Sarah Cottrell: Hi, and welcome to The Former Lawyer Podcast. I'm your host, Sarah Cottrell. I practiced law for 10 years, and now I help unhappy lawyers ditch their soul-sucking jobs. On this show, I share advice and strategies for aspiring former lawyers, and interviews with former lawyers who have left the law behind to find careers and lives that they love.

This week, I'm sharing my conversation with Bryson Malcolm. Bryson owns a recruiting company, and he specifically works with lawyers in underrepresented groups in large law firms in Biglaw. We'll talk a lot more on the episode about what that looks like and why he founded his company. But we also talk a lot about some of the news lately related to the Trump administration and Biglaw capitulating to various executive orders, and some of the experiences that Bryson has had as a recruiter related to that and all sorts of other things.

So I think this is a really important episode, and I'm excited to share my conversation with Bryson with you. So let's get to the episode.

Hey Bryson, welcome to The Former Lawyer Podcast.

Bryson Malcolm: Hi, thanks for having me.

Sarah Cottrell: I am very excited to talk with you about the topics that we're going to talk about today. As you know, I have very many strong feelings about them, and I know you do too. So before we get to all of that, let's just have you introduce yourself to the listeners.

Bryson Malcolm: So I am Bryson Malcolm. I am a legal recruiter and founder of a recruitment firm called Mosaic Search Partners. We're specifically focused on representing and helping historically underrepresented attorneys at the top slice of Biglaw—so usually like Vault 50-ish—and that could be people of color, members of the LGBTQIA+ community, women, and then of course, we're open to working with all types of lawyers. That’s just kind of where we specialize.

So I started that company about two years ago. Before that, I was a practicing attorney. I got my JD from Columbia Law in 2020, so not too long ago. I am a biracial attorney. I'm half Black and half white. I'm also Jewish. So I do have a pretty varied take and perspective on a lot of things. I think that helps me do my job better and makes me a well-rounded attorney, individual, citizen.

Sarah Cottrell: Okay, I literally have so many directions we could go just based on what you shared. But maybe to start, it would be helpful for if you could just give a brief overview of how you went from going to law school, working in law firms, and then ultimately, the role that you're in now.

Bryson Malcolm: Going to law school was kind of a last-minute decision, not going to lie. It wasn't so much that I didn't know what I wanted to do and I used it as a delaying tactic, which I know a lot of people do. It was more that I thought I wanted to be involved in the business world.

My undergraduate primary major was in business management, and then I also added, I basically had this tendency to add more majors for things that I thought maybe meant a little bit more. So I added political science and I also added economics, and then my economics degree, I focused on developing countries and things like that.

So I just kind of got to the point where I was like, "All the options in the business world don't really have a lane for altruism," at least as far as I could see it. And a friend brought to my attention the idea of being an attorney. I hadn't even thought about it before at all. I didn't have any lawyers in my family. I think maybe I'd met a lawyer or two during a real estate closing because I also did that on the side, which is a whole other story.

But I decided to try it because I knew there were a lot of options that I could take a JD, a lot of directions I could go. And worst-case scenario, if I just wanted to do business stuff, I could just go into corporate law, and essentially that's kind of the same thing. Which is probably a point we can touch on later, because that's kind of how we're seeing it reflected in the news with the Trump agreements at various law firms.

But yeah, so I did that. Also, I did have a little bit of Obama syndrome, where he was like my number one idol, and he got his JD, and I've always wanted to emulate some of the stuff that he was doing, besides the drone strikes. So I took that path.

Law school was great. I absolutely loved Columbia. I loved all my classmates. I think that was the first time I felt surrounded by people who kind of thought like me or came from a ton of different backgrounds that were new and unique and not just homogenous like a lot of the environments I was used to before then. So I really appreciated that.

Then when I decided to go into Biglaw—because obviously, Columbia is one of the most expensive law schools in the country, and I needed to pay some of that down—the only legal practice area that I felt comfortable in was real estate development, because I had a background there.

I summered at Skadden. I summered at a smaller place, mid-law, my 1L year. Then I ended up not going back to Skadden, and I did a boutique because I thought that Biglaw did not have the moral and ethical principles I thought it did, and I thought that it was all going to be like that.

I think the degree to which my experience was negative, for me, I'll speak for myself, at Skadden, I just don’t think it was a great fit. I thought all of Biglaw was like that, so I was like, "Let me try boutique." Boutique was better in a lot of different ways, but it was also less interesting, and the deals weren’t as fun.

So then I decided to go to Fried Frank for real estate, which is top of the market. So if it wasn’t going to be a good time there, then I don’t think there was going to be any spot I would enjoy.

