The reason I have doubts in Book Four: Ichi-no-Tani 2017

So.... this job does make me reconsider being a lawyer. Despite what my mom said. Because it puts doubts in my head all the time. There was a big one today that I had to e-mail to Wife and Mom to see… well… is it this firm or should I honestly re-think the law?

Two weeks ago, White Boss asked me to write a Statement of Admissions and a Motion for Summary Judgment on a Civil Case he’d been working on. I had not done either before; and was using a template given to our firm by another attorney… proof that this firm had never done one before. I wrote the statement of admission and request for Summary Judgment based on the templates given. I added up all of the money listed in the statement of admissions and came to a total of $63,000. That is the number I put in the request for summary judgment. I then sent it to White Boss asking that he look it over to make sure I did it right.

He looks at it for the first time today and is deeply disappointed. The case involves money in the amount north of $500,000. One of the admissions I wrote, and correctly, stated that the money borrowed prior to 2016 was $487,000. That is the only mention of that money and it is listed as “Principal Amount of Loan.” The rest of the case that I was handed did not specify if any amount of that loan had been repaid or not. White Boss tells me I need to ”think like a lawyer” and that he ”just doesn’t know how to scare (me) into doing things right.” What I was supposed to do was (1) Research what it takes to do a Motion of Summary Judgment in Iowa because he didn’t know how to do one either; (2) Research the case file in our One Drive to make sure I had all of the pertinent facts before starting my work; (3) Review the Petition of Demand for the detailed specifics; (4) THEN do what was asked of me.

White Boss reiterated his disappointment because “I should not have to look over your work for things like this. You need to do it right when we ask you to do it.”

And the thing is… my mistake is significant. That would have translated into an extreme loss to the client and the firm. But… I’m torn because… I honestly don’t know if I made a “bad lawyer” mistake or a “bad firm” mistake. Meaning.... if I was at a Firm that had at least one experienced Attorney… would these issues not exist? If I was at a Firm where a “supervising attorney” didn’t act like it was such a burden to be a supervising attorney… would that make a difference? Or is it really that I am a bad attorney? That these things that I’m being asked are “common lawyer work” and I should know better? This is where/why this job gets under my skin so much. I don’t know if it is them, or me, or the type of law, or what is going on. But I am positive that I can’t work here much longer.... like… they are “playing nice” because they’ve known they needed me to cover for them for 16 days. But when they get back from China? I am honestly worried about how much worse things could get.