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Mike Kasdan, Lawyering While Human and Innovating in IP (Pt. 2)
109 Plays2 years ago
In this week's episode, join Michael Kahn for part 2 of a discussion with Mike Kasdan, JD, about his refreshing approach to lawyering which includes, self-awareness, vulnerability, authenticity, and humane leadership.
Stay in Mike's loop >> Twitter: @law_while_human Instagram: zen.mayhem Facebook: Zen Mayhem: Lawyering While Human Group Website: www.lawyeringwhilehuman.com (under construction) Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: Mike Kasdan The Good Men Project: www.goodmenproject.com
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Transcript
Cultural Change in Law Practices
00:00:03
Speaker
We have to do a lot as leaders to sort of promote that sort of cultural change because it's not oppositional to being a good lawyer or making a lot of money. I think you can be a good lawyer and do great work and make a lot of money and not just like shred through people and have people hide themselves. I think it's actually like a win-win-win, but I think it's going to take a lot of work to get there.
Introduction to Podcast
00:00:29
Speaker
Welcome back to The Thriving Lawyers podcast.
Mindfulness and Mental Health
00:00:32
Speaker
In this week's episode, join Michael Kahn for part two of a discussion with Mike Kasdan about his refreshing approach to lawyering, which includes self-awareness, vulnerability, authenticity and humane leadership. What's mindfulness? I think it's really training your brain to work optimally. And I think that includes taking spaces. But I think, you know, there's a lot of science behind it. There's a course
00:00:58
Speaker
that I'm taking now online at Coursera. I read about it in the New York Times article recently. It's called the Science of Happiness. It's a Yale professor. Is that Yale, Ray? Yeah, it's up at Yale. It's online. It's the most popular course in the history of Yale. And I think the really important part is I think when people think about mental health and wellness, they either think about people are really acutely sick with depression or anxiety or PTSD or bipolar disorder. They're really the sick side.
00:01:28
Speaker
when you're talking about thriving, right, the opposite of, right, like, so mental health is not the, you know, is not the opposite of mental illness, it's thriving. And so I think that the really important point that that course makes, and that I think we have to make is it's not just making sure that we can deal with those situations.
Creativity and Well-being in Law
00:01:45
Speaker
That's important, of course, you know, having gone through that situation, I think it's important to deal with those situations when they occur. But it's also, you know, the other side of it, people think is like, it's people saying,
00:01:56
Speaker
breathe better and do yoga better and blah, blah, blah. And there's this huge other space in between where it's like, well, no, we're talking about creativity and making your brain function well. And I've had this conversation a few times. I think there's this identity problem, misconception. It's intertwined with this masculinity stuff we've been talking about. Because people will say, well, I'm a lawyer. I'm a soldier. I'm going off to war. I'm beating people. I've got to be tough.
00:02:23
Speaker
And I've actually had this conversation with people. I've had it online on LinkedIn, because now I'm actually on LinkedIn talking about this stuff and I never was, where I'm saying, no, no, no, hold on. You're not a soldier. Soldiers are soldiers. You're a partner at a law firm in Utah. You do an IP. And of course, winning is important. But in 95 or more percent of the case, the most important skill as a lawyer
00:02:53
Speaker
is being a creative problem solver, right? You're going to be an ally to business. You're going to find a solution. You're going to resolve disputes. And to be a creative problem solver effectively, you have to have a brain that functions well. And I think mindfulness and all the stuff we're talking about, you know, the science, the science behind it that shows like you're actually training your brain to just function better. You're more creative. You have better energy. And I think, you know, if people,
00:03:22
Speaker
looked at it that way. I think just the word mindfulness, you know, by the time I say ness in mindfulness, you know, I think 80% of people are like onto the next thing because they have this image of it. Um, so maybe we just did a different word for it. It's really brain training. Yeah. And, and really it is, and you're right. I mean, the word mindfulness has been kind of used so much and it ad nauseam that, um, yeah, it can lose its meaning.
Self-awareness and Mindfulness in Adversity
00:03:50
Speaker
But to me, it's the synonym for mindfulness is self-awareness. That's a good one. Yeah. And it's all about, and I know you know this, but it's about just being aware of the present moment right now. Like as I'm talking to you, Mike, how am I feeling? What am I thinking? What is my body telling me? And then that gives you the opportunity at that moment to make a choice, to make a different choice.