I liked working there. I actually had a pretty good relationship with Fried Frank. I still do. The group was really fun. Obviously, every Biglaw team has its ups and downs, but for the most part, I really loved it there. The work was great, but ultimately it just wasn’t a good fit for my personality in terms of taking orders from partners and chain of command and being stuck on matters that I really wasn’t interested in.

You know, there is some level of importance you can derive from working on major real estate projects in the city. I did, at least. I worked on Penn Station renovations, Grand Central, like a lot of big projects that people in the city love now. So that felt good.

But even still, I'm not really saving the world. Even that, I’m not even really making a huge difference in any one individual's life. There’s not a lot of social interaction, and those are all things I kind of missed.

So recruiting came along as an option. And then I realized that there was nobody in the space that, in my opinion, was really speaking to the experiences of diverse attorneys in Biglaw, because I personally am one of those and had my own experience in ups and downs.

And there's a huge learning curve in the information that people tell you and then what the reality is. And then everything is coded. Everything is very secret in how you share intel, information, rumors, gossip, all the things that you would need as an attorney to situate yourself in the best position possible.

Very hard information to get. Every recruiter I talked to when I was considering lateraling, I would bring up the topic, and they just would have no idea how to answer it. So I'd be like, "What does the group look like? Are there Black attorneys there? Is it good for diversity? Is there actual mentorship for people that look like me?" I would just kind of get blank stares from recruiters.

So yeah, I switched into recruiting. I also realized that a lot of the other recruitment shops that I pitched this idea to really didn't go for it—with one exception—but for the most part, the larger shops kind of scoffed at it and said that they didn't want to alienate their clientele or their candidate pool. Which basically means they don't want to alienate straight white men.

Sarah Cottrell: That is what that means.

Bryson Malcolm: Yeah. So, I mean, yeah, it's a business, and that's like your primary market, it's the biggest slice of the pie, especially when you're talking about partner placements. So I understand it.

But I think what they viewed as narrowing your scope and limiting your opportunity, I kind of had the opposite take, where I didn't think anyone was focused in that category, in that lane. And that if one person was truly dedicated to that and really invested in it, then it would pay dividends because you're the only person in the space who actually cares to center these types of attorneys.

I think people respond to that. I think so far, my theory has been proven correct, based on the speed of growth that I've had as my business has developed. I mean, we are coming up on the two-year mark, and we already have a ton of media attention. The placement rate’s pretty high. The caliber of attorneys we work with is very high.

Sarah Cottrell: Yeah. Well, I think anyone who listens to the podcast will understand so many things that you shared.

Okay. Oh, so many thoughts. First of all, I think that this is a really important service. This is part of why I wanted to have you on the podcast, because consistently, consistently, consistently, I've been working with lawyers now, for the podcast, it will turn six in August, and by far the lawyers who I see being mistreated the most and passed over the most for the most pretextual reasons possible are my clients who are part of historically underrepresented groups in law firms.

In particular—and I think I’ve said this on the podcast before—but the horror stories that I have been privy to related to the treatment of Black women specifically in Biglaw is like, I don't even have words.

Related to that, I’ve found that for many people who find themselves in a position like that, the best way for them to actually get what they deserve, for the kind of work they’re doing and for the quality of candidate that they are, is to make a move to another law firm because it gives them greater leverage.

Bryson Malcolm: Yeah. And it's kind of a chance to hit the reset button. And hopefully by the time you lateral, you've had a little bit more time on the inside to understand the types of things to look out for that you may not have spotted, especially because firms have such a... I mean, they’re smart about it. They’re smart businesses.

They try to get you early, when you’re a 1L or even before then. You have very limited information. What you're getting isn't the full story at all. So by the time people make decisions on where they’re going to start—like what firm they’re going to—I mean, at this rate, you might only be like 23 or 24 when you decide to commit to a firm.

Because you do your 1L somewhere, then you usually return, and then you accept a full-time offer. And then you get there, and then you're stuck for two to three years, depending on what’s happening with the market. Like, before you know it, a huge chunk of your life is gone.

I like the way you talked about it on the last episode kind of alluded to this—but there are a thousand percent traumatic experiences that have happened to attorneys in Biglaw. Specifically, they tend to happen to people who are historically underrepresented.

And I too have heard my fair share of horror stories, and I'm not sure... It's kind of one of those things where it’s like I don’t know if people know until they’ve seen it themselves or maybe had a friend that’s gone through it.

I think people kind of dance around it in a way that maybe allows it to continue to operate under the surface. So I try to be as direct about it as possible.

But I mean, there have been things that were directly said to me that were just straight-up racist and illegal, according to New York City anti-discrimination rules. That’s happened to me multiple times. There has been sexual harassment. There’s been pressure from people with power on those kinds of things.

