I’m excited to share some news with you. As a career coach, I give a lot of advice to lawyers via my JDCOT website, JD Refugee® programs, group phone calls and one-to-one calls.

 

As a fellow lawyer, I also follow the advice that I give. And that is what leads to my big news.

 

 

It’s not just legal recruiting…it’s legal recruiting with a unique angle that I’ll describe in a minute.

 

Before I explain my journey to this decision (with the goal of helping you assess your own situation), I want you to know this:

The JD Careers Out There (“JDCOT”) website, newsletters, career video library and JD Refugee® programs will all continue!

 

I will also be continuing to work with all of my current clients. My self-guided (online) JD Refugee® program will still be available. And I will be opening the doors to my group programs again with biweekly evening calls. But, to accommodate the needs of the legal recruiting career path, I will not be taking on any new private coaching clients in the near future.

 

This change will allow me to continue helping lawyers find the right career fit and actually connect those who want to stay in law to new jobs (when their backgrounds fit the parameters set by the employers).

 

You can contact me by replying to this email. Referrals are always welcome too.

 

The Unique Angle of This Legal Recruiting Firm
I’m joining Whistler Partners, a very forward-looking search firm. Whistler is uniquely focused on law firm and in-house counsel roles in the world of tech convergence: tech/IP, startups, entertainment, and fintech/regulatory work.

 

As someone who has worked in the music industry, worked for two tech startups, and built my own unique video-focused platform, all of this excites me. The opportunity to help the legal community in these specific areas feels like a great fit.

 

With an online presence that embraces the ever-changing platforms available, Whistler communicates in a way that evokes the fun vibe of the startup community (which is unique for a legal search firm).

 

For example, each recruiter’s bio on the Whistler website features that person’s playlist of interview motivation songs. The music fanatic in me of course loves that!

 

Another unique aspect to Whistler is its founder, Sean Burke. I’ll summarize him in three words: Sean gets it. More on Sean below.

 

 

I want to be transparent about what led to my personal decision since I help others determine their own.

 

My business used to be a mix of group coaching and one-to-one/private coaching. Over time, the JDCOT community’s interest in group coaching waned while demand for private coaching grew. In the pandemic era, private coaching has filled my schedule.

 

The “sales” process involved in onboarding people to my private coaching program includes a free, exploratory call. That allows me to determine if I can help the caller and, if so, invite them into my program. Some of those right-fit people will sign up and others will be too risk averse, on too tight of a budget, or too unwilling to invest the necessary time.

 

By Fall 2021, after engaging in so many of these exploratory calls, I realized that these calls are so similar to the get-to-know-you calls I would do as a recruiter. I also realized that the consultative nature of leading private coaching sessions greatly overlaps with the work of being a legal recruiter.

 

It’s almost like my work had circled back to recruiting without the benefits of actually being a recruiter!

 

When a Boston-based client of mine this past year decided to become a recruiter, he asked me to share everything I could about the career path. I found myself getting excited talking to him about it. Once he started the job and we had a chat about how it’s going, I found myself getting a little jealous!

 

As a coach, I’ve loved helping lawyers find themselves and determine what really fits them. It’s been incredibly rewarding. I get choked up just thinking about all of the great, inspiring clients I’ve had and how moving it’s been to take them through a program I built from scratch.

 

But as a recruiter, while helping lawyers find the right fit, I can also support them with the actual job placement piece. And I can support employers by helping them grow their teams with the best possible people.

 

Yes. I did. And I’m really not someone who tries to relive my past. I’m a future-focused person who gets excited by the “new.”

 

I feel that the opportunity before me with Whistler is “the new.”  

 

A big reason I left recruiting in 2008 was that too many of the job opportunities to present to my candidates didn’t seem enticing.

 

When the opportunities I’d be calling people about didn’t seem enticing, work to me felt like a drag. Rather than fake it and try to “sell” people on generic job openings, I would focus on my volunteer work with a local cancer charity. Eventually, I stopped recruiting altogether.

 

Whenever I had opportunities I thought people would be excited about, it made work fun. I loved calling lawyers to present them with those opportunities.

 

Two of my favorite placements, if not my very favorite placements, happened when I helped move two associates from Biglaw into in-house counsel jobs in the music industry. Friendships developed out of those placements.

 

This past December, I reconnected with both of those individuals at a party – and seeing how happy and thankful they STILL ARE all these years later got me excited.

 

I concluded that if I were to return to recruiting, I’d want to be able to focus on jobs like theirs…jobs that people will be interested in. I believe that is what the Whistler platform will allow me to do.

 

 

Yes. Definitely.

 

You can’t ask an individual signing up for career coaching to pay anywhere near what an employer can pay for finding the right talent.

 

So, once my overall work with JDCOT and JD Refugee® morphed into something so closely related to recruiting, I started asking myself, “Why am I doing the same work for less pay…BY CHOICE?!”

 

I wondered if there was a recruiting platform where I could focus on the types of jobs I mentioned above and be able to keep JDCOT/JD Refugee® going.

 

 

Sean called me recently to ask me to come work for him. Not only was his timing perfect, but he said he wanted me to keep my company and brand alive.

 

Between that and everything I’ve said I like about his platform, there’s more.

 

You see, I knew Sean from my recruiting days! In fact, I was briefly his recruiter!

 

We hadn’t communicated since the 00s, but I remembered him because he made a big impression on me when he was a Biglaw associate. I still have my notes from our 2005 conversations, which confirm my memories! Here are some excerpts:  

 

 

 

Crazy, right? He built a company focused on exactly what he said excited him in 2005.

 

Those same areas excite me. But I never thought of building a recruiting platform focused on that!

 

 

Like I said above, my current programs will keep running. The main change is that I will not be taking on any new private coaching clients in the near future.

 

I will continue to be committed to supporting lawyers in finding the right careers for them, both in and out of law.

 

If you’re looking for a change in law, you should contact me by replying to this email if:

Remember that recruiters can only help those who meet the specifications dictated by their employer-clients. Those limits are one of the reasons I built the JDCOT/JD Refugee® platform and remain a reason I will keep the platform alive.

 

I look forward to continuing to serve the legal community, both as a recruiter at Whistler Partners, and as the founder of JDCOT and JD Refugee®.

 

Until next time,
Marc