Steve Palmer [00:00:00]:

All right, LawyerTalkPodcast.com. they don't teach you that in law school. Here we talk about the real world experience versus the law school experience. I call it the ivory tower of law school experience. And we have Troy, our resident law clerk, who works for me upstairs in the law practice. You need some help, by the way? Palmer Legal Defense. Check us out. But, you know, we got to talking off the air here about law clerks and I mean, even that term, like when you started law school, what did the term law clerk actually mean to you?

Troy Hendrickson [00:00:32]:

Well, when I started law school, I had no idea what a law clerk even was, but in my head it was more like intern. That's pretty much it. It's just a fancy word I feel like for legal. Internal intern. Yeah, that's all it is. I don't know why we put a special title on it, but they're called a law clerk.

Steve Palmer [00:00:47]:

Like, what is a clerk? Well, I mean, there's a store clerk that checks you out at the counter.

Troy Hendrickson [00:00:52]:

Yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:00:52]:

There's other types of clerks that we know, but. And then in the legal profession, being a law clerk for say a federal judge is a very. That's a lawyer job that's got quite a lot of prestige.

Troy Hendrickson [00:01:07]:

Yeah, I think that last hearing we were at where there was somebody who was like, probably in, I don't want to guess his age, but he was like late, like 50s or something like that.

Steve Palmer [00:01:15]:

Call him my age.

Troy Hendrickson [00:01:16]:

Yeah, okay. Yeah, around your age. And he was clerking and it was just.

Steve Palmer [00:01:19]:

He was a full blown lawyer and his job was to do research and writing on behalf for. For the judge, to help the judge decide what to do. And a U.S. supreme Court law clerk is like the highest level of prestige and you're working on the cutting edge stuff all the time. So law clerk has just got this nebulous, undefined concept that people just don't get. But I've always had law clerks like, I've treated them like interns or maybe even externs. You're actually getting credit, aren't you?

Troy Hendrickson [00:01:50]:

Yes. So, I mean, I imagine most schools do this, but there's externship credits where if you clerk at what they determine as a recognized, like law firm, which pretty much anybody who's practicing law, you can get recognized. At least how our school works, you get credits for it, you still have to pay for it, which that kind of sucks, but you get automatic credit for it. So it's better than taking a class, sitting through it and not learning.

Steve Palmer [00:02:14]:

Yeah, of course you've learned more working.

Troy Hendrickson [00:02:16]:

From me than you did in your three.

Steve Palmer [00:02:17]:

And I'm just kidding.

Troy Hendrickson [00:02:19]:

And it caps out. You can't do your whole thing. But I think like 10 credit hours of the 90 I have to get will be from here. So it's a decent chunk of school.

Steve Palmer [00:02:29]:

Well, when you showed up day one, was there anything about your law school experience that informed your ability to do this job?

Troy Hendrickson [00:02:38]:

I would go with no. Because you knew nothing. Yeah, your first year, it's all the core bar studies and all that, they're just trying to make sure you can actually survive law school. So when you get to like your first job, you kind of don't know anything. You don't know what you're supposed to expect. In my head I was like, I took criminal law, I should know how to do this. And then I realized, no, I don't know how to do anything.

Steve Palmer [00:03:02]:

So which, which, this is the topic, this is the shift over to the topic we were talking about, which is pay and money. What was the understanding? I mean, did you guys have an understanding? By you guys, I mean law students in your community have an understanding about how much you should be making.

Troy Hendrickson [00:03:17]:

They did not ever like disclose. Hey guys, this is the number you should be going around. What they did tell us is if you're top, you want to be top percentage of your first semester and then you can go to Big Law and you can clerk there. And if you're going to Big Law, they're going to take you out to like New York, Louisiana, Chicago, they're going to put you in an apartment and they're going to pay you like ridiculously. Like you're going to make like 40 grand that summer, which that's insane for clerk money. Like imagine just over the summer you're getting like four grand a week pretty much. That's insane for a clerk.

Steve Palmer [00:03:53]:

I didn't do that. I never even tried to do that. I walked into a criminal defense practice sort of like you did, and I actually had a little, I had some teased offers to go to a bigger law firm and do that kind of stuff. I wasn't interested. But you know, the idea is those, the big law, these high dollar silk stalking law firms, whatever they are, you know, they've got the resources and what they want to do is grab talent and they're willing to invest that kind of money to suck you in and keep you there and churn and burn. They want people to do the work, do the research and they're willing to pay 40 grand, which sounds like a lot to A law student. But to them it's like, well, if I'm getting good, if I'm getting all this research done, we're billing them at X times what we're paying them and we can make money on it. Or maybe they do it just to develop the talent pool.