00:04:18
Speaker
often than your automatic choices when you're facing particularly when you're facing um adversity and and uh Different difficult situations. So so and that and you brought that all up earlier when you're talking about what's helped you with your depression, which is being aware of Of your at that at the time your tendencies like people pleasing like
00:04:45
Speaker
Similarly, not saying no, putting your needs last. But once you have that awareness, then that's where you have all the power, right? Because then you can start to make changes. It takes a while, of course. But you can start to make changes. Yeah, if you're not aware, self-awareness is a beautiful thing, constant struggle.
Communication, Authenticity, and Diversity in Law
00:05:05
Speaker
It's kind of our human condition, I guess. Maybe it makes it interesting to be human.
00:05:12
Speaker
The word choice is something that my therapist uses a lot. And she's great. And I think what a lot of young people struggle with and what a lot of young lawyers struggle with is, and I try to speak about this when I talk to law students, is they feel like they don't have a lot of choice. But they actually have a lot more choice. And young associates, too. Absolutely. I would much rather a young associate
00:05:37
Speaker
you know, communicate to me and say, hey, you know, I've got to watch my kids for these two hours. So that thing you asked for, I'm going to get it to you, but it's going to be, you know, at this time, instead of not saying anything and just saying, I've got to pound this out for Mike. And you'd be okay with that, Mike? Someone said that to me. Absolutely. I mean, look, there are times in everyone's life and career where there's a deadline and it has to be right. But for me, like communicating and doing something effectively. And that goes for me too.
00:06:04
Speaker
So if, you know, if I'm leaving the office at seven o'clock and doing family stuff, I certainly don't want someone saying, Oh, you know, I'm going to get it to you tonight and getting it to me at 10 o'clock and I'm sleeping. Uh, you know, I usually say, I'm not going to look at this until, you know, Tuesday. Cause I've got these, I think communication goes, goes a long way. Um, and I also think, you know, part of what I really want to talk about with lawyer and while human is also like authenticity. Um, you know, bringing your whole self to work. I really think that.
00:06:32
Speaker
And it ties in with diversity, because I think what makes us special is our diverse experiences and backgrounds and passions and interests. And I think a lot of people, especially in law firms, they come to work and they say, OK, whatever I am outside, I've got to be that button-down lawyer. And I've got to put on the suit and button it up and talk a certain way and write a certain way. And you kind of forget all of who you are, when to me, that's the best part.
00:07:02
Speaker
That's another aspect. One thing, the Lawyering While Human, the name comes from a presentation I did in 2016 that I'd actually forgotten about, but it was a really great opportunity. I had this friend who got me, I was a last-minute substitute speaker for this bar conference and he knew I wrote for the Goodman Project. He said, I want you to talk about that Goodman Project stuff and
00:07:27
Speaker
So I talked about mental health and I talked about authenticity and I talked about how, you know, writing for the Goodman project actually made me a really like a much better storyteller and writer. And I think that's what really writing briefs and arguing is about, right? Telling a good story. And those are really important skills. But, you know, at the time when I was an associate, I was like, there's no way I can tell anyone, you know, I'm publishing this stuff. There's no way I would share something I wrote at work or say, hey, I'm working on this thing.
00:07:55
Speaker
because in my associate brain, I thought the partner would say, well, why weren't you here building more hours? Why are you writing about sports? But meanwhile, and so I hid that part of myself.
Leadership and Cultural Adaptation in Law Firms
00:08:10
Speaker
I also, of course, hid the mental health part of myself that I no longer do. But I think all those things kind of make us who we are. And I think there's value in sort of being yourself. And I think
00:08:23
Speaker
A lot of this push is coming from like that younger generation, but I think, you know, we have to do a lot as leaders to sort of promote that sort of cultural change because it's not oppositional to being a good lawyer or making a lot of money. I think you can be a good lawyer and do great work and make a lot of money and not just like shred through people and have people hide themselves. I think it's actually like a win-win-win, but I think it's going to take a lot of work to get there.
