It’s been a hard 2020 for all of us, including especially for solo and small firm lawyers and for law students, but maybe Working Scribe can help a little.
This Working Scribe blog and Working Scribe subscription newsletter (more on that below) are here to serve working lawyers and law students as a humane professional resource, a water cooler, a mentoring clearinghouse and a trading post. I will talk below about *what* you will get here and in the newsletter, but first, a little about “how” and “why” I decided to form it.
We all know about “Human Resources” - a major administrative office in large companies that tracks employee paperwork, performance reviews, sometimes payroll and benefits. It does not primarily serve those human beings, but tracks them as intangible “assets” of the corporation and performed some services for the company that may, or may not, also benefit those human beings. An “asset” is something owned and of value; while human beings cannot (any longer) be owned, the commercial value of “workforce in place” appears on corporate books as an intangible asset. It’s the job of Human Resources to administer and track many aspects of that asset.
In contrast, a “humane resource” attempts to treat a human being as as self-owned human being, as her own resource, existing her own purpose rather than a corporate one. It is a service model, rather than a management model. You own yourself; this resource and newsletter may (I hope) help you get more of what you want out of your work as an attorney, present or future. This is a humane space - not always a “safe space”, but a humane, responsible one.
2020 has separated us from each other, from a sense of place, from our daily patterns. Many of us are working from home, some exclusively so. Our routines are disrupted, both on the clock and in our personal lives. Among the most unpleasant petty disruptions for me has been the restriction of seating in coffee shops - absolute for some, 50-75% for others here in the Holy Land of Maryland. I enjoyed a cup of coffee and a Sunday newspaper, sometimes reading the comics with my older boy S___. The effects of this isolation have taken some toll that’s difficult to calculate. The social disruption may be easier on me, an introvert, than on some. I do know of a well-known, well-liked attorney of my acquaintance in Philadelphia, one who had referred me work, one with a strong online presence. Per reports, the isolation made his substance abuse issues worse, and he died this summer.
The news of his death gave me pause; I have dealt with depression issues at times myself.
I don’t know that one middle-aged attorney blogger can fight the sense of isolation that many of us feel, especially through a blog and a newsletter. But I am willing, with what resources I have, to do what I can in my little strawberry patch. We have had a number of years of a difficult, angry social tone in the United States. Without getting political, I promise to keep the tone here decent, positive, welcoming to the best of my ability. At a minimum, I want you as a reader (and subscriber) to be at least very slightly better off for having stopped by. It is my hope that the Working Scribe community - here, on the newsletter, on Twitter, in other media - will be a decent one, and that maybe after the vaccines are out, we might have meet ups and drink (beer, tea, lemonade, to each her own.)
So, what’s Working Scribe all about?
Working Scribe is a growing clearinghouse of **useful** info - forms, tools, spreadsheets, checklists, some model pleadings, charts, even contact lists - towards making the practice of law easier for us “working scribes.” Many will be free to any reader, available either here or from public sources. Some will be free for subscribers as part of the (very inexpensive) subscription. Some will be links to downloads from other online resources, such as Gumroad.com. But you can also expect a lot more than good tools and forms. Working Scribe will also curate and assemble material with an eye towards uplift, positivity, re-moralization in an era of demoralization and isolation.
Basically, I want every visitor and every subscriber to be better off for having visited here, every time. This is not the way we lawyers typically talk to, or about, each other or about the way we practice. It’s a little off-rhythm - by design. Working Scribe is not here to blend in, but to offer a counter-message, a “sign of contradiction”, against the typical. Welcome and I hope you enjoy and can benefit from what’s coming.