I think the power dynamic can be a lot worse than what I experienced directly. I have friends who were in the industry when we were summers and when we were practicing associates who have been sexually harassed constantly. I know people who have been sexually assaulted by partners and senior associates.

And I honestly don’t think there’s a single instance where I think justice was doled out. I don’t think those people ever really paid a price for doing those things to my friends and colleagues.

So I think the biggest thing underpinning my mission with all this is I want to get to a point where we have—I mean, I’ll say—I do like hearing myself talk, so I would like to be part of the center of the conversation. But I'd like to get to a point where people respect and trust my voice enough where I can amplify other folks’ experiences and steer people away from the really toxic spots, and that way provide some kind of accountability.

So at least these spots that continue to let these things fester aren’t rewarded with top talent, and I can maybe save someone a couple of years of a really bad experience.

So yeah, I think that's at the heart of everything that I'm doing, especially because I think I’ve experienced shades of that myself. I could have saved a lot of my time if someone had had that frank conversation with me and been very direct and not danced around it and not have been afraid to be blackballed or fired for telling the truth.

Sarah Cottrell: I talk about this quite a bit on the podcast, but I think one of the big challenges is that there are still a lot of people who see something going wrong or someone being mistreated as a bug, as something going wrong in a system that otherwise works.

I think if you’re someone who’s actually looking at this situation with some level of honesty, the reality is in most cases, you have a system that's sort of protects and rewards people who are behaving in abusive ways, and that's why you see this. It's a feature as opposed to a bug. Because that's the case, the only way to really have that be different is for them to be trying to shift the system.

The reality is that there are going to be people who, for all sorts of reasons, are pursuing a career in Biglaw. And I think that—I know of course, on the podcast, it’s not like I’m singing Biglaw’s praises—but I also recognize it’s a real thing. It serves a purpose. It serves a purpose for a lot of individual lawyers. And if it’s something you’re going to be engaging in, then I think, I am always on the side of more information is better.

Bryson Malcolm: Right.

Sarah Cottrell: To your point, I think one of the things that is most confusing, especially if you are a historically underrepresented lawyer, is that there is a lot of lip service paid to the opposite of what you're actually going to experience in many cases.

That can be very disorienting. That can feel very much—

Bryson Malcolm: Gaslighty.

Sarah Cottrell: 100% gaslighty. "Oh, is it just me?" Or like, "Maybe I really do actually suck at this job or whatever." And it’s not just disorienting, it’s also just confusing. It can be hard to see the reality for what it is.

So we had talked before because I really like what your company is trying to do. But then we connected again more recently in part because I noticed some of the things that you were posting on LinkedIn about Biglaw and the Trump executive orders, because I also have many feelings about that, as anyone who listens to the podcast will know.

So do you want to talk a little bit about that whole dynamic? Now, for people who are listening, Bryson and I are recording the week that the episode—my episode—where I talked about Biglaw decision-makers being cowards, released. Related to the executive orders. So that is where we are in the timeline. So yeah, where do you want to start with that?

Bryson Malcolm: Yeah. Also, just for time orientation, yeah, we're couched somewhere between three major law firms winning their lawsuits against the administration for unlawful executive orders and, I guess, an authoritarian crackdown in Los Angeles, which is really fun. Great times.

The biggest takeaway I've had from everything with the executive orders and how Biglaw has responded is that I think the businessification of the legal profession maybe has gone further than I thought it did initially. I think that's kind of what you're seeing with even the partners who are taking a stand.

By taking a stand, they're usually still being pretty tactful about it and pretty quiet, which I wouldn’t expect partners to do anything differently. But even the plethora of partners who have left Paul, Weiss after the deal have been pretty cheeky, private with the reasons that they've given, but obviously we kind of all know.

The other thing there is, I believe they're all litigators. And most of the partners that I’ve seen that have departed firms who made "deals"—and I say “deals” in quotes because it seems like extortion to me—but they’ve all been litigators.

So I think that’s kind of something that’s always been maybe a stereotype in the industry, that litigators are the ones with, I don’t know, more principles or morals, and the corporate attorneys, we're just business people. So, bankers in a different shade.

Not to say that litigators are saints—and people defend some pretty horrific things—but I just think, yeah, it can be really easy. Speaking from experience of being a corporate attorney, it can be easy. The further out from law school you are—and law school is like your toward litigation—I think the more you forget about the ethics and morals and principles that the profession is supposed to be pinned to.

And that's kind of what you're seeing now. And it's very depressing, honestly, to kind of see that for a pretty low price—or wherever you want to put the number at, the amount of dollars that a firm could have lost—that’s all it really took for them to completely steamroll their attorneys of color and female attorneys and the LGBTQIA+ community.

