Winning Strategies for Hiring and Job-Seeking in the Legal Job Market

Transcript

Tim Haley 00:00

Sometimes an interview is almost like a deposition.

Candice Reed 00:02

You want to be authentic, and natural, and show that you’re a good conversationalist, but you also want to be talking about things that are relevant to the job that you’re applying for.

Tim Haley 00:14

You get to ask questions, and you have to answer questions, so you’re on both sides of the table for it.

Jorge de la Osa 00:19

Don’t worry about the money, don’t worry about the opportunities. Work hard and everything, all the doors will open.

Candice Reed 00:24

This is Leveraging Latitude: Cultivating a Full Life in the Law. Please join us on our journey as we discover how to leverage the hard work of becoming a lawyer, to achieving success and leading a rich and fulfilling life in the law.

Candice Reed 00:38

Hello, welcome back to the Leveraging Latitude podcast. We’re so happy that you’re joining us. Tim, it’s great to be with you again.

Tim Haley 00:46

Candice, it’s great to be with you again. How are you? How are things going?

Candice Reed 00:50

They’re going well. This is a really fun episode that we have coming up because we are going to have the opportunity to talk to one of our Latitude colleagues who has recently joined us, and is in the recruiting department if you will, or on the recruiting side of our business. But has also worn many hats throughout this long career as a former general counsel, as well as a job seeker.

Candice Reed 01:25

Today we’re going to be talking about looking for jobs, finding jobs, hiring legal talent, and all of the nuances that are involved with those many, many roles. Would you like to introduce our esteemed guest today, Tim?

Tim Haley 01:46

Excellent. I’m looking forward to it. I’m happy to introduce Jorge de la Osa. He is a Director of Legal Recruiting for Latitude, for us, out of our Tampa Bay office.

Tim Haley 01:58

Jorge, welcome.

Jorge de la Osa 02:00

Hi, Tim. Hi, Candice. How are you guys this afternoon?

Candice Reed 02:03

Hi, Jorge. We’re doing great. Or at least I’m doing great. I shouldn’t speak for you, Tim. Sorry.

Tim Haley 02:08

Yeah, I’m all right.

Candice Reed 02:11

Jorge, we alluded to the many positions or hats that you’ve worn over the years. Would you mind telling us a little bit about your career and setting the stage for the conversation that we’re about to have? All the many questions that we’re going to ask you about it here shortly.

Jorge de la Osa 02:27

Sure, Candice and Tim. My career, I was not a traditional go straight of school into law school. I actually worked as a finance business analyst for AT&T for a few years. Then decided I wanted to switch careers, and ended up researching and looking into law school. Ended up going to law school. Then from there, I was an associate at BakerHostetler, worked in the Orlando office for almost four years.

Jorge de la Osa 02:54

Then after some soul-searching, decided to go in-house. I enjoyed my time working for AT&T in the business setting, so I always saw myself going back in-house. I had an opportunity to go in-house with a small development company, resort development company, and I took the chance. I did that for a couple years. Then switched over to an international development hotel company, large hotel company based out of Spain. There was a unique opportunity that presented itself, I wasn’t looking. As a matter of fact, I was working for somebody who I considered a good friend back from my BakerHostetler days, so I felt bad moving but it was the right career choice.

Jorge de la Osa 03:29

I made the switch, went in-house. I was pretty much the lead lawyer for that group that was growing there at the time, the vacation club, the Spanish hotel company growing their vacation club internationally. I had the opportunity to establish, begin, and grow that department for about six years, six, seven years. The economic crisis hit the hotel industry pretty hard, especially in Europe and Spain. Then we went into more of a management role.

Jorge de la Osa 04:01

After a couple years, Wyndham came knocking, Wyndham Vacation Ownership, and made me an offer as an assistant general counsel position and I made the jump to them. Became their EVP and GC. Worked there for about seven years. Then it coincided with a spinoff from Wyndham Worldwide, the Wyndham Vacation Ownership Club went off on its own. That gave me an opportunity to again jump and look at a different career option with a smaller development company. I always enjoyed the development piece of working in a small growth company.

