Law Students

Ambition Looks Lonely (at least from my BigLaw window)

By Peg

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bored.jpg

As a follow-up to this post, I have to report that another terrific female attorney left my firm voluntarily last week.  A few women have left between the first post and this but none truly voluntarily (at least as far as I can tell) until now.  This one hurts more than the last but for different reasons.  When I wrote the first post, I was convinced that the woman that was leaving was abandoning the promise of BigLaw partnership for life balance.  While I understood how that was the right choice for her, I had a harder time accepting that it was the right choice for the rest of us.  This time, the woman that left is a close friend and I think she left because her ambition is bigger and different than her opportunity here.   Just as last time, I get that this move is the right decision for her and may even be the right move for women in general as I'm sure she is going to use her new opportunity as a stepping stone to bigger things than partnership at our firm.   It just wasn't the right choice for me (as if that matters, I know, I know.)

As I struggled to find something on point to write about related to my friend's recent departure I kept coming back to the reason why this is so hard for me and it comes down to the simple issue of friendship and the fact that I have one less good friend here and I feel lonely about that.  That has lead me to ponder the issue of being alone with my ambition on more than one level.

There are the obvious things like the fact that there are so few women making partners in BigLaw firms that the possibility that you could make a really good girlfriend at the office and then move up the ranks together is slim to none.  Along with that, there just aren't that many women that want to make partner which means only a very small number will stick it out.  Less women in the office doesn't necessarily mean fewer friends but it doesn't help the odds.

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Full post as published by Ms. JD on July 19, 2010 (boomark / email).