I think it's kind of shocking. Not that I was optimistic about society’s progress with that kind of thing. I always know that there's a backswing with these kinds of movements, like progressive civil rights movements. But I think I am still shocked at the speed of everything happening.

Just the impunity at which these firms think that these decisions are just business, and won’t have an effect on how people view them for decades to come, I think is silly.

Sarah Cottrell: I mean, it's deeply gross. I think that it’s interesting because so many people go to law school because they have some sense of, "I want to make the world better. I want to help people. I care about justice," all of these things.

A lot of those people have been on this podcast and talked about how they went to law school and ended up coming out and practicing private practice, civil litigation, whatever, and eventually being like, "Hey, actually, maybe I want to get back closer to why I went in the first place."

And I think it’s pretty clear to anyone who listens to the podcast with any regularity, I’m also a fairly practical person. So I’m not someone who’s like, “You don’t like your job? You should quit today. Who cares about money?”

In the same sense, it’s not like I don’t understand that there are business interests related to essentially money and profits per partner and these sorts of things that ultimately, in some sense, is the driving force for a law firm. And certainly I think has become even more so since the institution of the Am Law 100 and the MBA-ization of law.

I’m certainly not the first person to make that observation. But, you know, I had someone on the podcast who was a partner at a large law firm and basically said, “I felt like we were basically letting people be abused for money.”

And the reality is that I think there are a lot of people who are like, “Well, you should just suck it up. You’re getting paid all this money. It’s not as bad as whatever other misery that could be worse than the misery you’re experiencing.”

But ultimately, I think to your point—you mentioned earlier in the conversation—the values mismatch. I really think that one of the things that we see with these executive orders is just that there is this sense of, “Well, we’re just doing what’s right for the business.”

That doesn’t really include any sort of consideration of values outside of, I don’t know, whatever the most capitalist values are.

I think that is related to the point that you made, which is that, in theory, the legal profession is supposed to be about more than that. But I think especially when you're in a position of a very wealthy and powerful firm, or you're a person who’s making a lot of money, it can be hard to see that that is the case.

I don’t say this to be like, “Because I’m so great at seeing everything,” or whatever. But I do think there is a real problem with incentives. I guess I have to say that because I went to the University of Chicago Law School.

But there is a real problem with incentives when you're in a situation like that. I think that's part of why you see this almost decision-making as though there's a vacuum around values. Does that make sense?

Bryson Malcolm: Yeah. Vacuum, and there's like an echo chamber, I think, that a lot of these partners on the executive committees of major firms are sitting in.

And do I think that any of these partners had a genuine conversation with the associates up and down the chain at their firm to say, “Hey, what do you guys think about this? How do you feel about this? What do you think the repercussions are? How does this make you feel as an employee of the firm if we were to do this or that?”

I don't think any of those conversations were genuinely had. And I think that's kind of messed up.

I also think when you're in a room and there's like seven other partners, you are all coming from a very similar place, and I think you're leaving out very key information.

I also think a lot of these partners who made these decisions—who voted on these things—kind of underestimated the amount of media attention they would get. Because I think if there wasn't as big of a media backlash, they could get away with it in a pretty large part without anything happening. And historically, as an industry, we've never had this kind of attention on us.

Sarah Cottrell: I was going to say, and historically, that has been true. That's what's been done.

Bryson Malcolm: Right, exactly. I mean, I see a lot of sides of things. And there's part of me that thinks that this is a very negative flashpoint moment of history. But I do think it's the first time that people have actually peeled back the curtain and looked at what's going on and just been kind of like a wake-up call. "We have slipped into a territory that is not bound to the moral values that we all say that we follow."

We're actually seeing consequences for things now. Partners are leaving. Clients of firms are moving their businesses around, giving it to different firms that have sued the administration, who didn't immediately bow to the orders, who didn’t immediately roll back all their DEI stuff.

So there have been consequences, which I think—without the media attention, without the backlash, without people speaking out against these things—I don't think we see that.

So if we do learn anything from this chapter, I hope it's that maybe we as an industry, as attorneys, understand the power of speaking out and sharing information and being a little bit more transparent and risking a tiny bit.

I understand not everyone can speak with the candor that I do publicly, just because for me, the calculus is different because I have 130 law firm clients. And even if a couple of them don’t want to work with me because I criticize them—rightfully so—I think even if you talk to people at these firms, they understand that my criticism is fair.

But if a couple of firms don’t want to work with me because I take a fair shot at them in the public arena, then I still have 120 other law firms to work with. I don’t really lose much.

It also signals to other people where my values actually are.

I just make up for any lost business there with a law firm who maybe cares a little bit more about the rule of law and about protecting people who have been historically steamrolled by our country. So I don't really mind so much.