Jorge de la Osa 04:35

As soon as I got the offer, I took the chance and went in-house with Bluegreen as their general counsel. At the time, they were stagnant, so they wanted to get to the next level. They wanted to get into a growth phase, which is what we did for the last six years. In January, I found myself out of a job. As a job seeker, after we sold Bluegreen to Hilton Grand Vacations, so that was the sale that got me back in and looking for a new opportunity. Here I am with Latitude.

Candice Reed 05:05

We’re so happy that you are here with us. One of the reasons that we were so excited to talk to you is that you have had the unique opportunity to sit at various places within the hiring process. Both as a job seeker, as you mentioned, someone contemplating new opportunities that you maybe weren’t even looking for, someone who hired legal talent, both attorneys and paralegals. And then also now, someone who is assisting both legal employers as well as job seekers as a recruiter.

Candice Reed 05:46

There was something you just said as you were giving us your background, or explaining your career to-date. You talked about the fact that you did some soul-searching when you first were contemplating leaving the large law firm environment. I’m curious what that entailed or what that looked like? Do you remember some of the questions that you were asking yourself that I’m assuming the answers to those questions helped you to determine that you wanted to move out of the law firm environment and into an in-house role?

Jorge de la Osa 06:26

It was a difficult time because I had invested four-and-a-half years at the law firm. You get to the point where you’re at the crossroads of am I committing to the partner track, or am I going to get off the partner track and go in-house with no guarantees? At the time, I had never been in a legal capacity in-house, so with no guarantees of success. And certainly, a much different track ultimately. You could look at it and there’s many partners maybe in a law firm, there’s only one general counsel. If my goal was ultimately, which it wasn’t at the time when I made the jump, but if your goal is to be GC, it’s a much maybe tougher road to get there in-house, in a sense.

Jorge de la Osa 07:03

I think part of the decision in soul-searching was that that wasn’t necessarily my end all, be all. I didn’t jump in-house in order to just say, “I’m going to be GC.” That was certainly a goal, but it wasn’t the biggest reason. I think that got me comfortable saying this is more, in a sense, a lifestyle change. It was mostly going to be spending more time with my family, having better hours in general in my worklife. That became, I think, once I got very comfortable that that’s when I was making the move, then the decision followed.

Tim Haley 07:40

Now, Jorge, is that true necessarily, that the lifestyle of an in-house counsel is better than big law? Is that how it turned out for you?

Jorge de la Osa 07:50

So, Tim, I probably enjoyed one year of a really good lifestyle. But certainly, once I jumped into a high growth, the hotel company, the international hotel company, that went out the door. I was probably working and traveling certainly more hours than I was at the law firm. I think that part, although it got me comfortable maybe making the jump, obviously I’d never thought that two years later, I’d be leading a legal department of a new division in a hotel company, a large hotel company. But certainly, I was comfortable with the decision at the time, and then I was going to make the most of the opportunities as they presented themselves.

Candice Reed 08:26

How did you do that? You mention not anticipating that within just a few years, you would have the opportunity to sit in a leadership role in-house. What did you do once you made the jump or made the transition in-house that distinguished you among your peers, or that showed to other decision makers that you were capable of excelling in a leadership position?

Jorge de la Osa 09:00

The law firm experience was a great one, and I had great mentors, partners that had been at that law firm and obviously had been very successful in their career. And advice from one of those mentors of mine, and he was a successful partner there at Baker was, “Don’t worry about the money, don’t worry about the opportunities. Work hard and everything, all the doors will open.” As simple as that was, it certainly became true. It helped me laser focus on just being a good lawyer, being a good colleague, working hard at whatever it was that I was assigned. And not worrying about who assigned it, what the assignment was. All the other noise goes away and you just do the best you can. That certainly helps build your reputation and a little bit of your work ethic, and everything else. Sure enough, that managed to open up a lot of doors over the course of my career.

Tim Haley 09:57

Your career started in a giant firm, and you moved in-house to small companies, in-house in big companies, and then back again. I don’t want you to pick your favorite because I don’t think that’s fair. As you think through the roles that you’ve had in your career, what was the best part of each experience and what was maybe the least best part of each experience?

