(cont. from this past Wednesday’s blog post – “Finding the Right Attorney, Part 2 of 4: Personability”)
In my first post from this “Finding the Right Attorney” four-part series, I had laid out four distinguishing features for finding the right attorney and those were: (1) EXPERIENCE; (2) PERSONABILITY; (3) PASSION; and (4) AFFORDABILITY. We’ve covered the first two already and now on to the next: PASSION.
Passion is one of the most distinguishing features that sets apart the best from the rest in any occupation. Of course, it’s not to say that experience and personability aren’t equally as important because they are, but it’s also important to note that passion is what really pushes a person to go the extra step, to do the extra due diligence, to make sure things are absolutely ok … to make sure that everything’s picture perfect and pleasant. I’m not taking about passion simply in the terms of diligence and energy, but also in terms of eagerness and love for the particular practice area of law or type of case or matter. We’ve all heard how we shouldn’t settle for less when it comes to choosing our jobs, and that we should all be doing jobs that we genuinely love what we’re doing and where we’re at, or else that job/work becomes that much more difficult or strenuous to bear. Well, using that same logic, wouldn’t it seem more plausible that an attorney who absolutely loves what he/she does, will probably accomplish or execute things more efficiently than one who doesn’t? Yes, you might ask for the statistics and some tangible evidence. But really, putting all of that aside for a sec. If you have two attorneys who are both equally experienced in your particular legal matter and both are equally personable, who would you pick to represent you: the attorney who is passionate about his work and loves it; or the attorney who doesn’t? See! Why’d you pick the more passionate one? Probably because you feel slightly more confident with that choice as you know passion tends to mean that a higher than normal amount of focus is being put. So, I would say that the third thing to always gauge in any prospective attorney you are considering to hire, is whether he/she is someone that enjoys being an attorney and is someone who is pretty passionate about the practice areas and work that he/she does.
Speaking for myself, I can tell you that although I hated doing litigation 24/7 for the earlier part of my career (mostly because I just couldn’t deal with opposing counsel who, rather than simply sticking to and arguing with the law and facts, wasted my time by trying to intimidate me with their age; pull tricks; abuse court rules; and tamper their evidence), I absolutely love representing my clients in discussions and negotiations for a particular contract deal or offer, be it regarding talent and a role, developing a project, producing a film or joining forces to do anything media or entertainment related. To this day, I don’t know what it is about entertainment and media that pulls me, attracts me and fascinates me. All I know is that it does. So, it’s to no surprise that I read The Hollywood Reporter, its THR-Esquire counterpart, Deadline or Variety every once in a while … heh hem, every day … or that I know what’s the latest news in the industry. I breathe, live and love entertainment. Thus, for me, because my life is in entertainment and media (did I say that I’m also an actor?), it’s more apparent that the passion is there and that I love what I do. Anyhow, enough about me. My point is, hire an attorney who loves what he/she does and will enjoy helping you out. It’s that simple. You would probably want the same.
Talk to you tomorrow for the next post, “Finding the Right Attorney, Part 4 of 4: Affordability“. I’ll talk about the different ways we attorneys charge, and what’s kosher and what’s not. =)
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