Lee R. Nemchek
Information Resources Manager
Morrison & Foerster, LLP
Los Angeles, CA
Fifteen Years and Counting, Or Why I Love My Job
Law Library Journal Fall, 2001
There are a lot of things I don't particularly care for that I have to deal with on a regular basis in my capacity as a multitasking, multi-office information resources manager at Morrison & Foerster. In fact, there are so many things I don't like that I can make a list:
- I dread writing performance reviews and dealing with personnel problems.
- I don't like training new employees.
- Annual summer associate season is not much fun.
- Annual budget preparation is even worse.
- Integrating new lateral partners is a drag. (They create havoc for the records management department with their hundreds of boxes of incoming files, and they always want library materials from their old firms that we don't have.)
- Opening new offices is exhausting.
- Negotiating service contracts with vendors is depressing.
Need I go on?
One might wonder how I continue to thrive in an environment that seems to present so many negative aspects. The obvious reason is that I don't consider them to be negatives. At worst, they are annoying interruptions, keeping me from activities that I would much prefer doing. At best, they are opportunities to develop an ever-higher level of skill in performing certain specific tasks. For example, after fifteen years I can state with a fair degree of pride that I write a darn good performance review. Every year my budget projections hit closer to the mark than those I submitted the year before, and I'm almost to the point of reducing the RFP process to an exact science.
Nevertheless, becoming good at tasks that I don't really enjoy wouldn't have kept me here for fifteen years if that's all there was to it. And I couldn't envision another fifteen years if all there was to look forward to was more of the same. No, I stay at Morrison & Foerster because I can't imagine finding another employment environment that would provide the freedom to grow professionally that I have enjoyed, and continue to enjoy, here.
I have found that there are two important requisites to happiness and fulfillment in a particular position. First, you must work for people that you like and respect. I use the word "for" rather than "with" because it is more important to love your bosses than your staff. Yes, problem personnel can be a real pain, but such problems can usually be dealt with within the parameters of the employee review/discipline process. A problem boss—be it a library director, an office administrator, a managing partner, or a library committee—is a horse of a different color that can make both your work and home lives miserable. Deciding whether to stay or leave a job may be the only measure of control an employee has in a bad boss situation. If you feel that your work is undervalued, if you get little or no administrative support for your department, or if you're not given the freedom to do your job without oppressive meddling and micromanagement, leave the job! For the past fifteen years, I've been lucky enough to work with supportive managing partners and, most especially, with two individuals who surely must be the best legal administrators working in any law firm anywhere. These "bosses" are half the reason that I continue to toil away in the private law firm environment.
The second requisite to job fulfillment concerns the work itself. In order to stay happy over the long term of a professional career, you must identify at least one task, activity, responsibility, etc. that you love—one that drives you and keeps you passionate about the work—and incorporate that activity into your job. If what you most love to do isn't an element of your job description, find a way to add it. At the very least, find a way to make time for the activity in your regular work schedule. As a direct result of my work at Morrison & Foerster, I've been able to engage in what I really love to do, which is research and professional writing.1 I've initiated many research endeavors and other pet projects over the years,2 and the firm has indulged me in all of them without complaint. Similarly, find an employer that will support your passion—whatever it may be—and stick with that one. There lies the path to job satisfaction and longevity.
If your situation is similar to mine and you've been blessed with great bosses and professional freedom, do what you can to provide the same environment for your staff. You have it within your power to be a great boss, too, and to enrich the professional lives of those employees who report directly to you. Be the reason that someone loves his job; doing so will make you feel doubly good about yours.
1. I suppose that in a utopian world I would have been a university professor instead of a law firm librarian, assuming I could figure out how to do that without actually having to teach classes.
2. Editor's Note: For a recent example, see Lee R. Nemchek, Records Retention in the Private Legal Environment: Annotated Bibliography and Program Implementation Tools, 93 Law Libr. J. 7, 2001 Law Libr. J. 1.
For More Information About Law Librarianship or the AALL Recruitment Committee, contact committee chair Sarah Mauldin.