00:08:52
Speaker
Well, as leadership changes as the, as the older leaders, not just to make it a, not just to make it a generational issue, but I think as some of the older leaders cycle out and you get some of the newer folks like yourself who, um, where this, this way of being is more natural, um, that hopefully that, and I think it already is the change, but what I do hear from
00:09:20
Speaker
a lot of my lawyer clients, especially the younger ones, is the lack of mentorship. I mean, some of these firms speak a good game and say, yeah, here's your mentor, but it's not something that these associates can count on.
Support Systems and Mentorship Issues
00:09:41
Speaker
But not only that, not only just the lack of mentorship, but the lack of, I've heard it described, and I love this, you may have heard this, the board of directors.
00:09:50
Speaker
which is folks, your support system, people that you can reach out to doesn't just have to be lawyers, but different types of folks who you reach out to for different types of things. Like there might be, there might be someone and you, you may be able to relate to this. I know I do. I have certain people who I know if I'm needing just to vent, certainly I have my partner, Stephanie, but out of my friends, if I need, need to just vent, there's someone who I know I can go to.
00:10:17
Speaker
Yeah, nurturing and and listener. Then there's somebody else who I know is going to help me just get right in and fix a problem. You know what I mean? Yeah, you have to have a big diversity that you know,
Institutional Challenges in Law
00:10:29
Speaker
that network. I think it's so true. But yeah, I mean, what you talked about is, you know, so talking a good game versus actually doing it, like, and that's the part where where change is slow. And when you see it in all these kind of institutional areas, right, we wish we were like further along than we are. And there are hard problems to solve.
00:10:48
Speaker
because they're institutional and because they're really ingrained, like the ideas about masculinity really ingrained, ideas about race and gender are really ingrained, ideas about culture and mental health are really ingrained. So it takes a large push to change it. And I think it has to come from not only the top down, but the bottom up. But I think the bottom up is not insignificant. And in conversations with my peers, you know, when they see that the younger generation, you know, saying no, and on one level,
00:11:16
Speaker
you know, they're like, I can't believe that that kid said no, and he's going to do it this way. And part of it is, I mean, I've had conversations where they're like, I'm jealous, like, I didn't realize, like, I certainly didn't do that when I was that person's age. Yes. But I didn't realize I had that choice. I didn't realize I had that power. And if I did, maybe I would have and I would have taken care of myself, because frankly, if I have a superstar associate who, you know, needs more time or has some issue, like,
00:11:44
Speaker
I want to nurture that person, because that person is going to be really great to work with, and they're going to help me do great work. And so rather than burning through that person, I
Lawyers' Mental Health and Work-Life Balance
00:11:54
Speaker
want to be sensitive. And if they communicate to me, I can always make other arrangements. If it means that they're not going to do the next draft, but I have to do the next draft, that's fine. But of course, what happens is at the margins, clients come in, and they have expectations, and they have deadlines, and you've got to get something done.
00:12:13
Speaker
Usually I think it's like, it's really a leadership and issue. It's a management issue. You know, what happens, I'll tell you one story from my past, but I think what happens is the people who are the leaders, the partners, they get anxious and nervous and they push too hard because they didn't quite plan it out. And they're under a kind of crush and they push all that down onto someone else. And that's of course very natural and certainly not, you know, unique to law. But, you know, I really enjoyed my first
00:12:43
Speaker
you know, law job at Kirkland and Ellis. I worked with really smart people. I did really like interesting work on big cases. I got great experience early. I got to take the positions and write briefs and travel and work on interesting cases. But I left Kirkland after my daughter was born because I was called, because my wife, my then wife gave birth on a Friday and she was in the hospital and I got called by the partner I was working with to come into the office on Saturday.
00:13:11
Speaker
And it's not, oh, Mike's lazy, like he doesn't work hard. And it's not, oh, Mike isn't doing his job, didn't get his work done. He was traveling on the Sunday. I had always traveled previously with him. He didn't know how to make his own travel arrangements. He didn't know how to get from the airport to the place. He didn't know how to organize his documents. And he had a lot of anxiety about it. So when I said,
00:13:40
Speaker
I can't come to the office right now because my wife's in the hospital and I'm in the hospital. He said, well, I really need you to come in. And I did. And then, you know, and then I realized, you know, I don't want to be that. And that's had a lot of influence in kind of how I lead and how I try and treat associates. And it also had a lot of influence on my career path because I left. And how long did it, when, how long after that did you leave? Two weeks.
