Manage Your Life

The Law Practice Management Section of the ABA is running a 3-part Career Management Series by Kathleen Brady. The first, Manage Your Life, can be found here. Next month will be "Manage Your Time."

Message from the DOJ

There are exciting new developments in the Attorney General’s Honors Program and Summer Law Intern Program! Highlights include:

• An earlier application deadline and a faster review and selection process. The applications open on July 25th and close on September 2nd, 2008 (12:00 p.m. midnight, Eastern time; 11:00 p.m., Central; 10:00 p.m., Mountain; 9:00 p.m., Pacific).

• Four United States Attorneys’ Offices (USAOs) and the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys (EOUSA) are hiring approximately 16 entry-level attorneys through the Honors Program. Due to the level of responsibility held by AUSAs, these opportunities are only available to applicants who are admitted to a bar or, in some cases, who have taken a summer 2008 bar examination with results due in fall 2008. Participating USAOs are:

ο The Central District of California, Los Angeles, CA.
ο The Southern District of California, San Diego, CA.
ο The Western District of Michigan, Grand Rapids, MI.
ο The Middle District of Florida, Orlando, FL.
ο EOUSA, Washington, D.C., with possible assignments nationwide.

• The USAO for the District of Wyoming is participating in the Summer Law Intern Program and offering a position in either Cheyenne, WY, or in Yellowstone National Park.

• The Honors Program application has been expanded to permit applicants serving in post-J.D. legal fellowships to apply online on a conditional basis.

PLEASE VISIT http://www.usdoj.gov/oarm/ FOR DETAILS!

Women in Leadership

In February, we addressed the subject of Women in Law in a Bear Essentials lunch. This article looks at the same subject, specifically leadership roles of women in the legal profession.

Client Billing

For those of you who will be starting your own practice or joining a small firm, collecting payment from clients might be one of your biggest challenges. See this article from Law Practice Today, a publication by the ABA Law Practice Management Section, on how to "manage billing so that you and your clients are happy."

Why Airplanes Crash

"Whenever I work with young lawyers for the first time, I tell them they only need to know the answer to one question: Why do airplanes crash? Usually, I get answers based on physics. But, no, airplanes crash because the junior co-pilot sees a blinking red light on the console, thinks if anything was wrong then surely the senior pilot would say something or act, and just as surely thinks to himself that he will not say anything that harms his career or gets him yelled at. So, the co-pilot says nothing and that's why airplanes crash. "

- Michael P. Maslanka, managing partner of Ford & Harrison in Dallas (From this article in Texas Lawyer)

Salary Issues Across the Board

As many of you look forward to graduation and grapple with salary issues, you are not alone. This ABA Journal article discusses the growing disparity in attorney salaries.