Jorge de la Osa 10:21

I think they’re all … Tim, that’s a really thoughtful question in a sense, because every one of the experiences are important. You go through all these experiences in life, personal or otherwise, business, and they all mean something. You learn from all of them. They’re all part of building blocks of where you end up and who you become. Certainly, my law firm experience was a great one. We had a great team that taught me a lot, not just about hard work, but the value of culture. We had a great leader within that hospitality real estate group and it taught me a lot. I knew what culture I wanted to carry on later when I became a leader.

 

Jorge de la Osa 11:00

Then I went in-house and I worked in a different capacity, smaller group, smaller team. But it became important to get along with the group. You don’t have the luxury of having 100 people in your department, and you can just sit in your office or your cubicle and just do your work. You had to get along with everyone, otherwise the days would become very, very long and miserable.

Tim Haley 11:19

Yeah.

Jorge de la Osa 11:19

I think that taught me something else.

Jorge de la Osa 11:21

My most favorite, certainly my most favorite at the time. Not the reason I made the jump in-house, but it was the small growth … Or I should say the large hotel company with a brand new division that became a very high growth opportunity, where everything was being done from scratch. The innovation, the challenges, being able to create and develop my own team, all of that became just intoxicating. It was an amazing experience. It was wonderful to go through. Didn’t know it at the time, no matter how hard. I was working long, long, long hours and weeks. But still, I look back and that’s what I yearned for after I left Wyndham, is that environment. That’s why I jumped later to Bluegreen. But that became, for sure, an environment that I really enjoyed.

Candice Reed 12:03

Well, let’s now talk about your favorite favorite job, which is the one you currently have at Latitude. We mentioned that you are on the recruiting side of our business. Can you tell our audience how in the world you ended up in this role, given all of your prior positions, both at the law firm and in-house with the companies that you’ve mentioned?

Jorge de la Osa 12:30

Interesting. Certainly, did not think I’d be doing what I’m doing right now when January came along and we sold the company, and I was ready to move on. Immediately you think, “Okay. Well, I’ll look for another and find another general counsel position.” Again, I took the time … Luckily, it was the first time I had been in a position where I had a lot of time to sit down and soul-search. I took my time. I had a placement coach that they assigned during the transition, which was great because his general advice was not about pound the pavement, go out and get … It was much more about take your time, sit down. Jobs at that level, it’s not like they’re a dime a dozen. They’re not all sitting there. But those jobs are there, you just have to take your time and figure out exactly what you want, figure out how to connect with the people that have those jobs. Listen to other recruiters and what makes you a better candidate.

Jorge de la Osa 13:29

I took my time. I took 60 days I think it was, almost two months, to sit down and figure out what was my next step. In one of those searches, I started looking at contract work. Part of my thought process is, “Let me be open-minded. Let me not just peg myself to what I’ve always known. Let me be open-minded and see what else there is that I can do at this stage of my career, with my experience and my background.” I started looking at contract work.

Jorge de la Osa 13:59

That led me to, amazingly one night, I’m just sitting on the computer looking at contract work and it led me to Latitude. I start looking through the website. I was curious about what the engagements were in general. Not just for me, but just in general how it worked. I found myself lost in the Latitude website for over an hour, just looking around, looking at different jobs. Looking at the different roles and different recruiters, and the people that are involved and everything. Because I had very little experience with contract work, or any of these industries. For me, it was a new world and I just got lost in it, spent one night looking through it.

Jorge de la Osa 14:36

Then I looked at my market, specifically in the Central Florida to Tampa area, and the rest is history. I started looking at contract positions, and then I noticed that there was director of recruiting position. I can’t say I’d never thought of recruiting, but it wasn’t necessarily something that I thought I’d be doing immediately right after this hiatus. I applied to both. I just sent in my resume, and I think within a day I got a call back from Kyle, who’s my client partner that I work with.

Candice Reed 15:05

You mentioned the rest is history. What is it that you do day in and day out? How do you work with many of Latitude’s attorneys and clients in your role now?

Jorge de la Osa 15:19

The way I guess most of the model works is we’re paired with a client partner. Obviously, we’ve got a slate of clients, different type of clients, in-house departments, large in-house general counsel groups, or law firms. You’ll come to me, we’ll try to identify, or he identifies the need. As simple as I can put it is I try to find the right candidate to fill that need for the client. Both on obviously the experience, background, the hours, the responsibilities, everything has to fit right. That’s where I’m really enjoying this role that I’m in because it’s not just find a candidate, plug them in. It’s much more refined than that. We do a whole lot of work, at least on the candidate side, in making sure that there is a right fit for that role, for that client.

