TulsaPeople / July 2010 / Best lawyers: Joining the ranks

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Best lawyers: Joining the ranks

Local law firms keep young talent in Tulsa through highly developed recruiting and training programs.

For many law school graduates, the thrill of walking across a stage to receive their juris doctorate is soon eclipsed by the realities of walking into their first job at a firm.

For some, the fit will be good, and a long-term relationship will begin. For others, workload demands and personality issues may cause difficulties or even cut short their tenure at the firm.

Hoping to attract the brightest legal prospects and reduce instances of incompatibility, many firms have established summer associate programs to give second-year law students an in-depth chance to learn what the legal life is really like. As students learn the ropes, the firms can identify possible candidates for future employment.

One Tulsa-based law group that organizes a successful summer associate program is Hall Estill. With additional offices in Oklahoma City, Fayetteville, Ark., and Washington, D.C., the firm is home to nearly 120 attorneys organized into 14 major legal sections and more than 75 practice areas. What does a firm with national clients running the gamut from Fortune 500 corporations to nonprofit organizations look for in potential associates?

“We’re looking for talent,” says Michael Cooke, managing partner at Hall Estill. “We’re looking for a desire to work hard. And we’re looking for people who are interesting.”

Finding the best

With some minor variations, many law firms that employ summer associates follow the same basic process. At Hall Estill, for example, this begins with résumé submissions, followed by on-campus or phone interviews with students conducted by members of the firm’s recruitment and diversity committee. Students are drawn from about 15 schools, including The University of Tulsa, The University of Oklahoma and Oklahoma City University, as well as schools in Texas and Kansas.

Students who fare well in the interviews are then invited to “callback day,” a daylong event held at the firm’s offices. Students can ask questions of senior associates and shareholders and, in turn, answer questions about themselves. The end result: An even smaller number of these students are formally offered the opportunity to participate in the firm’s six-week summer associate program the following year.

As implemented at Hall Estill, the process is rigorous and highly selective. According to Lari Gulley, director of business development and recruitment, in 2008 and 2009 combined the firm received 1,000 résumés from students hoping to earn entry into the program. By the end of both summers, only six new attorneys were placed in Hall Estill’s Tulsa and Oklahoma City offices. And with fewer summer associates being accepted this year, that placement percentage will no doubt drop even lower.

“Due to the economy, we have scaled back our summer associate program for 2010,” Gulley says. “We conducted 23 second interviews for our Tulsa and Oklahoma City offices and made eight offers of summer employment, with five students accepting our offer.”

“They’ll spend a six-week program learning about us,” Cooke adds. “What we’re like, what our work is like, what our work ethic is like and what we’re like socially. They have to believe and be satisfied that this is a place they want to be.”

Real-world experience

At Hall Estill, summer associates move into a new practice area each week, offering them exposure to a wide range of legal sections, including corporate, commercial, litigation, labor and employment, and bankruptcy law.

Additionally, off-site social gatherings — such as golf tournaments, wine tastings and dinners at shareholders’ homes — are organized to give summer associates opportunities to interact with firm personnel.

Cooke emphasizes that the Hall Estill program is designed to function as a two-way street of interaction and evaluation for both the firm and the students.

“Not only are we interviewing them, but they’re interviewing us, too,” he says. “Every law firm is completely different in its culture and the way it operates, so we’re not going to be the right fit for every law school student.”

Students often find that the summer internship helps identify specific areas of interest. Such was the case for Chris Carter, who participated in Hall Estill’s program in 2007 prior to joining the firm in 2008.

“When I came out of law school, I really didn’t know what I wanted to do,” says Carter, who now focuses on business operations within the firm’s commercial/transactional group. “This helps you weed out what you don’t like and figure out what you do like, and what suits you best.”

That process of determining likes and dislikes often accelerates when summer associates find themselves working on actual cases rather than practice assignments. Karissa Cottom chairs the 14-member recruitment and diversity committee at Hall Estill, and she says the firm’s summer program is based on the concept of exposing associates to the realities of legal practice.

“We offer real-world projects, projects that would have gone to another associate in our firm had the summer associates not been there,” Cottom says. “So we’re giving them real work, taking them to hearings and depositions, and giving them a look at what it really would be like to practice law at Hall Estill. It benefits us not only in recruiting the type of people who will be successful here but also in retaining them.”

Raising retention rates

Lawyer retention is a nationwide concern, and Tulsa firms are not exempt. Jim McCann serves as the recruiting coordinator for the firm of Doerner, Saunders, Daniel & Anderson L.L.P., which runs its own six-week summer associate program for a handful of students each year. According to McCann, national statistics show that, of new hires directly out of law school, a whopping 70 percent leave the first firm that employs them during their first five years as lawyers.

“This generation believes and appreciates that they have many opportunities,” McCann says. “They don’t consider their first job offer as necessarily a lifelong job offer, although in recruiting, we always tell them that if you come to work for us, we hire you with the expectation that you will become a partner in this firm.”

Some firms aim to combat lawyer flight by forming ties with prospects even earlier in their academic careers. While most firms focus on recruiting second-year law students, Oklahoma-based GableGotwals is one of only a few firms in the state offering summer clerkships to both first- and second-year law students.

Sid Swinson, recruiting chair for GableGotwals, says he sees advantages in getting to know prospects as early as possible.

“If someone clerks for us during the summer after their first year of law school, and if we like them, we’ll invite them back for the second summer,” Swinson says. “That really gives us maximum exposure to that person so we can make a more informed decision on whether to extend a permanent offer.”

And an informed decision typically translates to greater longevity. Take the case of Genevieve Schmook, who came into contact with Hall Estill through an on-campus interview while she was attending The University of Tulsa Law School.

Hall Estill invited her to participate in its summer associate program, she joined the firm in 2002 and she recently became a shareholder. She’s very aware that, these days, that sort of linear path is the exception rather than the rule.

“Most of my friends from law school have hopped around to at least two if not three different firms by this point in their career,” Schmook says. “It says something to me that I’m still where I started. I’m happy here.”