Originally published on December 13, 2010 in our free BigLaw newsletter. Instead of reading BigLaw here after the fact, sign up now to receive future issues in realtime.
You've probably run into a former miserable coworker who left biglaw and surfaced a month later looking like the million bucks he left on the table. It's almost as if, simply by quitting, he instantly kicked that seven-year antidepressant habit, dropped 10 pounds, and added years to his life. Of course, if you're still unhappily slaving away, encountering these Jimmy Buffets can throw your own misery into high relief.
A widely cited Johns Hopkins study found that lawyers are more likely to suffer from depression than people in any other profession. Some have attributed this statistic to two personality traits — perfectionism and pessimism — rife among attorneys.
Biglaw attorneys seem even more depressed than your average lawyer. Why? Will Meyerhofer probably has some theories. I have five of my own.
1. Disenfranchisement
No matter where you rank in your firm's hierarchy — associate, counsel, a partner — you're constantly at the mercy of others. No matter how successful your career was prior to attending law school, if you enter biglaw, you'll start in the proverbial mailroom with everybody else as a first-year associate.
Count on waiting at least four years until you make any real substantive legal decisions or manage people below you. Even when you're a partner, clients dictate the work schedule, call the business shots, and direct you to fulfill them. Add in the pyramidal business structure that prizes billable hours over intelligence, seniority over merit, and business development over legal brilliance and it's easy see why lawyers become so unhappy.
2. Entrapment
Many law students graduate with $150,000 in law school loans and a degree that offers them only one career option for repaying the debt (relatively) quickly — biglaw. Working for three to five years at a firm can prove depressing if you're only there to pay off your loans. Also, knowing that the longer you stay, the less marketable you become to non-law firm employers makes it even worse. The dearth of legal jobs outside of biglaw that pay equivalent salaries doesn't help matters either.
3. Jerks
As I've previously noted, law firms have their own special (and especially insidious) breeds of jerks. Whether it's dealing with an indignant admin who refuses to enter your timesheets or a passive-aggressive partner who goes AWOL as important deadlines loom, the average biglaw associate is in a near-constant state of panic about screwing up, not receiving their full bonus, and getting fired. It's hard to maintain a sunny attitude when you're surrounded by jerks at work.
4. Long Hours
Long and unpredictable work hours take their toll on biglaw lawyers. Late nights, ruined weekends, and the all-too-common cancelled vacations strain personal relationships and torpedo efforts to stick with gym routines and healthy eating habits.
Associates get no respite from work during the day since they're billing by the hour. BlackBerrys ensure that they're always on call. Having a work/life balance is essential to maintaining happiness and sanity, but at many large law firms, this concept remains a myth.
5. Prophesy
If you work in a large law firm, you're supposed to be depressed. Like celebrities and plastic surgery, they go together. Don't blame me. I didn't start it. The media has told lawyers for years that they're depressed. The ABA and state bars have a program — the Commission on Lawyer Assistance Programs — devoted to helping attorneys cope. So many people reiterating the lawyer depression meme can be kind of, well, depressing. I mean, if nobody believed that you weren't depressed, wouldn't you be depressed too?
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