00:14:09
Speaker
Two weeks. Yeah. So you left. You you decided to leave the firm right away after that after that experience. Yeah, because, you know, I looked forward and and I was like, if I do really, really well and this, you know, and I don't want to be unfair to him either. He was, you know, dealing with stress and deadlines. But, you know, he had a young kid and he was billing an amount of hours that if I told you and you did the math, like you wouldn't even understand.
00:14:38
Speaker
I was possible. And so when I thought at that time with, with a newborn baby, with my son was two. Um, and, and, and I had no problem working hard. I like working hard. I like doing good work. Um, but that, but to have it be constant for like no reason, um, you know, it was problematic. And so that was really a, yeah, it was really the funny moment because I looked and I said, right, I'm doing well. And they told me I'm doing well. And if I continue to do well, I'm going to become that guy.
00:15:07
Speaker
And that guy like never sees this kid. He builds like 3,000 hours a year and he's stressed. And I was like, what am I doing here? There's no amount of money.
Innovative Law School Programs
00:15:15
Speaker
There's just no amount of money. And so I went to a different place where I thought I could also do interesting work and better balance. And I do see that happening. I do see younger lawyers more able or even to consider something like that.
00:15:37
Speaker
quicker maybe than years ago when looking at lifestyle and quality of life. I have so many younger clients too will say no and set limits with the partners. I'm impressed with that to be honest. They do it respectfully and they do it thoughtfully, but they do set some limits. I want to throw out
00:16:07
Speaker
or shout out, you mentioned law schools, that you're talking to law schools. And our last, the last podcast, well, we just dropped a new one, but two podcasts ago, or two guests ago, we had Shalini George, who's a professor at Suffolk University Law School. And she's doing some great work at that law school. She's even teaching a pilot class
00:16:33
Speaker
Just around well-being exactly issues and that they're they're giving her space to do that So there's definitely
Lawyering While Human Initiative
00:16:42
Speaker
good thing. I went to law school in the 80s And now to be fair I did have that we did have a counselor there, which I was pretty progressive. I think back in the 80s So I want to bring you back to the the luring while human yeah, and and what is your
00:17:05
Speaker
What's your mission? What's your goal? What's your vision? And is it a website or is it a blog? How is it packaged? Sure. I am still working on the website. I've been busy doing the lawyering part more, but I'm pretty active on socials and I can
00:17:26
Speaker
you that information. But I'm on Instagram and Twitter. Yeah, we'll have that. We'll have that with the podcast. But the vision. And so I think there's really two components to it. You know, one part of it is is the sort of longer term culture change that I'm talking about. And I think, you know, the pathway into this conversation, like I said, I think a lot of people have a misconception about
00:17:53
Speaker
that when we're talking about, you know, mental health and wellness, we're either talking about going to the gym or doing yoga or being really, really sick. And I think that it's what I want to talk about is it's just an integral part of being a lawyer. And I really, really believe that the pathway in the reason that everyone should care about this stuff. And I think like Professor George is modeling that at Suffolk by integrating it into a four credit course in law school.
00:18:22
Speaker
that this is part of your personal and professional development. It's going to make you a better lawyer.
Mental Health and Leadership
00:18:27
Speaker
And so the way in, you know, why people should care about this, you know, even if they don't suffer from depression or whatever, is this is a leadership competency. I think that if you're going to be a leader in a law firm or in an in-house, if you're going to be in this world, you know, 9 out of 10 people have, you know, know someone, either themselves are dealing with this or a family member.
