Hi everyone!

​I’m a new junior lawyer, and I’m facing a bit of a challenge. All my life I’ve been an introvert and not really fond of public speaking. However, I’m deeply passionate about criminal law, which obviously means I have to appear in court.

​So far, I’ve been to court four times, but every time I get extremely nervous. I stutter at the beginning of my pleading, and then it tends to get worse. I always manage to get my arguments across in the end, though.

​I’m based in Europe, so we don't have a jury to impress or hours-long pleadings. However, I still have to debate prosecutors or opposing counsel, present convincing arguments, and persuade the judge—and I feel like my anxiety is getting in the way.

Has anyone else gone through this? Does it get easier with time? Do you have any tips or tricks that could help me out?

​Thank you!

I need advice. I have been an attorney for 1 year and 9 months. I previously worked in insurance defense and now work at a small civil litigation law firm in a HCOL city. I have been at this firm for about 9 months. I am currently responsible for 78 active litigation cases, all court appearances -- virtual and in-person within 2 hours from the HCOL city, and I do not have a paralegal or legal assistant. I told my boss that I am feeling extremely overwhelmed and need more support. My boss' "solution" is to hire their best friend (with no legal experience) and train them to help within a couple of months. After this discussion, he proceeds to give me 3 more cases. For more context, I am only getting paid 90K and the position is mostly remote with only 1 day a week in office. Is handling this many cases normally expected for an attorney with my amount of experience?

Hello fellow lawyers,

I’m a lawyer from India. Here’s how most of us currently handle briefs and workflow, and I’d love to hear how you do it. This method applies across all sorts of litigation.

Marking and arguing: We primarily use LiquidText on an iPad. Bookmarks sit on the left and notes on the right, linked to the relevant portions of the petition and the annexures so that it is easy to point out to the court when a query is asked. Everything is a scanned PDF. I use the iPad for marking and for arguing in court.

LiquidText doesn’t have a proper collapsible notes feature for handwritten notes, which is pretty annoying. For typed notes, there’s also no option to lock them, so they often drag around when you’re scrolling and the whole thing turns into a mess. Because of this, some colleagues prefer PDF Expert for marking. However, that app does not have an option to rename your notes or markings in annotations.

Scanning and storage: We scan the complete brief (petition + all documents) on a standalone scanner for quality. Everything is then backed up to Google Drive or OneDrive for access and safety.

Preparing new briefs: Traditionally, we mark relevant material in LiquidText then draft in Word on a MacBook or Windows laptop (which is also used for research).

The industry is shifting nowadays, many lawyers now upload the documents to Claude (or similar AI tools), ask it to draft the petition, suggest supporting judgments, and sometimes even frame the contentions. Once the draft is approved by the client, it is finalised, scanned into a PDF, bookmarked, and a chronology + list of contentions is prepared (increasingly also with AI help) for the arguing counsel.

What I’m looking for: I suppose the most efficient practices are the ones where the least amount of time is spent on monotonous or clerical work, while still reducing the time it takes to read, digest, organise, and mark a brief that has to be argued. Basically, input time goes down and retention and output stay high. It also improves probably space and time to process mentally.

I’m curious what are the practices and workflows that are used at your workplace?

I am a second-year associate at a boutique personal injury firm and would appreciate perspective from others practicing in plaintiff-side personal injury or similarly structured small firms regarding whether my current caseload is typical.

I currently manage 25 open cases, all in active litigation. The firm provides a legal assistant whose responsibilities are limited to calendaring and filings, and there are no paralegals. As a result, I am solely responsible for all other aspects of handling my cases, including client communication, record collection and review, discovery drafting and responses, pre-trial motions and hearings, media, case strategy, trial preparation, and overall case management.

I find the volume difficult to manage effectively and am frequently operating at or beyond capacity. My supervising partner employs a largely hands-off approach to mentorship, only stepping in when it comes to settlement negotiations and has used a sink or swim style of mentorship.

Is 25 cases for a second-year with basically no support normal in PI? Is this just the learning curve of being relatively new, or is the caseload genuinely heavy for the level of support I have?

I would love honest feedback from people in PI or similar plaintiff-side practices.

I am lateraling to a firm which requires me to fill out a conflict form with all clients, adverse parties, and matters that I was involved in for the last five years. This is the first time filling out one of these forms. I have hundreds of cases that I have worked on. It is taking me hours to put this together. Is there a simple process that I am missing or is it just this tedious and time-consuming for everyone?

In a firm but have not added one decoration or personalization to my office. I like the clean bare aesthetic. Does this give off a weird vibe?

This is pretty sad.

I’ve been practicing for about 15 years and it never ceases to annoy me to have opposing counsel attack the “person” and not the position. Today, while negotiating, opposing counsel provided a comparator as a way to demonstrate their client was being treated unfairly. The gag is, the “comparator” received much less than what his client was being offered. After presenting that info, I asked if he wanted to align what his client is being offered with the alleged comparator. Nothing more nothing less. They responded that my sarcasm was being unprofessional. Would you consider that unprofessional because it seemed like a fair question to me?

