TransformingYourCareerTransformingYourself

  My, my, how badly the Justices of the US Supreme Court have been behaving.  As FT documents, it's everything from rude responses to opinions inside the Court to badmouthing members outside the Court in public statements. About the latter: Without naming Brett Kavanaugh, Sonia Sotomayor put the knock on him for his privileged background.  Why this matters is because SCOTUS had been among the few holdouts for old-line WASP (White Anglo-Saxon Protestant) gentility. The august aura historically attached to SCOTUS gave raw pragmatic America a bit of class. WASP culture embedded a code of behavior in which politeness was paramount.  That dominated, at least on the surface, institutions in America until around the 1960s.  Anything less in your presentation of self would have doomed you to hourly work. Language was indirect. Conflict was avoided. Perhaps that's why so many who looped into the ethos struggled with problem use of alcohol . Old-money Greenwich, Connectic...

  In that classic on power by journalist Hedrick Smith "The Power Game" there's a comprehensive explanation of how many versions of that there are.  One is institutional power, that is, it's established by your title in a major organization such as the US Congress. The world clamors for access to you. And that's the kind the late Lindsey Graham had.  It is reported Graham died of cardiac arrest at age 71.  The rumor is that Mitch McConnell, also with plenty of institutional power, suffered a cardiac event.  Back in January 2025, then chair of elite law firm Paul, Weiss Brad Karp experienced a major heart attack in his 60s. He survived that, for now.  So, you got to wonder if there's some kind of correlation between the dynamics of institutional power and heavy pressure on the heart. Perhaps human beings, at least so far, can't process a mega dose of institutional power.  Of course, there are other kinds of power. They're the individualistic type....

  Paul, Weiss' London office essentially is the House that Brad Karp and Scott Barshay built.  For years following its startup in 2001 the London location had been NoWhereVille. Then the two guys got to work. The latest accomplishment is being Apollo's primary outside legal counsel for its $76 billion purchase of discount carrier EasyJet. Apollo had outbid the investment firm Castlelake. Currently London is for Paul, Weiss a major profit center as well as branding international powerhouse. Bloomberg Law documents: "The firm has boosted its profile in London after hiring rainmakers Neel Sachdev and Roger Johnson from Kirkland & Ellis in 2023. Last year, its London teams guided parties in the $2.7 billion Soho House buyout and tech giant Qualcomm’s $2.4 billion purchase of semiconductor firm Alphawave Semi." Years ago Karp had brought in the Apollo account, then strengthened the hold on it in 2011. That was by poaching the seven partners at O'Melveny & Mye...

  Just like the Trump administration targeted Big Law more than a year ago, it's been in the process of imposing its power on elite higher education. Yale has the bad luck of being in the spotlight. And in process, if it settles as had nine large law firms, it could become the "Next Paul, Weiss." That is, a wounded brand because it did settle and became a symbol of capitulation. Harvard didn't cave, instead going to war on the litigation front as had WilmerHale and Perkins Coie.  The administration's official beef, as The Wall Street Journal reports, is: "Yale is under scrutiny after a Justice Department investigation said its medical school discriminated against white and Asian applicants."  Already, sources claim, Yale has made one settlement offer. It was rejected. It has made a second. Internally, many faculty, students and much of the influential law school are pushing back. The resistance now includes US Senator Richard Blumenthal, a graduate. T...

This isn't scientific. My caution about hope is based on observations from my intuitive coaching practice.  Let's cut to the chase during this era of intensifying financial distress. There shouldn't be a situation in which someone who needs income is without it for an extended period. Those who lost their job or never landed one should have done course correction in their search. The most common and the most effective is to grab work, any kind. That not only brings in income. It restores confidence, provides fresh perspective about what attitudes and skills are marketable and attracts new contacts.  What often prevents that survival move is, you got it, hope. After being unemployed for too long, for example, those now drifting into despair come to me for a complimentary consultation. What tumbles out is that they had embraced the hope that they could replicate the past. Yes, land the kind of job, responsibilities and compensation they had.  Or what was their dream job dur...

Euphoria. The tough job market for recent BA/BS graduates, along with collapsing sectors, has made piling on an advanced degree - MA/MS or PhD - seem like the solution. Then there's the study by Georgetown University projecting that by 2031 (right around the corner) the number of jobs requiring advanced degrees will be 14% higher than what it had been in 2021. So, you're over the moon when offered a free ride, including tuition and living expenses, to enter a graduate or professional school program. Yet, because of harsh warnings about the ROI of advanced degrees by influential sources such as The Wall Street Journal  you're probably also wary.  Postings on Reddit scream out that anxiety: Sure, it's free, no student loan debt but ... In my coaching I'm getting the same sort of questioning.  At the top of the list of what's-to-consider is the opportunity cost. No, you're not accumulating school loan debt. Through teaching or research contracts you might even...