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It’s the dregs of August. It’s hot and humid. You may be in the office or you may not be. But if you are, this may be the time of year when you start to feel…stuck.

August is like the 4 pm of the day, the Sunday of the week, and while there are beautiful descriptions of how to languish in a porch rocker, listening to the crickets and cicadas while sipping a cool drink as you watch the condensation slowly make its way down the glass…I am not an August person.

Also, some of us may be stuck in the frozen tundra of an air-conditioned office and not sitting languorously anywhere and so the need to feel “unstuck” is a very real one – alas, for me, my home office is the hottest room in my house, so that’s not me either. I’m more like an office hobbit, hunched in front of my laptop, dreaming of crisp fall days and pumpkin-spiced lattes (only a week away!).

But, I digress.
Continue Reading Two Ways to Become Unstuck

Yadira Flores is a partner in Fogler Rubinoff‘s Business Law department and is a member of the firm’s Indigenous Business Law practice group. Myriah Graves is the firm’s Director of Professional Development and formerly a litigator with the firm, who began as an articling student there. In this episode, Lindsay speaks with Yadira and Myriah about the impact of the pandemic on women, both generally and in the legal profession, how the return to work and continuing of hybrid working may continue to disproportionately affect women and their opportunities for advancement, and the ways in which young lawyers have also been impacted. This was a fun and fascinating conversation.

You can listen to the podcast here, or we’ve provided a transcript of the highlights below.

Continue Reading Law Firm ILN-telligence Podcast | Yadira Flores and Myriah Graves | Fogler Rubinoff LLP

Since 2019, I have had the pleasure of being involved in the Empowered Women’s Event series as a committee member, with our organization as an in-kind sponsor. The event focuses on storytelling and according to event founder and host, Susan Freeman,

Stories have a transformative power to allow us to see the world in a different way than we do if we just encounter it on our own. Stories are an entry point to understanding a different experience of the world. Storytelling, presenting a different perspective of the world, is important when it comes to connecting with each other. It gives us an opportunity to learn from another person’s experience and it can shape, strengthen, or challenge our opinions and values. When a story catches our attention and engages us, we are more likely to absorb the message and meaning within it than if the same message was presented simply in facts and figures. When someone tells their own personal story, we catch a glimpse of a view of the world that may be slightly or radically different from our own. When we see the world as they see it, or walk in their shoes, the experience can inspire empathy.”

Continue Reading Why Attend an Event Solely for Women?

I wrote a version of this post a few weeks ago when the Supreme Court draft was leaked and I was thinking about it again this morning as I was having trouble concentrating because of the massacre in Uvalde, Texas. I know I’m not unique in feeling this way – I’ve talked with friends and other professionals here in the US who are having a really hard time this week, those who are parents and teachers especially. I am neither, but I do have a ten-year-old niece, whose face I can’t help but superimpose over all the victims as I consider the goofy and earnest conversations we have over FaceTime each weekend, how much she loves her stuffies and her family, how hard it was for her mom, my sister, to send her and her older sister to school yesterday morning.
Continue Reading Human Connection: The Most Important Role We’ll Ever Have

My title today comes from Luvvie Ajayi Jones, whose new book Rising Troublemaker: A Fear-Fighter Manual for Teens, comes out today (yes, my copy for my oldest niece arrives today too). Luvvie is one of my favorite authors, speakers, self-professed “troublemakers,” and the reason I’m mentioning her today is that the book I’m currently reading has me all fired up and her words this morning brought me some comfort (more on that shortly).

I’m reading The Future of the Professions: How Technology Will Transform the Work of Human Experts by Richard and Daniel Susskind. And if you know me at all and follow this blog, I’m sure you’re wondering how such a book has got me in a lather – truthfully, I agree with almost all of the predictions in the book, which is unfortunately terribly dry and academic (Richard already has me blocked on Twitter for some unknown reason, so this post won’t fix our relationship). I’ve read his other tomes in earnest and enjoyed his previous speeches, but I am trudging my way through this manual from 2015 like I’m wading through oatmeal.
Continue Reading What Makes You Different is Your Superpower

Many of you who read this blog will know that last week, there was a leaked Supreme Court draft opinion on Roe v. Wade that indicated that the Court plans to overturn it.

I have a lot of feelings about this leaked draft, as a woman, as an American, as more information continues to come out from states around my country. Those feelings have often made it difficult to concentrate and focus on the things I would like to, to be as driven as I normally would be as my very rights are in question.
Continue Reading Lessons in Leadership: Supporting Real Humans

The short answer? Both!

After two-plus years of being limited to almost entirely virtual meetings, we’ve learned that there are huge benefits to doing things online. But many people were also chomping at the bit to get back to seeing each other in the flesh. So that begs the question – which is better? It turns out that we need both and for different reasons. So while you may be tempted to toss your ring light forever in favor of jumping back onto planes…not so fast. Let’s look at the pros of both types of meetings and see why you need to keep them all in your diary.
Continue Reading The Battle of the Meetings: Virtual vs. In-Person – Which is Better?

Recently, I saw a quote that said that adulthood is not one crisis after another, it’s multiple crises, simultaneously, forever.

Is anyone else feeling that way lately?

We had a little bit of a breather this morning when we found out that our Ukrainian colleagues are making their way from Kyiv to safety, but the war for too many continues and the choice to have to leave their homes is a terrible and heartbreaking one. One they shouldn’t have had to make. Should anyone wish to contribute to a reputable NGO, the ILN’s chair recommends this one, which has a long track record – they have been embedded in Ukraine since 2014 and are already supplying Lviv and other places with humanitarian aid.
Continue Reading Leadership Lessons: Navigating a Crisis

Tomorrow is officially the 13th “blogiversary” for Zen & the Art of Legal Networking. At times, it’s difficult to believe that I’ve been writing in this corner of the blogosphere for so long and at other times, it’s flown by. This year in particular has been a lot and it’s hard to find the words to share with you all.

Traditionally, I use this post to either reflect on where we’ve been or what I’ve learned and I appreciate the opportunity to do that each year. It’s not often that we’re able to slow down and take a look back.
Continue Reading Happy 13th Blogiversary to Zen & the Art of Legal Networking!

If you’ve been here a while, you know that I like to look back to find out whether the predictions that we made in the past ever came true – we know that the legal market likes to move slowly, but how slowly? Is the industry that we imagined ten or fifteen years ago where we really are today?

It’s hard to believe that the great recession was 13/14 years ago already, but it’s true. And that means that in the years following the recession, we were all making big promises for change and a “new normal.” (I know, I know, we’re entering yet another “new normal” following the pandemic, which of course only reminds us that the only constant is change.)
Continue Reading Did We Ever Adjust to that “New Normal”?