ChiTownScion
Call Me a Cab
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- The Great Pacific Northwest
At my old job at one point they suggested bringing in non- attorneys (obviously, political hacks who had done their part to get the then- county board chairman elected) to supervise courtroom- assigned public defenders. A quick call from the chief judge pointing out that would violate the canons of ethics ended that harebrained idea.
Then, at one point, we had a head public defender (in an office of well over 500 attorneys), a former judge and prosecutor, who had a penchant for bringing in his former prosecutor- now- underemployed buddies as field supervisors: a lot of them didn't last too long. Many of them couldn't grasp that ours was not a "Thank your sir! May I have another? <SMACK!>" work culture like the prosecutor's office. "Ordering" subordinates to report to work at 8:15 AM in courtrooms where the judge won't take the bench until ten AM got nowhere, especially in light of a collective bargaining agreement that only mandated "hours commensurate to the full time practice of criminal defense law." A few of those wunderkind were gone within a month: the decent ones learned to adapt to the work culture and learn from subordinates who had outlasted supervisors for decades.
Most of my supervisors were pretty good, though. They learned to leave the job to me, and only be available when something extraordinary arose. In return, I saw to it that they never got phone calls from irate judges, and that they always got their weekly stats on time. They usually left it to me to break in the newbies: all I asked of them initially was to see their union card. If they were one of the very few who had no union card (and were therefore a "fair share" employee) they were told to have management teach them the ropes. By the time I left the office, we had 100% union membership among the rank and file, and I like to think that, in my own small way, I helped that come to pass.
Unionization was not only the best thing for us, it was the best thing for our clients. It assured a pay scale that retained qualified attorneys who had earlier been forced to go into private practice when feeding a family became a reality. But it also forced the higher ups to set rules for promotion, reassignments, and grievances, and to play by those rules or face costly consequences. I considered myself damned fortunate when I saw colleagues from the States Attorney's Office tossed out after decades of faithful service- some just a couple years from retirement, simply because the office holder wanted to score a few political points. Our union would have never allowed that, and they had no recourse whatsoever. It demoralized their office, and thankfully, that office holder's days are now numbered after having lost her most recent primary bid.
Then, at one point, we had a head public defender (in an office of well over 500 attorneys), a former judge and prosecutor, who had a penchant for bringing in his former prosecutor- now- underemployed buddies as field supervisors: a lot of them didn't last too long. Many of them couldn't grasp that ours was not a "Thank your sir! May I have another? <SMACK!>" work culture like the prosecutor's office. "Ordering" subordinates to report to work at 8:15 AM in courtrooms where the judge won't take the bench until ten AM got nowhere, especially in light of a collective bargaining agreement that only mandated "hours commensurate to the full time practice of criminal defense law." A few of those wunderkind were gone within a month: the decent ones learned to adapt to the work culture and learn from subordinates who had outlasted supervisors for decades.
Most of my supervisors were pretty good, though. They learned to leave the job to me, and only be available when something extraordinary arose. In return, I saw to it that they never got phone calls from irate judges, and that they always got their weekly stats on time. They usually left it to me to break in the newbies: all I asked of them initially was to see their union card. If they were one of the very few who had no union card (and were therefore a "fair share" employee) they were told to have management teach them the ropes. By the time I left the office, we had 100% union membership among the rank and file, and I like to think that, in my own small way, I helped that come to pass.
Unionization was not only the best thing for us, it was the best thing for our clients. It assured a pay scale that retained qualified attorneys who had earlier been forced to go into private practice when feeding a family became a reality. But it also forced the higher ups to set rules for promotion, reassignments, and grievances, and to play by those rules or face costly consequences. I considered myself damned fortunate when I saw colleagues from the States Attorney's Office tossed out after decades of faithful service- some just a couple years from retirement, simply because the office holder wanted to score a few political points. Our union would have never allowed that, and they had no recourse whatsoever. It demoralized their office, and thankfully, that office holder's days are now numbered after having lost her most recent primary bid.
