Well, the world sure can change quickly, can’t it? One minute the legal market is humming along nicely and the next minute the job market has evaporated. What can you do?
The short answer is this: wait it out, but use this time to prepare. We at Sand Search have been through our share of market downturns. After the tragedy of 9/11, the legal market collapsed…then came back roaring strong. After the economic recession in 2008, the legal market collapsed…then came roaring back strong. And now we face the COVID-19 crisis and the legal market has all but collapsed. But if history can teach us a lesson, it is that this is temporary and that the market will come back, possibly stronger than it was earlier this year, so the best thing that you can do with your time now is to prepare the recovery.
Let me start off by saying that hiring is still going on despite the lockdown. If you have a niche practice that an employer NEEDS, opportunities are available. If you have a book of business and want to stay in private practice, there are DEFINTELY opportunities available (and frankly, now is the perfect time to think about the platform your firm offers and whether a change might be best for growing your practice). But for many attorneys, the dearth of opportunities is disheartening.
If you are facing a lack of opportunities, be patient. Use this time to network. Use this time to update your resume. Use this time to think about what skills you have that would be valuable to an employer. It might be time to reach out to a recruiter and introduce yourself. Make sure that you are thinking about the future and not just the present day. It’s akin to the old adage that you should be playing chess while others are playing checkers. Think a couple of moves ahead and start planning for a future move now.
You can use this downtime wisely or you can squander the time. If history is any indication, we are staring down the barrel of a roaring comeback in the future, so how ready will you be for that? The choice is yours.