Special counsel is one of the nation's largest staffing services specializing in the placement of lawyers and paralegals. Joe D. Freedman, president and CEO of Amicus Legal Staffing, now a part of Special Counsel, a division of Accustaff Staffing Services, offers the following observation: More and more members of the legal profession, including attorneys and paralegals, are choosing to work for staffing firms like Special Counsel because of the quality of life that being a temp, legal contractor worker, or consultant can offer.
There are two types of people who come into a legal staffing service like Amicus: those with three to five years of legal experience, and recent law school graduates. Experienced people are used to working 60- to 70-hour weeks and producing a lot of billable hours for a law firm. They may have made partner or not made partner. They are tired of the rat race of the typical law firm and are looking for a different lifestyle. The lifestyle they want may be a full-time job in another law firm where they can work 40 hours and make a good salary. The other option may be to work on various projects as a legal temp or contractor for a staffing service.
Therefore, according to Freedman, the typical experienced legal temp is either looking for a temp-to-hire type of situation through Special Counsel or wants to be kept busy working for a variety of clients where the temp is placed by Special Counsel.
Over 80% of the legal temps who come to Special Counsel are looking for a permanent job. A tryout program where Special Counsel sends the lawyer or paralegal to a firm for a probation period of several weeks or months is especially popular with the legal temp because it not only allows the business where the temp is working to try out the temp for a period of time, but, more importantly, it allows the temp to see if this is where he or she wants to spend the next several years being a lawyer or a paralegal. Remember, everyone can be on one's best behavior for a couple of weeks, but it takes a full-moon cycle to show someone's true colors; that goes not only for the temp but, more importantly, for the business where the temp is working.
A lawyer who has been unhappy with a big corporate firm and is placed at another large firm as a temp can decide whether that is really where he or she wants to work next. Or will the lawyer be getting into the same type of atmosphere that he or she is trying to get away from?
The other type of candidate who comes to a company like Special Counsel is the recent law school graduate. Freedman says staffing services will look at where the graduate placed in the class. Candidates who are in the upper half of the graduating class have a greater chance of being placed. But if you were not in the upper half, do not be discouraged! Freedman said staffing services also look at work experience. For example, if you worked in a bank before or during law school, a staffing service may be able to place you on an assignment that would utilize not only your banking skills but also your legal education.
The trend in legal staffing, according to Freedman, is to provide two types of services. The first is traditional temping or placement. That means someone calls a service like Special Counsel and needs a lawyer or a paralegal for a specific amount of time strictly as a temporary employee. The other type of service, traditional staffing, is when a company calls Special Counsel and needs someone who will be a full-time employee. The company will either pay a fee up front to Special Counsel, which is called a direct placement, or will try someone out for a period of time while paying Special Counsel by the hour for this person's skills.
Outsourcing is an area of legal staffing that is really growing, according to Freedman. Many law firms now call a staffing service when they have a big project to handle, whether they need research done or they need preparation completed for litigation. Rather than add to their head count, they call a staffing service and tell the staffing service to handle the project. The project could last for a month to several years. The staffing service must then recruit and manage the legal work done for this special project. Handing out these projects to an outsider is called outsourcing. The legal staff for these projects work as a part of a law firm but are employees of the staffing service.
When asked what characteristics qualify someone to be a successful legal temp, Freedman said those who have practiced law for five years and were graduated from an American Bar Association-accredited law school are qualified. The candidate will need to work in urban areas as opposed to small towns. These people also need to be Internet sawy. Over 85% of the resumes come to Freedman via e-mail.
Computer skills are important to the legal temp. Persons who have Windows experience and can type their own letters and memos are more place-able. Many legal temps are also using laptops. The legal temp should also be proficient in using the computer for legal research. Recent law school graduates will know how to use the computer. If you are not computer-literate and fairly skilled in the use of computers, all research indicates you should take the time to learn.
The immediate growth trends in legal staffing, according to Freedman, are in intellectual property work, litigation, and corporate work.
Staffing services that hire members of the legal profession are like other staffing services that recruit the professional technical temp. These white-collar staffing services are offering benefits for temps that are very competitive. Items such as health insurance, 401(k), credit unions, and referral bonuses are offered to those who are working temp while looking for full-time work as well as those who are looking to become a permanent temp or full-time employee of the staffing service.
Shelley Wallace, president of The Wallace Law Registry, the nation's largest legal placement firm and a subsidiary of Kelly Services, Inc., offers this suggestion to lawyers or paralegal professionals interested in temporary employment: only register with a reputable agency, an agency managed by attorneys-one that is local, has been around for awhile, and knows the marketplace. She also says that even if you are really looking for a permanent position, a temp job might be an ideal way for a prospective employer to evaluate your performance before making a long-term commitment.