00:18:51
Speaker
If you're leading people and our business is all about people, right? That's, you know, we're a good law firm because of our people and their brains and their ability to do good work. So if you're going to be a leader, I think today you have to care about and be able to navigate this stuff. And if you want to foster innovation and creativity and be the creative problem solvers that great lawyers need to be, you need to have an infrastructure, you know, and a firm culture
00:19:20
Speaker
and policies that support this. So part of what I'm talking about, so I want to talk to, I am talking with law students and law schools on one level, and lawyers and law firms on one level. And leaders. And leaders about these issues. And some of it I can do on my own. It's sharing my own experience and my own insights. And for example, and that's kind of the long game. But I also think in the short term, from being out
00:19:50
Speaker
from dealing with depression and anxiety over a long period of time, both as an associate and as a partner and from kind of having almost every job you could have in the law. Like I've been a law clerk and I've been an in-house lawyer and I've been at a small firm and a medium firm and a large firm and I've been an associate, I've been a paralegal and now I'm a partner. I feel like having gone through that, I think I can help law firms and lawyers to arrive at
00:20:19
Speaker
policies and structures and Programming and education and sort of build a culture like kind of the nuts and bolts stuff. So do you see yourself being a consultant? And that kind of role at some point I do and I think the way so right now I'm navigating this like I'm really enjoying being a lawyer and and and I'm building this while I'm doing it and it's very integrated and it's great and but I think you know when I look at the law world what I see is
00:20:50
Speaker
I see really big, I'm talking about law firms and look at them first, because I think that's where I have the most experience personally. But I see big firms, the really, really big law firms, like for example, Kirkland and Ellis, where I worked, or Quinn and Manuel, they're very large firms. Those firms are hiring wellness directors, right? And you said, oh, it's great. And it's great. I've met a lot of those people, and I think it's a wonderful development.
00:21:17
Speaker
But I think if only those big law firms, which are in many ways the hardest places to work culturally, to have that resource, I think it's great that they're thinking about it. And those people are doing tremendous work. But it's sort of in the very narrow top level. And being at a firm of the size of Wigan and Dana, where we're 150 lawyers, which in law firms makes you medium-sized, I think there's a vast middle layer
00:21:47
Speaker
And then of course, like there are many small law firms and you know, and those places maybe don't have the resources or ability to hire a full-time person. So one thing I think I could add is to sort of be an outsourced, whether you call it a consultant or an outsourced director of wellness, but I think I could help firms in that middle layer to set up their wellness programs, to bring in people to do these things, to work on their actual policies and structures and internal groups
Integrating Well-being into Law Practices
00:22:16
Speaker
to kind of build the type of culture that we're talking about. And I think, you know, if I'm able to do that through Loring While Human, you know, myself and bringing in others to do that, I think that we can reach a lot more people more broadly. So that's kind of my hope. I love that idea. I think that's really, I'm not sure anybody else is doing that right now. Yeah, I don't think anyone else is doing it right now. It's a great idea.
00:22:39
Speaker
Thank you. And you do. I think you're right. You come very uniquely qualified. I think your own personal story certainly helps you in this work. It's not just an abstract thing for you and the fact that you've come out the other side, but also the work is never done.
00:23:03
Speaker
Right. Exactly. As you've said, you've had bouts with depression now each time. For sure. You have more tools. Exactly. Each time it comes up, which is great. And you still have a therapist, which I, of course, as a therapist, I think that I recommend that for everybody. And you're just, I love, I'll go back to what you said before, which I really liked, which was very forward thinking and long-term thinking. You were, you said,
00:23:31
Speaker
if I have an associate who's really good and the last thing I want to do is burn him out or burn her out. So that's very thoughtful way to think about not only is it good, I mean, listen, I would love if everyone made decisions based on altruism. And if that's not enough,
00:23:58
Speaker
think about, well, how is this good for the firm? How is this good for our clients?
Mindful Business Charter Impact
00:24:03
Speaker
Exactly. You want someone who is working on all cylinders, right? Yeah. And I think what's inspiring is, you know, there is, I think there's a lot more top down leadership is needed. Um, and I hope to have a role in that. Um, you know, law firms, if you take a cynical view of law firms, which many do, and I understand why, um, you know, law firms don't often make gigantic changes without it making a lot of scary sense.