Troy Hendrickson [00:04:42]:

Yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:04:42]:

So they've got a pipeline of associates coming in.

Troy Hendrickson [00:04:45]:

So my friends that did do those clerks, they were, I mean, they're sucked in. They're like, no matter what, I'm going to work for them. Because I mean, they got a little taste of this. They're like, I want to do that. That's it. And then there's a ton of other opportunities. Like I have friends that clerked for like the Southern District of Ohio or the Ohio Supreme Court. And their pay was like not very good whatsoever.

Troy Hendrickson [00:05:07]:

Borderline one of the worst. But that is like amazing on your resume. Like, I imagine as a lawyer you'd want to hire people who took those clerk jobs. I don't know. If you saw that on resume, what would you think? Since you're the hiring lawyer here?

Steve Palmer [00:05:22]:

I wouldn't care at all.

Troy Hendrickson [00:05:23]:

Okay.

Steve Palmer [00:05:24]:

I honestly wouldn't. I always look at it this way. In fact, I like people. This is going to different directions, but I'm cool. I'm totally fine with it. What I look for when I hire people upstairs are, is more of a sort of the big picture of what I'm getting from this individual and not necessarily an experience level. Because look, if I, I know what I need to have done up there and I know how I like it done. And I almost don't like it when people come in with their preconceived notion of what they think I need to have done.

Steve Palmer [00:05:59]:

And they've done, they've done this before and they're going to do it their way. I like to train people to do it my way. And that happens in a lot of ways through osmosis. You get to hear me talk on the phone to clients, you get to participate in meetings with clients. You get to see how I create my files at the office, how I save things, how we were just talking about the other day in a motion format. Look, dude, I don't care what everybody else does. Here's how I do it here. And I want you to do it this way.

Steve Palmer [00:06:28]:

And the less contaminated people are coming in with their prior experience, I look at it like the better. But I am looking for people that are open minded. I'm looking for people that are not afraid to screw up, people that would Take initiative, people that I think can. I hate arrogance. Like, I hate it. So that is, like, you're going to fail if you're like, number one in your class. You're coming into my office and you think that you deserve certain money. Like, don't even apply.

Steve Palmer [00:07:01]:

I don't even want to know. I don't want to do it. But let's say you went to a. I hate to say it, but I almost look for, like, the mediocrity, because.

Troy Hendrickson [00:07:11]:

That'S why I'm here.

Steve Palmer [00:07:13]:

Well, what I mean by that is not necessarily. I don't make it a requirement for the people that I look for that they had. That they're in the top 5 or 10% of their class. What I want to know is what they're capable of. So I want to see a little. I want to see a little writing sample. I want to hear you talk to me. I'd love to, if I could.

Steve Palmer [00:07:33]:

In a perfect world here, you talk to other people. Like, outside, that would be ideal. I look for people who have a network because that's only going to serve you well as we go forward. And I want people who are smart. Right. But I guess what I'm saying is I don't think the top 10% or 5% necessarily reflects somebody's intellectual abilities. I mean, it matters, but not always. And maybe it's just because, I don't know the top 10, they're always going other places.

Steve Palmer [00:08:06]:

So I'm just used to dealing with whatever. And your grades are good. I mean, it's not that you have bad grades, but you're none of those bad qualities that I was looking for. And that's why you're here, because you're open to learning. You're open to not doing it the way you think it always has to be done. And you were. I'll use a word I learned long ago. You were tractable, easily led, taught or managed, meaning you can be taught.

Steve Palmer [00:08:31]:

And that's what I'm looking for the most.

Troy Hendrickson [00:08:33]:

Okay.

Troy Hendrickson [00:08:34]:

And so going back to what we were mainly talking about, was it money wise? Is it just ranged a lot there. You hear about the big law number and then you hear about. I would go with a lot of the public work is the bottom end. And it kind of just ranges. And I think the 1L year, like all cats out of the bag. I think Franklin county was $18 an hour for PD and like, prosecutor stuff. I think that's what it was. I think some people were, like, shocked by that because in their head they're like, I'm going into law.

Troy Hendrickson [00:09:06]:

Like, I'm going to make a ton of money.

Steve Palmer [00:09:07]:

Yeah, good luck.

Troy Hendrickson [00:09:08]:

And in my head, I've worked for the government through the military. So I was like, well, I understand how it works. Like, I mean, you're not really there for the money. You're there to do public good. And there's also government has good benefits.

