New Era ADR’s Shane Mulrooney notes that although networking can be intimidating for junior attorneys, each of his career milestones can be attributed to connections made at trainings, events, and CLEs.
There is no substitute for hard work. But while hard work is always necessary in the legal industry, it’s not sufficient for an attorney to achieve their career aspirations—especially when moving to an in-house counsel position.
When I reflect on my own career, every major milestone after my first law firm job was based on connections I made along the way. New attorneys might feel intimidated by the term “networking” (I know I was), but it’s not as hard as it sounds. For an early-career associate, a good—and easy—place to start is by building relationships where you work.
I began my career at the corporate tax group at Kirkland & Ellis in Chicago immediately after graduating from law school. About six months into my job, I was at a tax department lunch with a senior partner who mentioned that when he was a young tax associate, he treated all the corporate associates “as his clients.”
Since the tax group generally supported the corporate group at Kirkland, the partner argued that tax attorneys should conduct “business development” with the corporate lawyers to build their own brand among them, generate “business” (i.e., more work) for themselves, and establish a reputation.
He said he used to take corporate folks out to lunch all the time, grab drinks with them after work, the whole nine yards. As a busy and timid first-year associate, I said I’d think about it.
I didn’t go as far as he did, but I did start to attend more general corporate and transactional meetings, lunches, and CLEs at my firm, and sat next to new people each time. I kept this up for the next couple years. It quickly went from an intentional task to something I looked forward to and did as second nature.
And while I met tons of new colleagues and my relationships (and reputation) certainly improved, nothing else truly tangible came from it. Until the one time it did.
In my third or fourth year at Kirkland, I befriended a capital markets associate at a training lunch. It turned out he was a new lateral hire and didn’t really know anyone else yet. He began sending me work and asking me all the tax questions that came up on his deals, and we developed a solid working relationship.
Then one day, he asked whether I would be willing to meet a guy who “really wants to talk to a tax lawyer.” Being the open-minded, networking-type that I had become over the past couple of years, I said, “Sure, why not?” Turns out this man and his venture capital firm had led the seed fundraising round in a rising Chicago meal-kit delivery company named Home Chef, and he was looking to help them hire a general counsel.
To receive an opportunity to be the first legal hire and legal department head of a company, even a startup, was pretty wild for a 28-year-old, and I jumped on it. I went on to build Home Chef’s legal department and lead the company alongside a group of highly-motivated, intelligent, but junior colleagues, and facilitate the sale of Home Chef to Kroger three years later.
I learned a lot during my time at Home Chef on the substantive practice of law as an in-house attorney, on navigating the corporate minefield, and how to run a business generally. But in keeping with the theme of this article, it was the connections I made outside of Home Chef that led to my next venture.
It was a steep learning curve—moving from a corporate tax attorney to a generalist in charge of a legal department at a venture-capital backed food delivery company. Fortunately, I soon found many resources and, even more importantly, networking groups. Once I found out about the Association for Corporate Counsel and TechGC, I no longer felt alone on an island.
After going out on a limb a bit and attending a few TechGC events in New York, I pestered the founder to open a Chicago chapter. Before I knew it, I oversaw the inaugural event for Chicago and helped organize a lunch CLE with an open invite to any current or prospective TechGC members.
I was shocked at the attendance levels and quickly realized how many lawyers like me there were in Chicago. At that event, I found out there was already a very informal “ChiTechGC” group that met monthly over coffee or a drink and compared notes about how our CEOs didn’t listen to us enough (joking, kind of).
The attorneys at those meetings became not only my professional acquaintances, but friends to this day. At these meetings I met my co-founders of New Era ADR, which all began as a conversation over drinks where we lamented the only options—at the time—for resolving legal disputes in the US. And that’s where I am now, in the best job I’ve ever had.
I can draw a direct line from where I am today as a co-founder and general counsel of an exciting new legal technology company to making the conscious decision to sit next to and strike up a conversation with a fellow associate nearly 10 years ago.
You never know where your next opportunity will come from. It could be from something as small as befriending work colleagues or much more involved like starting a chapter of a networking group in your home city. So while I couldn’t have achieved success without hard work, I also wouldn’t be where I am today without taking the risk to put myself out there.
While everyone’s desired career path is different, I recommend to any in-house attorney—or those aspiring to be—to work hard, keep an open mind, and always introduce yourself to the person sitting next to you at a networking event. You never know where it could take you.
Author Information
Shane Mulrooney is co-founder and general counsel of New Era ADR, and was formerly general counsel of Home Chef.