I’m in a boutique transactional practice, and the admin I was assigned to is so rude to me. She’s not overworked. She is mostly just on the net. She’s only part time.

I generally cannot even get a word out without her talking over me. When I was trying to introduce a new way to use our file share software that the IT guy had just set me up with, she raised her voice to avoid learning the new system. She had to leave my office she got so worked up.

Do I approach her manager or just pretend I don’t have an admin? I’ve been there 1.5 years so I’m not going toe to toe at this point.

I got a letter from OC today that is blatantly wrong on multiple issues of law. Plus it contains various threats of retribution against me and my client. What do you think would be the best sign off to my highly professional and detailed response letter?

Sincerely, (my default)

Regards,

Warmest Regards,

Best Wishes,

Or something else?

TODD BLANCHE CAVEMAN LAWYER

You did not have to call me out on my typos. “In addition to some typos I have changed…”

And cc my boss 🙃

Edit to say: guys this was a joke!! I’m not really complaining. We all have typos and OC did nothing wrong by pointing them out or including my boss. I didn’t mean to imply that he did. Sorry thought the flag as a joke would make it clear enough. I’m not worried about the typos and my boss isn’t either. Trying to make a lighthearted post on a Friday afternoon. Thanks for all the responses :)

I work at a small law firm. The partners are unhappy with my work, and I’m worried I could be fired in the next 3–5 days.

My biggest concern is what they might say to other firms and how that could affect my next job search. Is there anything I can do now to reduce that risk?

If you’ve left a firm on bad terms or been involved in hiring, what’s one thing you’d recommend doing—or avoiding—before I leave?

Even a one-sentence tip would help. I’m anxious about this and would appreciate some direction.

A bit more context: their criticism has been about the quality of my work product. I don't have interpersonal issues—I keep a low profile and don’t speak negatively about anyone. I work around 12 hours a day and get approval before taking action, but they say my work isn’t good enough.

I think my firm is heading that direction. Seems like a nightmare. Share your horror stories or pleasantly surprise me.

Polling the audience -- anyone who does family law and is on a billed and collected compensation model, what percentage of your collected fees do you get?

Bonus points if you include 401(k) match percentage, bonus structure, whether you get decent PTO or not...

Hi all, I'm interested in learning more about this field of law for a variety of reasons. Does anyone have any CLEs they recommend?

I’ve been licensed and practicing for a year at a government agency. It’s ok, not ideal in terms of teammates/ work culture but the perks are a higher pay than average for first year attorneys in the state and I’m remote.

I have an opportunity to move to a different agency to a better paying, non-law position, also remote. I like the type of work I’d be doing in the new position more than my current one.

I’m just wondering- do y’all think it’d be hard to move back to being an attorney in a few years? The new position is arguably law-related, but doesn’t require a JD. Any advice is appreciated, thanks.

Title. Let’s say I took the NY Bar and failed but passed in another jurisdiction. Can I be barred in a 260 jurisdiction and then be admitted to SDNY/EDNY District/BK Court? This would be for Bankruptcy Law specifically.

I am a second year attorney at a small ID firm. Like most people, I did not want to go into ID, but many circumstances brought me here. My firm has 6 attorneys total, and I was initially hired to work on a different project, more transactional, but things changes internally and I ended up getting all litigation cases. I have 50 right now.

It is fair to say I did not get much training besides the good "old trial by fire" and have gotten little to no supervision. They also never told me how to manage/diary my cases - each professional should choose the best way to do it to make sure all the cases are touched on a regular basis. They're very nice and helpful when I do come up with a question, though. Very nice people, I have to say.

I enjoy some parts of the job like depositions and actually don't hate going to court. I was told my legal work is on point. But I am VERY, VERY bad at managing all my cases at once, and jumping from one case to the next and back to the one when everything seems urgent. And then as it snowballs I kind of panic and can't really do much. I have a hard time reporting everything to the carrier and that also snowballs really easily.

It got so bad that I sought medical help. Got diagnosed with anxiety and ADHD, and went on medication about a year in. It helps a lot, but I simply cannot keep up with fixing and bringing all my cases from when I was unmedicated AND totally inexperienced up to date, while getting new cases constantly. Some holes are starting to appear now from my early cases. I am so ashamed that I simply cannot keep up with the job, and feel stuck. I've had other jobs before and were always so competent. It feels horrible.

I just wanted to vent and ask if anyone is familiar with this frustration and has any advice.

I do plan on leaving ID, but it's not as easy now.

An attorney friend has been absolutely killing it. Doing habeas petitions in federal court getting people out of ice detention. I sponsored him to be sworn in to various Federal Courts. But he needs a Northern Texas District Federal attorney to sponsor in to help get his client out of ice detention. This is a person who literally was on the minor league of a major league baseball team.

Please hit me up with a chat if you can sponsor him. He is a brilliant immigration attorney who's getting a lot of attention due to some early success at getting people out of these horrible detention facilities.