I think that in the little ways that attorneys can speak out and share information, they definitely should, whether that's speaking directly to, like yelling into the ether on social media, or if that's talking to a journalist that you trust or talking to me, plug, because I love getting that kind of information. It's great. It helps me make—

Sarah Cottrell: We like a whisper network.

Bryson Malcolm: Exactly. And honestly, that is kind of the cornerstone of my business—The Whisper Network. And I think that's the best way to protect people too nowadays.

This is a bad time, but if there is any silver lining, I just hope it's that people understand the power of information and attention on these things. We can't all just stay quiet all the time, because nothing is ever going to change if we do. It's not just some innocuous thing where no one's getting hurt. People are getting hurt. It's not theoretical.

That's my silver lining. But yeah, no, it's pretty bad right now. I think it's getting better. It's better than it was in March, I'd say.

Sarah Cottrell: Yeah. I do think, you know, it's interesting because you said the attention and the fact that there are enough people outside of the legal profession seeing it and being like, "Wait, what's going on here?"

I talk about the lawyer bubble on the podcast a lot. Typically, I’m talking about it more in the sense of, if you’re someone who is not happy as a lawyer and you might want to do something else, having this sense of, "But what else could I do? There’s nothing that would be better than this."

All these things, just being around lawyers all the time sort of encourages you to think that way. But I think it's kind of the same sort of thing where you have this situation where it's like, "Well, we all agree," and by we, I mean primarily—although not exclusively—cis-het white dudes, older cis-het white dudes. "We all agree that this is the reasonable thing to do, right?"

It feels like this is one of the first times that the industry, or a significant portion of the industry, was making decisions in that way, and enough non-lawyers got eyes on the situation to say, "I'm sorry, what?"

And to your point, I think it's helpful. I think it's also helpful for people who are in these organizations, who are in these institutions, to think about what their own personal values are and what that’s going to look like for them in terms of what they expect from an employer.

I did an episode a couple of weeks ago about Reddit and Fishbowl and talking about stuff in the legal industry. If you look at boards where people are asking questions specifically about Biglaw, if someone comes in—no matter what they say, no matter how bad the thing that they describe is that’s happening—some number of people are just going to be like, "Get over it, it’s just how it is."

I think you can be realistic and say, "This is how it is," in the sense of literally describing what it's like, versus saying, "Well, that’s just how it is," as if it’s prescriptive and you just have to get over it and be cool with it, regardless of how much it violates your humanity and the values that are important to you.

Bryson Malcolm: Mm-hmm, yep. I think also—I mean, I personally hate... I mean, I am on Reddit, but I hate posting on Reddit, because any time I do, the trolls are so unbearable, and I can't sometimes.

Sarah Cottrell: I'm an old person, so I have basically no experience on Reddit. It became a thing, and I don’t know what I was doing. Being a lawyer, I guess. Now, apparently, it's a place that people talk.

Bryson Malcolm: Yeah, there’s good information on both sides. But definitely putting yourself out there or asking any kind of vulnerable, honest question, you just kind of have to accept that baked into it is going to be people who are going to gaslight you and demean you. It does force some folks to grow tough skin in the virtual context.

Sarah Cottrell: Another piece of what you mentioned that I think is important to talk about—and I think I did an episode maybe like a month ago from when we’re talking now—is the idea that DEI is a problem for Biglaw, that somehow Biglaw has too much DEI. That is so ridiculous.

I think that's part of why—and I’m assuming you probably share my feeling about this—it’s part of why the capitulation to the executive orders is so ridiculous to me. Because it is not attached to reality.

If you are a Biglaw firm and you have capitulated, and then you're like, "Sorry, we're pulling out of all of these programs that were designed to support lawyers who our DEI policies were designed to help and support," to me it's just like, no reasonable person with any real knowledge of the situation can actually think that that is true. That that is a problem and that they should be removing themselves from those programs.

Bryson Malcolm: I think with a lot of these things—even if I'm giving firms the benefit of the doubt with a lot of the diversity initiatives—there's still, even with the guidance that we’ve gotten from the Trump administration, which we don’t even know if it’s thoroughly backed up by the law—it hasn’t really been tested fully—but even the guidance we are getting, there’s still wiggle room for certain initiatives to exist.

So I think for me, one of my lines has been employee resource groups or attorney affinity groups at law firms. Those are things that, as far as I have been in the profession, have always been open to everyone.

There’s no restriction on membership. You can show up to an event for a group you might not belong to historically, but you're just passionate about supporting, or maybe you want to learn more about it. You could still show up to those things. So there's nothing restrictive about them. There’s no reason why they should be eliminated.

