Down Memory Lane - There Was Actually a Time in When $70k for New JDs Was Big Money

 Let's cut to the chase. The year was 1987. 

On a Monday in October the stock market crashed. 

Corporate downsizing, made an art at GE by Jack Welch, was purging the system of middle-aged middle managers.

Staples caught the wave of accidental entrepreneurs forced out of corporate careers. It created the new category of office supplies for small business. We the purged agonized at Staples about what color business stationary. 

It was the worst of economic times, at least since The Great Depression. 

Meanwhile, large law firms were getting a lot of attention because they were paying inexperienced law-school graduates starting salaries of up to $70k.  Cravath got the ball rolling on that.

The phenomenon was enough to attract a major article by The Washington Post.  The kicker was this: The money wasn't enough for young lawyers to stay with those jobs which they found long in the hours and short on stimulating assignments. Often they were locked into proofreading documents at the printers or searching an obscure legal point for a partner. 

Circle now to 2020 - 2022. There also wasn't enough money - although entry level salary was $215k, plus there were bonuses - to keep inexperienced JDs. The game was to get in, then bolt in a lateral. Bonuses were thrown at them. Most only held on until the bonus was made, then bye-bye. There was even the awarding of off-season (in addition to on-season) bonuses by law firm Paul Weiss. They were positioned and packaged as awards to the "committed." However, commitment wasn't part of the overall ethos in Big Law.

That was then. The money is still big. But there is a sea change in attitudes among many of the new recruits. 

On professional anonymous networks and in conversations with me they bellow in pain with fear of not being able to hang onto the job. Yes, call it a perfect storm: the confluence of a slowdown in demand in myriad categories such as M&A, clients balking about fees, partner angst about Profits Per Equity Partner and the threat of generative AI to a range of jobs. 

About the latter, the strategists seems safe, only though for now. Generative AI keeps learning. It can get smarter than the strategists and knock out a genius strategy for each legal situation without much human intervention. The middlemen needed would be the ones to create the right prompts to extract that brilliance. And that will be that.

The insight from this discussion about money could be that it really doesn't count all that much, not in real life. As long as it is enough. Its impact usually is more abstract, as in X orY is a billionaire. None of my coaching clients and none of my communications clients do aspirational thinking about becoming billionaires. 

2023. The only way through the uncertainty, AI disruptions and need to conserve financial resources is to get smarter. That ranges from your organizational communications to career issues.  Complimentary consultation with award-winning marketing communications crafter and coach Jane Genova. (For appointments text 203-468-8579 or janegenova374@gmail.com)