were talking about networking earlier. But Josh, how do you start networking? Where does that come from?

Josh Pittman:

Being intentional is really important, and I think showing up is one of the easiest ways that you can be intentional about building your network. One conversation, if you can stomach that, at a bar association happy hour is worth 50 cold LinkedIn messages. And I was told early on, and I don't know if I believed it at the time, I definitely do now, that when someone sees you two or three times, even if you don't talk to them, they feel like they know you as you've been around them. Being physically present with someone, and like Tiffany said, showing your you, your why to someone really helps building a connection and building a network that's useful. I mean, you can have a couple hundred or a couple thousand LinkedIn connections, but how many of them can you call when you have a problem or when you've encountered a new situation that you've never encountered before or when something happens that has the potential to disrupt your professional life?

Who can you really call on to calm you down and help walk you through that problem? It's those organic, those deep connections that you can actually rely on. The trite phrases is very accurate here. It's very much quality over quantity. You want to have a network that you can actually depend on, or someone that you can call up to do a mock interview when you're going into the big law interview when you're nervous and you've never been through a mock interview before. So you want to sort of cultivate those connections and not focus so much on trying to know everybody because you just need to find your people.

Dave Dalton:

I like that. I like that. Tiffany, what kind of investment of time are we talking about? Whatever that means exactly, whether you're doing pro bono work or volunteering for a board somewhere or going to bar association meetings or whatever it is. To make it worthwhile and to make it help long-term , you're looking at a few hours a month, what do you recommend to somebody in terms of, I got to budget some time to develop a good professional network? How do you go about that?

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

The first question you've got to answer for yourself is if you're at a firm, like you're a new lawyer at a firm, what is the way in which that firm measures success? Is it having a lot of connections? At what point, if you have to have a book of business, those sorts of things that can impact this discussion. So at some firms that's very important for very young lawyers, at other firms it's not. So if it is very important, obviously you're going to want to spend more time doing that if that's the way you're going to be measured in terms of success at most firms. The most important thing you can do is be a damn good lawyer. And so whatever you do on the network side should not take away from that. You need to make sure that you are learning how to do your craft and doing it the best that you can.

Outside of that, I agree with Josh that it is quality over quantity, depth versus broadness. Generally, again, this can be changed depending on what the metrics are where you are. But what you're trying to do is build up relationships with folks who eventually might call you because they have work they want to give you or because they have an opportunity that might open up. The way you get there is you have to build trust, trust takes time, and I'm not talking time like you're calling them every day but years. And so if you're looking at it in that scope, what do you do as a young lawyer? How much time do you spend? It's a couple hours a month maybe because you shouldn't be taking away from learning your craft. I also think that people underestimate the network that they graduate law school with because you automatically have the people you went to law school with, and some of them you'll be closer to than others, but you have a shared experience that if you want to deepen a relationship with somebody, you can already go there.

You know all the same professors, you can joke about the local watering hole, you can joke about that crazy thing that happened at OCI, the fire alarm, whatever. You've got something. That's probably the easiest network to work on and that's the network that long term can probably be the most valuable because as you advance, so will they, and some of them are going to end up places maybe in the short term, probably in the longer term, where they're going to be the ones who can give you work or can open the door if you decide you want to go in-house. So don't lose track of the folks from law school and that's really what I think young lawyers should spend that couple hours at most a month just keeping track of folks, sending a note, have a happy hour for the folks who stayed local, something to make sure you have touch points with them so that when somebody becomes the GC at a big company, you're not cold calling them for the first time in 15 years like, "Hey, I know we haven't talked, but..."

That's awkward and everybody knows what you're doing. Much better if you have cultivated that relationship over time. The last point I'll make is a lot of folks, when they come out of law school, you want to make a difference and you want to help folks and I think that that's great. We all have a responsibility as lawyers to give back to the community. I believe that wholeheartedly. But you've got to make sure you don't oversubscribe and then not be able to do your first and foremost job, which is to be a damn good lawyer. And I've told Josh this too, I usually tell young lawyers don't go joining boards or getting super involved in things for the first two years. Give yourself a little time to figure out how to do this job and how to make it all work so that when you do go and you do join those things, you can be really focused on that.

Dave Dalton:

I cannot find any reason to disagree with anything you just said. Well, that was so smart. I try and come up with a follow up question sometimes and say, "Well, what about..." But I love the two things you said. First of all, the law school thing is brilliant because it's easy, it's a layup. Stay in touch with those people and you've got a shared experience. And number two, get out there, hit the grindstone for a couple years and the other stuff kind of takes care of itself once you're a good lawyer, as you say. So this is terrific. I kind of wish that our last question because we could end on a high note, but unfortunately I have one more question for you guys, if you can stand it, and we're going right into Tiffany's wheelhouse, which is about work-life balance that she says she hates. But I've got to ask, but Tiffany, however you interpret this or you said you might have a different term rather than work-life balance, but how do you know when you're getting it right?

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

Yeah, there's a couple of things. So first, the preferred term I like is work-life juggle.

Dave Dalton:

Okay.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

I think if you talk about work-life balance, you are insinuating or suggesting that there is some perfect balance that can be reached and met every day and that's not realistic and you make people feel like they're failing when they're not because it's not going to be a day-to-day thing. Juggling to me is a much better way to think about it because you're trying to keep balls up in the air and the balls that are coming down are the ones that need your attention in that moment and those change from time to time. So I'm a mother, I'm a lawyer. There are some days where I am an amazing lawyer, just did something great for my client and I'm really excited that my kids made it home from school safely. That's what I did, I was that pick up just 20 minutes late, that's all it was. It was fine. Other days, I'm an amazing mom and I didn't commit malpractice.