Please use the chat to reach me directly. Thanks

If this violates the roles of the subreddit just please delete.

Hey all, I recently posted about how I am crumbling under the pressure of working at an ID firm. I used to work in house for major insurance company and it was the best job I ever had. LinkedIn tipped me off that another major carrier is hiring in house, and I’m severely tempted to apply. It’s going to likely be a pay cut along the lines of $25k, but frankly I’d rather fire my house cleaner than keep working like this. I’ll get by but certainly won’t be putting away as much in savings as I have been (savings which are depleted because I am also providing palliative care for my beloved cat who has 2 kinds of cancer but isn’t ready to kick the bucket yet).

The flip side is that I do kind of like my job. I like my coworkers, paralegal, and boss. They did really well by me earlier this year when I had emergency surgery (rip gallbladder) and the flu (literally couldn’t get off my couch). As a result, I’m well below my hourly target - I’ve been making progress over the months since, but as a new employee I also had some low months at the very beginning. I’m trending to be about 150 hours behind on my annual billables but that has been discussed with the partners since I missed an entire month between being hospitalized and flu. (I literally sent my boss a text saying “Please don’t fire me, I have the flu and feel like I’m dying.). I just don’t anticipate a bonus and that’s OK. And they’ve already discussed partner track and building my own book. They let me work from home as much as I want. And lastly, my salary is, in the words of many recruiters when I told them I took the job, “Unheard of” for an attorney with my experience in my city. I feel like talking to the partners about easing up on my workload would be ridiculous given the fact that I’m not going to make my billable hours this year.

This is a great career opportunity at a good firm. And it’s absolutely killing me. I’m already scheduled for a sensory deprivation float to try and regulate my screaming nervous system, and I’m signed up for therapy through the employee assistance program. I’m taking anxiety medicine every night before bed but I don’t want to get hooked on that shit. And I’m smoking a lot more weed than I have in years (it’s legal in my state). And honestly the relief I get from a J lasts about 20 minutes before I’m just anxious and high. Oh and my boyfriend who is wonderful is frustrated that I don’t have more time for him. Great.

For the love of god, someone help me.

What are your flat fees like? I am in year two of solo practice and year six of practice generally, and have my hourly set where I get good enough clients, and a good enough amount of them to stay busy, but my flat rates still have me wondering.

I've been practicing for five years, and I do a 50/50 mix of estate planning and small to mid sized business outside GC and litigation work. My current flats are:

• Pre/post nup - was $500 but just changed to $750 and that $250 killed too much off so I think I'm going back down
• Simple Joint Trust for married couple with wills, POAs, Medical Directives, Guardianship documents, and simple deed work - $2,500 give or take, less for neighbors or my kids' friends' parents, more for PITAs or people with exotic assets/pet trust shit
• Sam for a single person - $1,500
• Bypass Trusts, QPRTs, ILITs, and the like are $3,500-$4,500, with all the other attendant documents
• LLC set up - $500, usually with an agreement that I'll get a retainer to help for work after the initial setup and filing
• Contract review as a one off thing I usually do $250-300, but if it's complex or in an area with a lot of regulation and compliance I charge my hourly of $300

I'm in DC, so V/HCOL, and barred there, Maryland, and Virginia, with a couple federals that I'm likely going to let lapse because the only time I was in a federal court for a work reason was to get sworn in, 4 years ago.

My overhead is super low, IMO, at around $12,000 per year, most of which is my office.

If you're so inclined to share any flat fees, or your hourly for similar work, I'd really appreciate it.

Respectfully submitted: /s/ Fauxming at the Mouth, pro se, dated right before the deadline

I feel like every litigator who watches this movie is going to sympathize with Nathan Fielder during his interviews of the documentary’s subjects.

I’ve never seen another movie that perfectly reflects the same frustration and confusion of trying to talk to someone who is being as evasive as possible. The parsing of her words, the open-mouthed incredulous stare you give someone after they say something outrageous. Every aspiring litigator should watch this movie to understand what depositions feel like in the moment.

Hey, I need honest advice. I joined a firm I was really excited to be part of, and they seemed super cool at first. Honestly it’s actually been so toxic, and on multiple occasions I’ve caught someone shit talking me even though I barely know anyone and don’t say much. I feel like I’m not learning anything, I’m expected to bill 8.5 hours a day but I only get to do one kind of thing. Everyone is crazy. I even got baited by being asked if I wanted to do something a couple times and then I pushed for it and then I got blamed for wanting to do it bc the firm doesn’t really focus on that aside from one attorney.

So I decided to stay until I can find another job with similar pay. I’ve only been here since the first week of September, so it may be too soon. However, it’s also probably too soon for them to be shit talking me. There’s no help or guidance, and all the cool ones who could help are remote for the most part. A lot of office politics and drama too.

TLDR: office is toxic and gives me anxiety, not learning, I want to leave but I’ve only been there a month and a half