Steve Palmer [00:09:20]:

So that's like, they incentivize it in other ways.

Troy Hendrickson [00:09:22]:

Yeah, yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:09:23]:

But I get this a lot where people come in and they expect more money than I'm often willing to pay. And some of that's governed by my experience. When I walked into working for my mentors, he wasn't even joking. He said, you should pay me. And at first I was like, well, I can't. I mean, money. But I knew he was only sort of tongue in cheek. But he paid me less than what I could have made elsewhere.

Steve Palmer [00:09:51]:

And I immediately understood why. Because I knew nothing. Nothing. I was completely incapable of doing what I later became very capable of doing. And it was an opportunity for me. And I can't highlight stress. Italicizes, boldface the word opportunity for me to learn the trade that I could then use in my career to make money. And I watched.

Steve Palmer [00:10:20]:

I learned. I started as the guy who, look, somebody had to get the lunch. That was me. I had to go pick up Aunt Fanny, one of the attorney's aunts, and take her to a doctor's appointment. Yeah, my job routinely was to go to the cleaners and pick up shirts. Sometimes I was the low man on the law clerk totem pole. So I wasn't allowed to go to the vet to get the medication or the special food for one of the partners, dogs.

Troy Hendrickson [00:10:53]:

That was for the second year law students.

Steve Palmer [00:10:55]:

That was for the people he trusted. Right?

Troy Hendrickson [00:10:57]:

Yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:10:58]:

But doing all those things. And I was the guy who had to go to the post office at midnight to file a brief, because back then we didn't have e filing. But I'll tell you what I learned. I learned how to do all those things. I learned how to draft a letter. I learned where to put the date, where to put the signature line, how to. How a business. I mean, I learned some of this in high school, in typing class or business classes, but, you know, I learned that stuff.

Steve Palmer [00:11:23]:

I learned how to get around in the city and park and where to park. How to park without getting towed. How to get to the Ohio Supreme Court. Who at the Ohio Supreme Court, I would hand something to to file. I learned back in those days we had to take briefs to Kinko's copy place. Oh, okay.

Troy Hendrickson [00:11:43]:

I was like, what?

Steve Palmer [00:11:45]:

I learned how to do that. I learned all sorts of things. A skill set that has really, really benefited me throughout the rest of my professional career. And none of that stuff really had anything directly to do with law. So, you know, I just. I learned how to be a responsible adult and do things. So when I. And we didn't have Google, so when I.

Steve Palmer [00:12:10]:

When somebody said, look, I need you to go out to X Street on the east side somewhere and pick something up, you couldn't even look it up. There wasn't even the Internet. And I had to figure that out. And I learned how to do those things and that problem solving contributed, and still does, day in and day out, to my ability to do what I do in a courtroom. But then the next year, I got a little bit more responsibility. I could start writing briefs. This is sort of the same ladder that you're on. You learned all that menial crap.

Steve Palmer [00:12:46]:

And then the next year you start to. All right, now I'm going to start doing a little bit of writing, and then I'm going to start doing a little bit of the research and the writing, and I'm going to. And you're getting more and more and more responsibility. And I guess what we were talking about, I think as law students, that's probably not discussed so much.

Troy Hendrickson [00:13:05]:

No. So we actually, me and my friends, we discussed it the other day because I have this joke group chat with its law clerks that are in small criminal practices. I called it like a union. I call it the small criminal practice union for clerks and all that. And kind of like, discussion, because we were talking about how sometimes there's public workers that are getting paid more than us. But then we were also then having a discussion. What are those people doing? And it was that some of these public law clerks are like, they're literally just filing documents and not filing. They're not drafting it.

Troy Hendrickson [00:13:42]:

They're literally like carrying folders from building one, the building two, and doing very minimal stuff. And then we were like, what is the value on what we're learning compared to them? Because we're getting. Our experience is like 10 times better.

Steve Palmer [00:13:57]:

You're learning how to be a lawyer.

Troy Hendrickson [00:13:58]:

Yeah, yeah.

Troy Hendrickson [00:13:59]:

And so that's. And so, like, we were putting the. The union was discussing on that, on the dollar value on that. And we were like, that's probably worth it. Because that was like. Because we're like, we can say that we've actually done this stuff before. And we actually have templates and everything now. Somebody could ask me about this appealable issue and it's like, okay, I've actually seen this like 10 times already.

Steve Palmer [00:14:23]:

By the time you're done here, you could graduate law school, hang out a shingle and start doing court appointed appeals.