Most of the guidance I’ve seen from the Meltzer Center, NYU DEI Center—they’ve been really good with thought leadership on this—and they say it’s one of the least risky things that an employer can do, is keep these ERGs open and as an open support group for people who are historically underrepresented, who might benefit from having a lane to chat with each other.

A lot of these things are useful because law firm diversity numbers are very, very low, way lower than the national average for the demographics. Even if you add that there are certain practice groups that are more homogeneous than others.

So it's super common for you to be in a practice group at a firm, and you're kind of siloed. You could be the only person of color in that entire practice group, or you could be one of a handful of women in that practice group, it’s isolating.

It can be grounds for inappropriate behavior to stem up. It can also lead to burnout. If you don’t have anyone that you feel like you can connect to, that understands your experience, that you can just build community with and share your genuine feelings and thoughts and common values, common culture, burnout rate’s going to increase, and you’re going to lose employees.

So it’s also in the benefit of these companies to keep these programs, because it increases the longevity of your attorneys. So you’re really just pulling out the small degree of support that people had. You’re just completely removing it.

Now some of these people are just siloed in groups, and they have no idea who they can reach out to, to speak to, who they can feel safe to connect with. Because it can be a very intimidating environment if you’re in a group and you’re trying to advance and build mentorship relationships, but nobody in your group has the types of experiences you’ve had or grew up in the culture that you did or looks like you.

I think also another thing that I’ve been talking about with people recently is that people put a lot of pressure on the attorneys coming up the chain themselves to put the effort in to connect with people culturally who have power in their group.

And it's not like they’re not trying. But I would say that same can’t be said about a lot of the partners in power. Because, you know, they’re busy, whatever. Whatever reason you want to give, I’m sure there is a valid excuse.

But the fact of the matter is, if you’re a straight white male attorney and you’re a partner in your group and you’re super busy, and say you walk into a room with somebody who’s just from a drastically different culture than you are and looks completely different, and say you feel even a little bit uncomfortable with that person, maybe because you’re worried that you might get sued for saying the wrong thing or whatever. It doesn’t even matter.

If you feel a little bit uncomfortable and then you let that discomfort guide your decision, and then you end up spending more time with other straight white male attorneys who are associates, then you build those relationships, then those people get advantages through those relationships and through that inside information, and you kind of end up freezing out everyone that doesn't align with what your exact background is. I don't even think that's an intentional thing, but that's what's happening.

So the least that we could do is offer attorneys resources to connect with each other across practice groups within these firms so that they can mentor each other and share information and guidance and support and pump each other up, like how we see with a lot of these relationships with straight white men up and down the chain.

Then in terms of the numbers, like you alluded to, they're extremely low. I've been tracking them. I'm a really big data guy, so I've been tracking them for a while. I think you are correct in saying for anyone to think that there has been a huge meaningful improvement in those numbers based on DEI initiatives, that's absolutely preposterous, the increase in representation.

Sarah Cottrell: Truly. It's unhinged.

Bryson Malcolm: It's laughable.

Sarah Cottrell: It is not attached to reality. There are no facts to support this claim.

Bryson Malcolm: But the thing I do want to say to flag on this, and I'm very worried about this. The main institution that tracks diversity numbers is NALP. I've heard a lot of rumors that many law firms are pulling out of reporting their demographic numbers to NALP. So I don't think it's going to be an effective way to track these things anymore.

I think that's part of the plan. I think that's part of the Trump agenda is to remove all objective sources of facts so that when they say these things, we don't even have the data to back up and confront them and say, "Hey, no, actually, the numbers are still really low and the representation is bad."

Now going forward—and I think we're going to see this, honestly, right now it's happening because there used to be a website where you could check publicly what each firm's demographic representation was on a firm level, and most of those data sheets have been pulled off of the website. So now those are no longer accessible.

So now when you try to go there and say, "Actually, no, look at these trends that we have, look at the numbers that we currently have," we don't have any of that anymore to use. So that's a huge problem.

Sarah Cottrell: Which, let's just say, if literal facts are something that you don't want people to know, that pretty much tells me what the strength of your argument is. Because no one whose argument is actually strong doesn't want you to see the facts.

I'm curious, I know that you ended up talking with some reporters about some of this stuff, and in particular, the way some of your clients reacted to you talking about this, so do you want to share a little bit about that experience and any insights for the listeners that you might have?

Bryson Malcolm: So with one specific client, it was with Goodwin Procter, who is one of the hundred law firms I work with. I haven’t placed anyone there in a few years, and that’s because, if we’re being honest here, the reputation in the industry amongst top attorneys has been declining because they’ve introduced massive waves of layoffs over the past three years, periodically and consistently.

