<p>Con, what kind of law do/did you practice? What do you suggest or what are your thoughts on those of us interested in becoming financial lawyers, or civil lawyers, which field is less abrasive and in fact enjoyable?</p>
<p>Bal: I have been practicing Intellectual Property law since 1983, in New York City. I have 2 science degrees. The field used to be called “patent law” and used to be practiced exclusively by attorneys in relatively small law firms that only handled patent, trademark and copyright law. In those days, things were somewhat civil. Then, these small firms either got large or got gobbled up by large firms. I let myself get gobbled by a large GP firm for a few years. Now, most big firms have an IP department, mostly manned by arrogant Ivy leaguers with no science education who think that they are smart enough to handle anything, including organic chemistry. That’s another story. As patent cases became handled by bigfirms, litigation became much nastier, IMHP. As for what area to practice in, well, go where the jobs are. When I lateralled to the large GP firm, they had just finished firing most of their real estate department due to a change in the lagal demands, and instead were hiring bankruptcy attorneys. Then a few years later, most of the bankruptcy attorneys were fired and real estate attorneys were hired. M&A (is this a “financial lawyer” that you ask about?) was peaking, then it was not, and staffing changed accordingly. All this is, of course, “civil” law, although the lawyers are typically not. With civil law, no one’s going to jail or get executed, it’s all about money, so you can sleep well at night, presuming they let you come home, a real issue with 1 to 3 year associates. I have to admit that I have enjoyed writing briefs, and depositions can be fun at times, as well as court arguments. But, one has, somehow, to ignore the nastiness that your opponents constantly throw at you in each of those tasks. After 25+ years, it now makes my stomach tighten. You young wippersnappers, however, seem to love it and love the fight. Good for you. In most areas of the law, you are trying to get something that someone else doesn’t want to give to you without a fight. It’s not just about writing a good brief, or making a good oral argument, etc. And some of the most annoying fights are with “helpful” or inquisitive or concerned clients. If one could only practice law without clients! Clients and opposing counsel, aye, there’s the rub.</p>
<p>ConCernDad,</p>
<p>Your perspective is interesting, even if a little scathing. Most of the big firms I interviewed with had an IP department that was divided into hard and soft. The non-science people did soft-IP, and the science people did hard. In fact, some of the firms during our interview week had their own interview schedule for hard-IP candidates.</p>
<p>So with all that, I wonder about the accuracy of the notion that big firms have arrogant non-science people do hard IP. That certainly wasn’t the case with many of the firms with whom I interviewed.</p>
<p>Flower:</p>
<p>Nice to hear about your interview experience. I have lived it.</p>
<p>I guess I wasn’t clear. I was asking a question. Were firms misrepresenting themselves to me during the interview process? Their purported structure seems to contradict your account.</p>
<p>When I was at BigLawFirm, there were 25+ people nominally in the IP group – which only handled patent litigation and a small amount of TM litigation (also a bit of trade secret litigation). Of the 25+, only about 5 had a science degree. But the rest were <em>smart</em> guys, I guess. What BigLawFirms like to do is have a low level science associate to provide scientific advice to the english-major, former-federal-prosecutor partners. However, there are many BigLawFirms that have attracted a critical mass of patent people, either through law firm acquisition, or inch-by-inch. Check their firm bios for science depth. However, if you have <em>no</em> science degree, I suggest non-patent work is in your future.</p>