Q.1 Your career spans private practice, high-profile federal prosecutions, and years on the bench. Which specific experiences convinced you that the profession needed the kind of course correction described in The Significant Lawyer?

Recognizing our profession needed to course correct took years. What caused the profession to be blown off its course took longer. It was evident even in my early years of private practice that the services of lawyers and the servicing of clients required keen legal insight, writing and ability to cultivate client relationships and we recorded our time because ultimately it produced firm income. The emphasis was on producing superior legal work, and that was for me my principal motivating factor. Keeping time records was more of the practical need record what we did for a client. I never associated the task with my success. As time wore on, the connection between billing hours and profitability and advancement was given more emphasis. It was when I began my public service position in 1994 that the sole focus was performing superior work and representing the people of the United States was my motivating goal. It was a defining shift in focus.

Q.2 After retiring from the bench you chose mediation and writing over returning to firm life. Did that transition crystallize the ideas that became this book?

The book was something I wanted to write for 20 years but I didn’t have the margin to do so until I left a full-time position. Full-time work was just that. My waking hours were dedicated to my practice and ultimately to serving the judiciary. When I retired, I finally had the capacity to devote time to writing about the work I loved the goal of which was to persuade lawyers, especially those early in their career, to think hard about how to find fulfillment in the profession.

Q.3 You pinpoint the mid-1980s shift from “profession to business,” with success measured by profits (per partner). What accelerated that shift, and more importantly why did the bar fail to resist?

The shift was years in the making, but became pronounced in the mid-1980s when the most prominent firms in the country began competing and looking for identity in the profitability, with AMLaw 100 serving as the first public comparison of firm production and partner income. The information published was specific and eye-opening. The bar likes to recognize the growth and financial success of firms and individual lawyers. It was a good story and one on which the press and bar associations capitalized financially and reputationally. Bar associations began to care when the data began to show that the pressure to succeed professionally was taking a heavy toll on lawyer satisfaction and physical and mental well-being.

Q.4 Today, artificial intelligence is rapidly transforming legal practice—from document review to contract drafting to legal research. Do you see AI as a tool that could help lawyers return to more “significant” practice by freeing them from routine tasks to focus on client counseling and strategic thinking? Or does it present new risks to the profession’s soul, similar to the profit-maximization trend you critique?

The jury is still out on where and when AI will have a role to play in law practice. It is rolling out too quickly and too many providers and professional consumers really don’t know how it will help. We are already seeing how it erodes practice as more courts are finding imagined citations and holding lawyers accountable for producing shoddy-AI generated work. I suspect it will have a place in organizing and identifying information in large volumes of data. Evaluating what AI computer software might identify will always require a lawyer’s critical eye. As this technology develops other shortcomings of it are showing. It produces a superficial writing voice, is not capable of producing in-depth insight and misses nuances, all skill successful law practice requires. Sit on the sideline is my recommendation. This technology has a long way to go before we know how to deploy it as a practice tool.

Q.5 Given your post-judicial career in mediation, how do ADR mechanisms, primarily mediation and arbitration—offer opportunities for lawyers to be ‘significant lawyers’ you describe? What unique professional virtues does ADR demand or reveal that are sometimes overlooked in traditional litigation, and how can aspiring ADR specialists internalize these lessons?”

I continue to believe that those mediators who have developed, over many years, excellent analytical skills and, maybe more importantly, an understanding of people and their motivation, those who have developed insight and wisdom—can be career mediators and have successful mediation practices. With the cost of litigation services and risk rising, there will be an increasing need for ADR processes over time .

Q.6 You cite growing lawyer dissatisfaction in your book, but recent studies go further—showing lawyers are among the most at-risk professions for depression and suicide. What aspects of legal culture do you believe are most responsible, and how can law firms or institutions begin to meaningfully change that?

Lawyers largely measure success and their identity by their income levels. It is a seductive measurement and the acquisition of expensive houses, cars and showy vacations to exotic places is the visual manifestation of wealth. That never satisfies. Never. Fulfillment comes from satisfying work that serves to help others. The profession needs to focus on this, including by evaluating lawyers’ performance based on their contribution to clients and a firm, and not how many hours they bill.

Q.7 As an honest admirer of The Significant Lawyer, we would definitely want to know if every new lawyer could internalize one sentence from The Significant Lawyer, what would it be?

“Aligning your conduct with your values—living with integrity—is key to finding fulfilling and meaningful work in the practice of law.” (p.21). In the end,  your identity is who you are, not what you make.