So starting from there, they were not very happy with the way I addressed their decision to pull out of diversity programs for students. These diversity programs have been reworked since SFFA v. Harvard, the Supreme Court diversity case. So they’ve been open to everyone and race-neutral, identity-neutral for a couple of years now.

There’s absolutely no reason to pull out of these initiatives, and they still provide a really good resource for students and attorneys who feel like they might need them. This could be anybody who’s a first-generation professional, first-generation lawyer, regardless of color. It’s just another resource people can use if they need it. A lot of people do need them, do need these resources.

So in criticizing them for pulling out of those programs, they reacted by severing my recruitment contract with them, which is not normal for the industry. Typically, most of the terms are more tactful than that. If they did want to not work with somebody, they would just kind of freeze them out or ghost them. They wouldn’t make it a whole thing.

So that was interesting.

Sarah Cottrell: That was a choice.

Bryson Malcolm: It was a choice. You know, I genuinely think it was a choice. I'm not exactly sure where it all came from, but I think, in my opinion, it did backfire on them because the media attention from that choice, I mean, I think there are like four or five articles written about that now.

The engagement on the posts that I’ve had are way higher post them doing that versus if they had just been neutral on it and ignored it. So there’s that. Yeah, so I think it is powerful. I hope it gives other law firms who are considering similar actions a little pause to weigh the consequences of that.

It shows that people actually care about these things. A lot of people do. I know these programs are on the chopping block at a lot of law firms. So I hope they think a little harder about doing that.

But yeah, I know the media is a very powerful tool. I think, like I said, I can see a lot of sides of things, and I try to see the silver lining with everything and everyone. I personally have no love for Donald Trump, but I think one of the lessons that I have been able to learn from him is that the media is a very powerful tool, and he’s very good at wielding it.

Whatever you want to say about him, he’s good at capturing media attention and hammering home points that—even if they’re not based on fact—people just start believing it because they’re getting blasted with it from all these news sources.

So that’s one of the things that I’ve tried to lean into in terms of working with the press and trying to get as much information out there as possible and trying to mobilize voices on social media who may be aligned with these principles that I share. I think it’s effective. I don’t really know. We’ll see.

But yeah, I think people are upset about these actions. I hope that firms are starting to factor in the consequences of that. Also, I think a lot of the reporting has focused on how law students are viewing all this and how it is dramatically affecting which firms they want to go to.

Even if firms don’t see the immediate effects of it now, the pipeline is for sure going to be affected. Students are a lot more animated about these things than practicing attorneys, I think, because they haven’t been stuck—

Sarah Cottrell: Yes, they have—

Bryson Malcolm: Yeah, they have hope.

Sarah Cottrell: They haven’t been brow-beaten into—

Bryson Malcolm: Exactly. So they still have a ton of decisions. Very similar to what I was describing for my business is that they can choose between like 50 different law firms which one they want to go accept the summer offer at. They don’t need to go to your firm. They don’t need to stay at your firm.

So that’s going to have really strong ripple effects that I think are already being seen in the rates of students accepting summer offers. I’ve heard that’s gone down for certain firms.

I think most people know this, but Gen Z and all the generations that are coming after them are a lot more motivated by values, ethics, morals, and feel more strongly that their workplaces need to reflect their own values and morals.

I think the days of law firms being able to coast by not having to care about what their attorneys actually feel or think, I think those days are kind of coming to an end. I don’t think the next generation of attorneys is going to put up with this kind of thing.

I think, you know, there’s always going to be attorneys that are okay with those decisions. There are always going to be attorneys who are still happy to go to Sullivan & Cromwell or Paul Weiss post this deal, or Skadden. But, you know, those who care a little bit more about these things or stick to the values that they were taught in law school are going to start making the decisions to go to Jenner & Block, and to go to Covington or WilmerHale or Susman Godfrey.

These are major shifts that are happening already, and that’s in big part because of the media attention that they are getting, both positive and negative.

So just like I shouted out those law firms, I think those firms are getting a lot of positive attention too. So there is a flip side. There's a direct benefit for sticking true to the values that your firm was built on, and people do notice.

We are all paying attention. I am paying attention. Every student I know is paying attention at the T14. The associates within your ranks at firms are paying attention, even though they're more quiet about it and they might move a little more slowly. Everyone's paying attention.

Sarah Cottrell: Yeah. I think everyone is paying attention. And here's the other thing, listen, if you're a corporate type and you're listening to us have this conversation or you listen to me say anything I say on the podcast, especially about Biglaw, I'm sure there can be this tendency to be like, "Well, you're just being unrealistic," or, "But you don't understand business," or whatever.

I'm like, listen, here's the thing, ultimately, each of us has to decide what is important to us. Some people will decide that values outside of whatever the capitalist agenda is are not important to them. But a lot of people will decide that there are other things that are important to them.