Troy Hendrickson [00:14:29]:

Yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:14:29]:

Because you've learned how to do that here. And you may not do it as well as I can do it, or if you did it under my supervision for a few more years, you'll get better and better and better at it. But you could do it. And that's how I wrote all the briefs upstairs when I was a law clerk. And obviously the lawyers would review it and do whatever, but I got to the point where I just did. I was turnkey. I'd hand them a document, they knew it was done. And I'm not patting myself on the back, I'm patting the process on the back because I learned that the hard way.

Steve Palmer [00:14:58]:

I wasn't just vested with all that responsibility initially. And had I been, I would have learned nothing. So all of it is incrementally learned as I went. And those early problem solving skills that I learned by having to deal with the stuff that's completely non legal related really gave me a set of tools in the bag that I use day in and day out on stuff that is legal related. And that's what's so great about the experience. Now the question is money. This is my, I'm going to. Here's what.

Steve Palmer [00:15:38]:

This is going to sound political, but I don't care. We got to talking about minimum wage.

Troy Hendrickson [00:15:43]:

Yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:15:45]:

And the problem with this is that had you have come to me and say for law clerks, because I've heard these arguments, law clerks should make $30 an hour or $50 an hour or 40,000 a year, whatever it is.

Troy Hendrickson [00:15:59]:

Yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:16:00]:

Well, you started to say something.

Troy Hendrickson [00:16:01]:

No, I was like, I was gonna say that sounds a little like 50. I'd be like, that's kind of insane. 30. I. The problem is we were talking about the size of firms and all that. I get there is firms out there that can pay 30, but they also have, you know, 20, like 25 attorneys or something. Like they're bringing in a time and they have like, you know, three or four clerks. And it's just they, they can't afford that because they're, they have so much more money coming in.

Steve Palmer [00:16:27]:

Yeah. Or they're billing, they're turning around and billing the 30 at 100 back to the clients of that law firm. But here's the Problem with that, if I were forced to pay some minimum wage like that to a first year law student whose job really is going to be grabbing lunch and picking up this or that and sitting around and listening until you learn something. So to me, I do this. I don't know, pro bono is not the right word. But you talked about it's like for the good of giving back. I mean there is some, there is some facet of that going on where I do like to teach, I love to teach, so I do it to give back. But if the cost of giving back eclipsed the value that I'm getting or at some point the curves cross rather, and if I had to pay too much for that, I just wouldn't do it because the other option that I have, and this is what law students, you should think about this.

Steve Palmer [00:17:25]:

There's a paralegal or there's a whole profession of paralegals out there who can probably do what you do better, particularly in the realm of AI they've been doing it for 20 years. Whatever it is, I can send off a brief to brief writers who will do it. And I don't want to do that. I like to teach. But if I were forced through some edict to pay more than what that's worth, then it's not that I'll just pay it and decrease my bottom line, it's that I won't pay it at all and I'll go hire a paralegal that I will have for a decade. Or you know, I can really develop and develop a relationship more and I might even still do both. But the point is like when I worked at the construction site, I used to bang nails and day one I showed up, got my brand new tool belt on, I got my brand new hammer, they gave me all these tools and said, well, take it out of your check and I'm all ready to go. And I had some experience cutting wood and doing stuff.

Steve Palmer [00:18:24]:

I was a pretty handy guy. And my job was, you see that they were engineered floor trusses. They weren't just dimensional lumber, but they were trusses. And they said, you got to carry all those over there to Tom because he's setting them over the basement and he's doing the framing. I'm like, well like all day we were building multi unit condo complex. Yeah, that's your job today. So that's what I did all day long. And I didn't complain.

Steve Palmer [00:18:54]:

I mean, I've sort of like, I didn't even think all day. I mean, I just, I did what I was asked.

Troy Hendrickson [00:18:58]:

Yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:19:00]:

Now I got. Looking back on that, I was making my. I think minimum wage at that time was 335. But if minimum wage were like something exponentially more than that, it dawned on me now, looking back, that they wouldn't have given me a job because they would have hired an experienced carpenter and just had that guy do it, because then he could at least contribute to the other stuff. Because after about half the summer, I was allowed to start using the saw. And after about the other half of the summer, you know, as I went, I could do more and more and more. And by the end, I was actually up on the rafters, framing rafters and making hip cuts and valley cuts and doing all that stuff, because I learned over time. And I got incremental raises as I went.