00:24:26
Speaker
But if you look at the pro bono and diversity sort of pathways, when clients started demanding stuff, law firms changed. And I think it's interesting. Such as diversity. Well, yeah. And I think it's very parallel. And I think what's inspiring to me is, for example, I came across a fellow in the UK, and he's running an organization called the Mindful Business Charter. His name's Richard Martin. And that was started by some very large companies in England
00:24:56
Speaker
HSBC and Lloyd's of London basically saying, we recognize that we're gigantic clients and that when we send an email to our law firm, they run around like chickens without heads and drop everything. And that's actually not great for us. It's not good for us. It's not good for them. And so we want to actually, so it actually started from clients. Wow. And so a number of companies and law firms have signed up to that mindful business charter.
00:25:23
Speaker
Again, I think it's sufficient from that sort of mindfulness buzzword and its title, but what it really is, is some of these concepts and sort of building in these concepts to culture about how we communicate, when we send emails. And I think it's interesting to see it coming from, I think it's really, really progressive.
00:25:40
Speaker
to see it coming from that direction and really hopeful because that's- So this is coming from the companies, from clients, not from the firms. Well, that's how it started, but a number of firms and companies have signed up to this mindful business charter to sort of try and do business in accordance with these principles. But I think more of that is kind of needed to push us to where we need to go. But I do think it makes business sense. In fact, I'm working on a
00:26:09
Speaker
an article on the business case for wellbeing in law.
Social Change Through Storytelling
00:26:14
Speaker
And others have before me written tremendous law review articles on it, but I'm working on an article to say like, look, this actually makes economic sense. You know, if you look at it, and I think that's an important kind of piece to the conversation if we're really talking about the epic changes. All right, we just have three or four minutes left, but I do wanna ask you about the hashtag we rage for love.
00:26:39
Speaker
Tell me more about that. What was that about? So it started, I wrote an article for the Good Men Project during the either the Trump campaign or his presidency. And it was really talking about kind of like the intensity that people need to push for important social change. And it's really for love. And it really came from a quote where someone was basically saying,
00:27:08
Speaker
Like if we fought as hard for the beliefs that we have on the issues that we care about as, for example, the NRA fights for guns, that's kind of the passion you have to bring for it. But it's not, you know, it's for love. Like we're coming from a good place. But, you know, you have to fight like it's everything to you. Like it's your reason for being. And so that that was sort of came from a political place. But, you know, it was there was talking about kind of that. Yeah. And then
00:27:37
Speaker
The other hashtag you mentioned, not weak, just human, was a really important one to me that came out of the Goodman project, not only puts out articles, I think 40 articles a day on a range of topics, but also interactive. So I helped to create this program there called Social Interest Groups, where every night of the week you have a phone call. It's actually like a, it's like a podcast, it's an interactive podcast where all the callers are involved in the conversation.
00:28:05
Speaker
and they have conversations on race and gender. And I actually led one on mental health for a while. And in addition to sort of having a group to talk about, we wanted to do something out in the world. And we did a video sort of a public service announcement to try and sort of destigmatize to say, you know, we're not weak, just human, and had different people from different walks of life sort of talking about themselves and the issues that they were dealing with. And this is through the Goodman Project?
00:28:33
Speaker
Yep, that was all through the folks. And is that still going on? Or is it that's still ready about mental health for the Goodman project? There were an article just last week. But I mean, the that that not we just human where people were calling the way you described us. Yeah, the hashtag is telling us right now, this there's not a mental health social interest group going right now. The one we have our environment, race, gender and relationships.
00:29:00
Speaker
Um, but, uh, but they, they kind of come in cycles and they're, they'll probably be a mental health one again. And people can find out about that going to the website. Yeah. You can search on Twitter for that hashtag. You'll find a bunch of stuff. And then you're going to have, uh, Loring while human is going to have a website soon down the road. Yep. Yep. We, uh, we, it will be at, at www, um, Loring while human.com. There is a whole placeholder up there.
00:29:26
Speaker
But right now, I'm sharing content every day on Instagram and Twitter. And LinkedIn as well, right? And LinkedIn. LinkedIn is just me, Mike Kazdin. And on those other places, on Twitter, it's at law underscore while underscore human. And on Instagram, it's at zen.mayhem, actually.
