The legal establishment notices that life sucks for contract attorneys

The January edition of Washington Lawyer, which I guess is the official publication of the D.C. Bar, put the plight of contract attorneys on the cover. It finally is online here. Took a few weeks, I guess. Anyway, it is an interesting piece, and I have waited to comment on it until it was available online, so I could link it, and until I had time to really go over it, so I could make some sense of it.

Anyway, I guess I've reached that point on both counts. All in all, I think it is a good piece. It hits on the dissatisfaction of contract attorneys, the shitty working conditions and pay, and the threat of no longer having a job as a contract attorney because of overseas competition and computerized review programs. Nonetheless, the piece fills me with mixed emotions. It starts like this:

Temporary contract attorneys are, by most accounts, crucial to the legal workforce in Washington, D.C. But some contract lawyers are not, to put it bluntly, happy about their fate. They bemoan what they describe as poor working conditions.
Sometimes there’s no toilet paper in the bathroom. Sometimes they are not allowed access to their cell phones or the Internet. The work, they say, is tedious. The hours can be long, and the rooms can be windowless.
When they talk among each other, they share their stories of mounting debt, low wages, and what they see as humiliating treatment by law firms they had once dreamed of joining. They describe themselves as disillusioned and, most of all, trapped by their inability to find other more permanent employment. “We are treated like day laborers. We are the [migrant farm workers] of the industry,” says Fiona Edwards, a Washington, D.C., lawyer who “stumbled into the contract market” and has never gotten out of it. “We are treated like an inconvenience when, in reality, law firms are making lots of money off of us. The morale among contract lawyers? Disenchanted.”

You know, all that is true. And I bitch about these things as much as the next temp -- actually, more, because I have a blog that depends on my bitching about temping for content. That's why I do stuff like food porn, politics, music and other stuff -- even temps can only take so much bitching about how awful it is to be a temp.

Having said that, there are a couple segments of the article that made me want to load the .45 and go looking for some folks. One guy quoted prominently was Marc Zamsky, identified as the chief operating officer at Compliance Discovery Solutions, described as "an e-discovery legal staffing company." That's a fancy way of saying "a temp agency."

Now, I've never heard of Mr. Zamsky, but I've spent a pretty significant amount of time working for Compliance. He says some shit about working at Compliance that makes me wonder if he jumped the gun on DC decriminalizing marijuana. And complaints about Compliance can largely be applied to pretty much every agency I've ever worked for, so he not only is ignorant about his own agency, he really knows nothing about conditions in the industry. Or maybe he's just adhering to Rule No. 1: they're lying. Zamsky basically says that any complaints by temps about pay, working conditions or anything else are just made up.

Law firms and legal staffing agencies counter that the complaints they have heard and seen on blogs are often embellished and not connected to the reality of what they have seen on a daily basis.
“Of the recent complaints that have made their way onto the blogosphere, many, if not all the things cited, were either out of context or patently wrong,” says Zamsky of Compliance Discovery Solutions.
Compliance has its own centers to house contract lawyers while they are conducting document reviews. Zamsky says Compliance makes a point of ensuring that the facilities have comfortable work stations, fully stocked kitchens, and properly working air conditioning or heat, as needed. He says the contractors get a “fair market wage.”In addition, Zamsky says, law firm clients often work at the facilities alongside the contract staff.
“Our facilities are all in Class A buildings and provide the highest grade amenities. The facilities are kept clean and the bathrooms are maintained,” he says. “We have the understanding that all our attorneys want to work in a nice environment with windowed facilities. In my experience, complaints can often be exaggerated and unsubstantiated.”
Zamsky says there are certain restrictions on Internet access and rampant phone use as a “security protocol” that law firms and their corporate clients demand.

Zamsky's references to complaints on blogs alludes to this article at the popular legal blog, Above the Law. I commented on that same article, which focused on some emails sent by a temp on a Compliance project to Compliance managementcomplaining about various problems and injustices, here. Follow that link and you will see that my main advice to the complaining temp was "shut the fuck up and quit whining." That post was not meant to imply that Compliance -- or agencies in general -- are blameless, or that the temp was making spurious complaints. Rather, my point was that conditions suck in Temp Town and if you didn't know that, you better get used to it. Maybe my "tough love" was a little harsh, since I told the bitching temp, who was all butt-hurt because Compliance lied about the hours and was out of free coffee:

What makes you think you're entitled to anything? The Above The Law post that featured your emails focused on how tough it is to be a temp, but your emails make it clear that temps -- or at least you -- don't understand the legal market as it stands today. Of course the hours aren't as advertised -- they change to fit the needs of the client, not to fit the needs of the temp. Of course the working conditions are horrific -- the agency is trying to stuff the number of attorneys the firm wants into the space the agency has. And of course the agency is out of coffee. They have too many people on site for their standing coffee order, and nobody thought about increasing the standing order, because they know that no one will jump because there isn't any free coffee. So go across the street, buy some coffee, and either shut the fuck up or go get a real job. You're embarrassing me.

I stand by that. However, I must also say that Zamsky either doesn't visit his own review space, or he is a firm believer in Rule No. 1, because pretty much everything he said about Compliance's facility is wrong. They aren't the worst, nor are they unique. Every agency tries to minimize costs however they can. You can bitch about it -- I do, obviously -- but you really can't change it. You need to either find another line of work, shut the fuck up, or start a blog. At least then you can vent.

The article is pretty good and I recommend it. I also recommend the Above the Law piece I linked above. I don't think either one really pays enough attention to the likelihood that temps in this country are going to be phased out in the next few years by low-cost alternatives overseas and technology, but that is maybe a topic for another day. At least if that happens, temps will quit bitching about temping. Of course, they'll probably bitch about whatever job they find themselves in afterward.