黛布拉·布鲁诺
二零一七年六月十二日
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也许这里的要点是确保你一开始就很坚强.
Lawyers who are looking for a work–life balance plus a flourishing career might start by looking at what Kathleen Moriarty 穆勒, 盛德澳门赌场官网事务所法律顾问, 已经做了.
穆勒, 52, stepped almost entirely out of the workforce for 10 years. In 那 period, she tended to her two small children and went on to add two more to the family. In 2010, 当四个人都到了上学的年龄(5岁), 7, 9, 和11, 准确地说), 她觉得自己已经准备好重返职场了. She approached Sidley, asking for a part-time schedule with the firm, not on the partner track. 盛德几乎立刻就雇用了她.
听起来很适合许多职场妈妈? There is one caveat here: By the time 穆勒 太k her years off, 她已经确立了自己的明星地位. A summa cum laude graduate of Northwestern University School of Law, she served as Coordinating Notes and Comments editor on the Northwestern University Law Review. 从1990年到1991年，她是帕特里夏·M·史密斯法官的书记员. 世界银行.S. 哥伦比亚特区巡回上诉法院. 接下来是在美国.S. 最高法院大法官约翰·保罗·史蒂文斯. 这让她进了司法部, where she served as both appellate staff attorney and trial attorney for the Federal 项目 Branch of the DOJ.
In other words, these are not your average humdrum legal credentials. That’s probably why when 穆勒 decided to reach out to Sidley about restarting her career, 她得到了她的日程安排. 意思是她每天七点半到办公室.m., and leaves in time to do the afternoon carpool pick-up at her children’s school. (Her husband, Don 穆勒, is a budget analyst for the Navy.)
卡特菲利普斯, chair of Sidley’s executive committee and former managing partner, says he was immediately interested in 穆勒 because she was a Northwestern alumnus (like him) and clerked for Stevens, 他最喜欢的法官之一.“当穆勒出现时, 菲利普斯 says he knew “she was one of the superstars of 那 generation” and brought her into the firm’s Supreme Court and appellate practice group.
他说，在那里，她“非常顽强”. 她专注于一个问题，然后与之搏斗.事实上, 菲利普斯说, 穆勒 is “one of only a handful of lawyers who consistently force me to be at the top of my game.”
彼得Keisler, co-leader of Sidley’s Supreme Court and appellate practice group, 他说他也立刻同意了这个招聘. “当时我觉得我们很幸运”能得到她，他说.
“当我在处理一个她没有参与的案子时, I almost always ask her to moot me for the case in advance, 如果她有空的话,他说. “She has an uncanny ability to ask the questions 那 judges turn out to ask, and sometimes they are questions 那 had not even occurred to me.”
Mark Haddad, in Sidley’s Los Angeles office, says he worked with 穆勒 on Kerry v. 喧嚣声, the 2015 Supreme Court case 那 examined whether there was a constitutional right to live in the U.S. with one’s spouse, a case 那 is still seeing reverberations in today’s legal climate. 穆勒, 哈达德说, had a “critical role” throughout the briefing process and moot court preparation.
超越法律的眼光, 菲利普斯, Keisler, and Haddad all pointed to one other thing about 穆勒: her personality.
“She’s unbelievably cheerful for a woman who has four children and works as hard as she does on as many different matters,菲利普斯说。.
“她是一个很棒的人，一个很棒的同事, 心情愉快的, 支持, 种类, 和你在一起很有趣,凯斯勒说.
“I remember I’ve had calls with her where she’s calling from the sidelines of a soccer field,等着她的一个孩子完成练习, 哈达德说. “很明显，她全身心地投入到家庭中, but she also manages to be fully engaged with the work she takes on.”
穆勒 attributes some of 那 perspective to her clerkships. “I learned from both Judge Wald and Justice Stevens the value of politeness and civility. 他们在口头辩论中总是态度强硬,问一些相关的问题，找出弱点, 但他们“以一种既文明又礼貌的方式做到了这一点。,穆勒说。.
她说:“我希望更多的法官能像她那样。. “You don’t have to be nasty or personal to make a point or to be a zealous advocate.”
穆勒 also offers advice for those who might be considering her path. First of all, she says, be sure you love doing what you do. “我喜欢当澳门赌场官网，”她说. “我是为数不多喜欢法学院的人之一.”
“现在人们问我当澳门赌场官网的事, I say you have to do it because you’re really interested in the law, and not because it makes you a lot of money or you want colleagues to think you’re a smart person,她说。. That’s also why she knew she didn’t want to be on the partner track at a firm. “Sidley doesn’t expect me to be responsible for the management of the firm or all the financial part 那 goes with it,她说。.
至于兼职的时间表, 那, 太, requires a certain sense of limits and a full understanding of what part-time is. 她每周在办公室工作的时间加起来大约有35个小时. 但很多时候她也在晚上工作.
Since she concentrates on appellate litigation, most of the time her schedule is predictable. Then again, she says, there are days when she works from 10 p.m. 到2a.m. 简短的结束.
“If you’re doing what you really like,她说。, “the stress is bearable. When you don’t really like what you’re doing, there’s no point.”