Steve Palmer [00:19:40]:

But they would never have, like, if they had to pay me too much to be the floor sweeper, I would never have been the. Or the lumber getter. Then they wouldn't have hired me to be a lumber getter. They would have hired somebody who had the experience instead of me, and then I never would have had my foot in the door to learn how to do the rest of it. And I think law clerks should look at it similarly. Don't go into a small law practice like mine thinking you're worth whatever because everybody else is getting it. Because if you do that, you're depriving yourself of an opportunity to learn a lot. So money is part of.

Steve Palmer [00:20:14]:

And I get it, the curves crossed. But if it's artificially inflated, I just won't hire anybody.

Troy Hendrickson [00:20:19]:

Yeah, I agree with that. And that's why the union, we had that discussion. I was like, well, we're learning way more, so you have to try and figure out a dollar amount on that. And that's what it was. And it's a great experience. And so I would. I would also agree that law clerks should go into a lot more of their experiences trying to value how much you're going to learn. Because I have guys, my roommate, his clerkship this summer, they didn't give him a login this summer.

Troy Hendrickson [00:20:49]:

He literally sat and looked at a computer and walked around with them for 10 weeks.

Steve Palmer [00:20:55]:

He didn't even have. He didn't do anything.

Troy Hendrickson [00:20:56]:

No, he didn't do anything.

Steve Palmer [00:20:58]:

Yeah. That's a waste of time.

Troy Hendrickson [00:20:59]:

Yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:21:00]:

Yes.

Troy Hendrickson [00:21:01]:

I was like, holy crap, man. That's insane. And I remember him texting me two weeks in, just sending me a blank computer, and he's like, it was insane. It was with the lottery. So you say you have to walk around a lot of casinos and all that. Couldn't gamble, though. So.

Steve Palmer [00:21:12]:

A government job.

Troy Hendrickson [00:21:13]:

Yes, it was a government job.

Steve Palmer [00:21:14]:

This is why I hate the government. Because, look, I mean, this is what I mean.

Troy Hendrickson [00:21:18]:

It didn't mean to trigger your rant here. I'm sorry.

Steve Palmer [00:21:20]:

But here's the thing. They're not spending their own money. They're spending your money and my money. Like this unknown mass of money, this budget that they got at the end of the year that they want to use up. So they just put people there and, you know, great, but your friends aren't even getting much out of it. And my tax dollars are paying for that.

Troy Hendrickson [00:21:38]:

Yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:21:38]:

So it's. It's like. It's really like. It's. It's doubly bad.

Troy Hendrickson [00:21:41]:

Yeah, it's.

Troy Hendrickson [00:21:42]:

It's. It's terrible. But I. There is other of my friends that were clerking that had similar situations where they didn't have them do any legal work. It was more just come hang out. And I get that. That's easy one. I think the time moves crazy slow.

Troy Hendrickson [00:21:56]:

I. I hate when I work at jobs, and they're like.

Steve Palmer [00:21:58]:

I mean, it's rare upstairs that we don't have something that's got to get done right away.

Troy Hendrickson [00:22:01]:

Yeah.

Troy Hendrickson [00:22:02]:

And it makes the time go so much faster when you're, like, pressed on all that. But I remember the military would always just be like, today, we just need you to, like, hang out over here and do nothing all day. And those were the longest days ever when I was miserable just staring at a wall. And I'm like, that was also for the government, but.

Steve Palmer [00:22:18]:

No, I get it. But, you know, in the private sector, particularly the smaller private sector. But look, even your guys that are working for big law, they're probably at least getting jobs to do. I mean, they're.

Troy Hendrickson [00:22:28]:

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:22:29]:

I mean, they're at least getting something. They're doing something, but they're working for.

Troy Hendrickson [00:22:33]:

Sure.

Steve Palmer [00:22:33]:

Yeah. And that route, look, there's a lot of money to be made in that route. And a lot of people get chewed up and spat out in that route, too. You get three or four years in as an associate, and you never jump up to the next level. And they don't care. They'll spit you out. They'll pay a lot to spit you out. Look, I don't know what we were talking about here other than this.

Steve Palmer [00:22:53]:

The law school experience is a unique one, but. But I think it's also a reflection of economics and how it sort of works. I think in most jobs, it's like you have to find your entry level, use it to learn and move up within the system and take your time. Folks, it doesn't happen. It didn't happen for me overnight. This is 30 years. And if you push too far, you get too above your skis or too far over your skis, you're going to fall and it's not worth it. So anyway, they don't teach you that in Law School.

Steve Palmer [00:23:23]:

LawyerTalkPodcast.com Check us out. Send us a question on the website, leave us a comment, do whatever. We'll cover it right here, off the record, on the air.