That's a little extreme, but it really can vary from day to day or month to month, and there are times when I really need to give my attention to my family and there are times when I really need to give my attention to my work, right? Because I'm getting ready... I was just gearing up for trial for this summer, so that was a really intense three months where I needed to really focus on work. That case resolved, and I've spent the last six weeks really being more home and being more engaged with my family and first day of school today, dropped off the kids, did all that stuff. You have to look at it in this long-term time period, which is the second thing. So the first is it's not balance, it's juggling different things, what needs your priority at a given time and understanding that the time period you to be looking at this is measured in weeks, not hours. Again, know thyself because what looks like a good juggling act for me may be different for Josh.

What I think is really important to be at for work events, for my children's events, for my own self-care, self-care is important. My priorities there are going to differ from other people, and so then what juggling looks like for me is going to look differently for other people. And I try every couple of years to take a look, am I doing all the things I want over the time period that I'm evaluating it in the proportions that make me happy. I've heard the saying you can have it all, but maybe not all at once. That's true in the micro scale. There are some days where you can't have it all that day. There aren't enough hours in the day. But long term, are you hitting where you want to hit for these different pieces of your life?

Dave Dalton:

Sure. You've spent time thinking about this, haven't you?

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

I've done a fair amount of thinking about this. I've spoken to a lot of people about this and my thinking on it has evolved a lot and hopefully I can save some folks some time. I came out and sort of had an idea about balance and had an idea about, well, if you're going to have children, this is what it has to look like and all these things. And I figured out pretty quickly that those weren't my wants. They were other people's projections. And you can realize that, but then it takes you some time to figure out what your own wants are.

Dave Dalton:

Okay. You know what? You're going to write a book someday. You're going to call it Work Life Juggling. In fact, get one of our IP people out. You need to protect that, work life juggling.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

Okay, I'll get right on it.

Dave Dalton:

If you need an editor, you let me know. I'd love to help. Josh, follow up with that if you can. What does a young lawyer know when he or she has it right in terms of making all this work?

Josh Pittman:

Yeah, I don't know when you have it right. Like Tiffany said, like law, it's a practice, it's something that you try to cultivate and develop over time. When I hear work life balance, I try to think more work life integration. I try to think what are the ways in which... Like Tiffany said, sometimes you're going to have a lot in the work category and you're going to have to just sort of make do in the life category and vice versa, different seasons of your life. I try not to think of them as entirely separate. I've made real friends here and colleagues and classmates at Jones Day that I consider to be part of my life, and I have people from my life side that I think are some of my greatest professional support resources. So I don't think of them as entirely separate categories. I think of it more as, how do you integrate these two concepts into your whole life?

And there's little things like making sure that your partner is okay with you checking emails at dinner and knowing that maybe the people on your case team are okay with you having to leave at a certain time to, like Tiffany said, pick up kids or if I had particular plans I really wanted to protect, building the support in your work life to make space for your personal life. So I have to think of it more as integration. How do you make both sides of the house talk to each other and work for you at the end of the day?

Dave Dalton:

Smart. Smart. Hey, you've been so generous with your time, but I did want to wrap up with one more thing. We've covered a lot of material here. You've both imparted some great advice and some great insight. Anything else you'd like to leave this audience with in terms of transitioning from law school to lawyer? Anything else? Someone out of here? Tiffany, you first if you have something.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

Yeah, enjoy it. That's going to sound weird, right? I think we've talked about all the anxiety and the things, but it's an exciting part of your life. You have studied to prepare yourself to undertake a profession, not a job, and I think there's something really special about that. Josh, you said it's a practice and that's what you get to do. And I think a lot of lawyers are lifelong learners and you're getting to kick off the next stage of your lifelong learning when you start your work, so try to enjoy that as much as you can.

Dave Dalton:

Josh, wrap us up. Anything else you'd like to say?

Josh Pittman:

Yeah, Dave, I wholeheartedly agree with that. I'm only two years out of law school now, but I look back on my time in law school very fondly now. In the moment, all you're thinking about is outlines and finals and those things aren't really what you take forward in the years to follow, it's the friendships you make, it's the people you get to meet and it's the learning that you get to do, the fun exploration that you get to be a part of. So I think it goes back to just give yourself some grace, know that there are stressful times in life and in your schooling and work as a young attorney, but there's fun points too and focus on those.

Dave Dalton:

Excellent. Josh, Tiffany, we will leave it right there. Hey, thank you so much. I really enjoyed this conversation. Thanks so much for your time today. Really, really liked talking with you, so thank you.

Tiffany Lipscomb Jackson:

Thanks so much, Dave. Anytime.

Dave Dalton:

Take care. We'll do it again. And for complete biographies and contact information for Tiffany and Josh, visit JonesDay.com. Subscribe to JONES DAY TALKS® at Apple Podcasts, or wherever else quality podcasts can be found. Perspectives and Pathways and JONES DAY TALKS® programs for produced by Tom Kondilas. As always, we thank you for listening. I'm Dave Dalton. We'll talk to you next time.

Speaker 5:

Thank you for listening to JONES DAY TALKS®. Comments heard on JONES DAY TALKS® should not be construed as legal advice regarding any specific facts or circumstances. The opinions expressed on JONES DAY TALKS® are those of lawyers appearing on the program and do not necessarily reflect those of the firm. For more information, please visit JonesDay.com.