Above the Law - Thinking Like a Lawyer

Joe and Elie come to you from the Legaltech NY conference musing about the future of law, the future of law conferences, and the future of weather where Elie is constantly unhappy.

Elie is deeply concerned about the media's willingness to cave to every request of a public relations firm, mostly because some people never get to hire one. And the gang talks about other legal stuff o' the week.

After Elie complains about toxic masculinity and razors, he and Joe discuss whether or not Rudy Giuliani's bizarre turn from respected former prosecutor to a talking head lunatic that seems to make his client's case worse at every turn. Did something happen to Rudy along the way... or was he maybe not that great at his job to begin with? Also, stealth layoffs may be appearing in the Biglaw world again. Is it time to start panicking?

Just when you thought the legal profession couldn't get weirder, we've got an extended treatment on the acceptability of emojis in workplace communication and the slow death of the Department of Justice under the weight of the shutdown. Moral of the story? If you have a civil claim against the government, now is the time to bring it.

Joe and Kathryn take a deep dive into some Above the Law stories from the last couple of weeks. Kathryn focuses on what ticks her off about a superficially light-hearted story about a Supreme Court advocate appearing for oral argument while his baby was busy being born and Joe talks about what reasonable accommodations for disabilities and the unconscious rhetorical choices he's made.

Joe and Elie discuss the major headlines in law firm news. Paul Weiss found itself in hot water after putting out a picture promoting its new partnership class of predominantly white dudes. It's a lesson in the damage visuals can wreck... and how to address incidents like this. Jones Day inserted itself... again... into the war on workers by entering the Slate labor dispute. And does your firm give the staff Christmas Eve off? Shouldn't everyone be doing this?

Elie and Joe talk to Ralph Baxter, former head of Orrick and current board member of Intapp, about the future of the legal industry. Baxter has long been an evangelist for legal industry change, willing to rethink Biglaw's long-standing practices to deliver better and more cost-effective services to clients.

Many folks become lawyers so they don't have to deal with math anymore. It's one of those weaknesses that holds back the profession as a business. Yet, cutting-edge tech is bringing number crunching to the fingertips of lawyers everywhere in the form of easy to use data analytics. Joe and Elie talk to Josh Becker of LexisNexis about the release of Context, a new tool that delivers deep insights into judicial idiosyncracies by analyzing the language of their body of work.

As everyone departed for the holiday, Joe was left solo to make a few announcements about upcoming opportunities to see the Above the Law team, including an invite to our upcoming holiday party for all the loyal readers and listeners.

Joe and Elie share their tips on how law students should prepare for final exams. They suggest getting into the mindset of mentioning concepts in the right place, organizing your notes before test week and even choosing the perfect song to get you hyped for studying. They top it off with their dislikes for final papers!