00:29:53
Speaker
Uh, which is sometimes used to describe myself and it's been my long time fantasy baseball name that I turned into that. Uh, and I'm also on Facebook. There's a group called lawyer and while human, um, it's an open public group, uh, where, uh, yeah, I'm just sharing articles, sharing content, thoughts, memes, that kind of stuff. Uh, it's kind of been fun to build community that way, uh, connect to different law firms and law schools and, and folk out there. Well, you're doing fantastic work, Mike. Really? I think, uh, that's.
00:30:24
Speaker
I don't want to be trite and say the conversations need to happen more than conversations need to happen for sure. But, and you are doing more than conversation, but you're putting it out there. You're also modeling vulnerability and authenticity and congruence. Am I saying that right? I'll take it. You're saying nice things about me. I'm having a moment here. I'm not sure. Anyway, you're being congruent. There you go.
00:30:54
Speaker
And that's hugely important. And being a good leader, the folks who work at your firm, especially the young associates, are lucky to have you. So that's where change happens. Yeah, no, thank you. I appreciate that. And I'm grateful for falling into the Goodman project. And it's interesting you mentioned about the conversation. And I think it is important to start the conversation. And it's really important to actually
00:31:23
Speaker
You know, you have action. Yeah, action. But but the tagline for the Goodman project always has been and still is the conversation no one else is having. And, you know, on issues like diversity, inclusion and race and gender and mental health, like more people are having it. And that's fantastic. I kind of love that tagline. And it's kind of an inspiration to kind of bring the conversation as a first step to more people. When we do our workshops, when we used to do them in person in the room,
00:31:53
Speaker
Uh, we'd have lawyers come up to us and our programs are on, on ethics, but it's, uh, more around the impact of stress on ethical decision-making and we do wellbeing programs, et cetera. Um, but we'd often have lawyers come up and say, I am just glad to hear that I'm not the only one because we're very interactive. So they hear from each other. And just that is very, if that's just the only takeaway for, for lawyer attending the program, that's huge.
00:32:22
Speaker
Yeah, I agree. That there are other people out there who are struggling. Of course, that's not the last step. That's the first step to, to feel like I'm not alone. And that, and that, that in and of itself helps folks feel better. But then it's, of course, okay, now what do I do? Yeah, what kind of tools can I use to help me get to a better place? Yeah. And even though, like I said, these are big, slowly changing problems. It's,
00:32:50
Speaker
I am inspired and hopeful because more people are talking about it.
Conclusion and Future Collaborations
00:32:55
Speaker
I had an experience three years after I had depression where I met people I used to work with who are senior to me and I described what had happened. I thought I was telling this big secret. This thing happened to me. I didn't know what was happening. And they were both like, oh yeah, that happens to us all the time. But nobody talked about it. So being out and seeing people, seeing more people talk about it now, I think, gives us a chance. It gives us a chance. Yes. And telling your story, I do a lot of work with clients who are dealing with grief and loss.
00:33:20
Speaker
And telling your story is often what folks who are grieving want to do, to talk about the person who died. And often when they do, that's what happens. The person they're telling will say, yeah, I lost my child too. Or, yeah, I had a miscarriage too. So it's that, it's just opening up leads to connection. And that connection is just so critical. And we're not, we're not getting as much as we need, particularly during the pandemic. Yeah, I agree. I mean, I'm a big story storytelling person.
00:33:49
Speaker
I believe that like storytelling is like the path to social change and on all these topics, right? Because it's connection and that's what all the stuff is about. Like you were talking about it. That opening up is a beautiful thing and it actually, it's productive. Like you can actually move forward to a different place. So yeah, I have a lot of hope for this and a lot of energy around it. Well, Mike, thank you. I know you have a child to get at the airport soon.
00:34:17
Speaker
And I'm sure you're looking forward to that. So I want to end the interview now. But I really appreciate you're giving me your time today. And I look forward to staying connected. Same here. Appreciate your time. And thanks for inviting me on. It was great to talk with you. Thank you. And thanks, everybody, for coming back and listening. We'll have another interesting interview down the road. Thanks again.
00:34:48
Speaker
Thanks for listening to this episode of the Thriving Lawyers Podcast. We love hearing from our loyal listeners, so please feel free to email us any questions, comments, suggested topics, or guest recommendations at the following address, feedback at thrivinglawyerspodcast.com.
00:35:03
Speaker
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