That doesn't mean they're being unrealistic or childish or immature. It just means they have different values. I think that you're particularly right that Gen Z, let alone Gen Alpha, it's going to be a different situation.

I think even when you talk about millennials—so I'm an elder millennial—there was a little bit of a bait and switch. I think on millennials, there was this expectation that certain things were important and that the reality did not match that. I don't think that younger generations, they cannot be baited.

Bryson Malcolm: No. I think they're also willing to risk more because of the experiences that they've had in terms of the frequency of national trauma that's happened for people of that age range. I mean, it started with Me Too. I mean, I was like five or six when 9/11 happened, and every few years since, it's been pretty bad.

Sarah Cottrell: Oh my gosh. I was a freshman in college. So cool, cool, cool. That's where we are in life.

Bryson Malcolm: Yeah. But yeah, and then we had COVID and all that stuff. So yeah, it's just different calculus for people. People have higher risk tolerance. A lot of people, honestly—I'll just be honest—I think the younger generation feel like they have less to lose because I think they're one of the first generations that aren't going to be better off than their parents financially.

We have climate change. We have all these things. So, I mean, if we're going to be losing, we're going to get the short end of the stick anyway, we at least want to feel like we care about something and we have values and morals and ethics. It's kind of one of the only things we have left.

But yeah. I mean, everyone's going to make a decision. I don't really judge people who are willing to stay at the firms who made deals. I understand how business works, clearly, I run one. But I just know that there are a lot of people who do care about these things.

For those people where it is very important to them, or an important factor, or something that they need to have represented when they decide to go to a new firm, that's kind of where I want to be present and help facilitate that kind of thing.

Sarah Cottrell: Well, and related to that, I just want to say, I also think we need to recognize that there is a very real sense in which these toxic institutions prey on people being in positions where they can't make a different choice for a lot of practical reasons.

To me, that's another factor that you should be thinking about. If you are a decision-maker at a large law firm, if you're like, "The only reason we aren't seeing even more blowback from this terrible decision that we made," is essentially because we're in a position to basically take advantage of people.

Bryson Malcolm: Right. And the market's not good. The lateral market is pretty slow right now.

Sarah Cottrell: Right. That's gross, man. That's gross. I mean, it might be a reality but that's also gross. If that's what you're doing, then okay. But I guess admit it to yourself and admit that it's gross and you're taking advantage of it anyway.

Yeah, okay. Well, that is what I have to say about that. Do you have anything else you want to share with the listeners, Bryson, about all these many things or anything else?

Bryson Malcolm: No, I mean, I think I touched on everything. But just, LinkedIn is my platform of choice. So if you can find me there, Bryson Malcolm, pretty simple.

I try to post every bit of information that I can on what each firm is doing in this kind of situation. Also on demographic tracking, we have in-house researchers who do these compilings of stats even without NALP. So we will still have access to these diversity metrics for partners and associates at the top 60 or so law firms. I post about that pretty frequently.

If you ever have information that you want to talk about, if anyone wants to share any insight on what they've experienced, basically, they're kind of like a tip line, I'm really happy to have those conversations.

I've been in those situations myself. Even if you need someone to play therapist for 30 minutes, I'm happy to do it. It makes me feel better about my own experiences to know that you're not alone in that. And then that information can also be used to help other people down the road.

Very similar to the Legal Accountability Project that Aliza's been doing, who is someone that I support and respect greatly. I know you donated for UChicago to have access. I donated for Columbia and Harvard to have access. So I think that's something we're also all aligned on.

So yeah, transparency and information is definitely powerful. We don't all have to stay quiet forever. There are smart, safe ways to share that information.

Sarah Cottrell: Yeah, I mean, if you can get information into The Whisper Network, that's great. Not everyone can host The Former Lawyer Podcast, they are clearly not going back to practicing law and can say whatever stuff they want to say.

Bryson Malcolm: Exactly.

Sarah Cottrell: But I will say the stuff that I want to say. And that's where we are. Okay, cool. So we'll put that information in the show notes and the blog posts so people can reach out to you if they want to connect for any of the reasons that you mentioned.

Bryson, I really appreciate you coming on and talking about all of these things because I think they're really important.

Bryson Malcolm: Yeah, thanks for having me. I think it's really important that both of us get our voices out there as a counterpoint to everything else happening. So I appreciate what you've been doing for longer than I have been doing. Hopefully, we can keep working together on this kind of thing.

Sarah Cottrell: Thanks so much for listening. I absolutely love getting to share this podcast with you. If you haven't yet, I invite you to download my free guide: First Steps to Leaving the Law at formerlawyer.com/first. Until next time, have a great week.