Jorge de la Osa 16:13

I’ve always enjoyed doing that was part of when I was growing my legal departments, is that I took a hands-on approach, very hands-on approach to the hiring process and growing my groups. I find this an extension of that. I can take all my experience where I used to do that back in my days as general counsel, and I can do that for the clients that Kyle has, or any of the other client partners, and try to find the right fit.

Candice Reed 16:37

I’m assuming that some of the questions that you ask today are similar to the ones that you asked when you were in-house and you were building the team. You mentioned that you took a very hands-on role when you were in that general counsel seat. Do you remember some of the questions that you liked to ask to make sure that you were getting that right fit that we talk about so much?

Jorge de la Osa 17:02

I was generally one of the last to, once we narrowed the slate down, I was one of the last ones to go through it. I always interviewed, whether it be legal assistant, paralegal, whatever it was, attorney. It didn’t matter what level it was, I would get involved in the process. Again, I wanted to make sure that we had a good fit, and ultimately the culture is an extension of the leader or the general counsel in a sense, so I wanted to make sure that that continued to permeate to the department.

Jorge de la Osa 17:27

But my interview approach was a much more relaxed approach. I’d start off by putting the candidate at ease, because I didn’t want somebody who was nervous and ding them on that. Or he or she be nervous, or something to that extent. I wanted to make sure they got comfortable, so I’d probably spend the first 10 minutes talking to make sure that we got the butterflies and all the nerves out. Then I would turn it over to the candidate, to walk me through their resume. I didn’t have candid questions yet, I didn’t do anything. At that point, they were in a calm state. They saw that I wasn’t intimidating in any way, and then I would just let them walk me through their resume.

Jorge de la Osa 18:00

I’d let them be themselves and set what they found important in their resume, what they found important in terms of experience. What they knew about our company, what they knew about the position. I’d just let them talk for the next 15, 20 minutes. Then I’d get into more formal maybe questions in relation to the role.

Jorge de la Osa 18:19

That was my way of trying to bring out the personality in the candidate as best as I can. To your point, to this day, I still do that. In my pre-screens, I give them background on Latitude, I give them a little bit of myself and what I do, and how the process works. The rest is probably 10 or 20 minutes of letting the candidate just be themselves. So I can get a good sense of who they are, how they interact with others, whether their extroverts, introverts. That all comes across when you just let them talk, and that’s why I try to do. Then I just turn on the ears and just let them do their thing. And then the questions come naturally towards the end.

Candice Reed 18:55

Sure. To flip that around, how would you advise a candidate to prepare for that type of interview?

Jorge de la Osa 19:03

I think my advice, and this was true of my interviews, you hear this, it’s a two-way street. I was just as concerned of me having and asking the right questions, and wanting to understand the fit of the department that I was going into, as it was being prepared for whatever questions. I’d do my research-

Candice Reed 19:21

You mean as a candidate? I’m sorry to interrupt.

Jorge de la Osa 19:27

As a candidate.

Candice Reed 19:27

As a candidate?

Jorge de la Osa 19:27

Sorry, as a candidate.

Candice Reed 19:27

Sure, okay.

Jorge de la Osa 19:27

As a candidate, I’d be prepared … Maybe that put me at ease in a sense too, is that I was interviewing the department as well, or whoever it is that I’m meeting. That put me at ease that I needed to be prepared in terms of not only the expectations and what the role required, but I also had questions and a set of interests in learning more about the actual leadership of the department, how the hierarchy and responsibilities were set up, what kind of accountability they gave all of their associates and attorneys.

Jorge de la Osa 19:57

To me, part of the advice would be to be prepared to do both things. Not only answer the questions, which tends to be maybe a little bit easier, but also be prepared to ask some tough questions and be very transparent about what your expectations are for the role and for the department that you want to work for.

Tim Haley 20:18

Jorge, I wonder if you’ll go back to your role and experiences at general counsel. When we talk about team building, there’s two functions. I’ll use two different analogies that hopefully clarify where I’m going with this.

Tim Haley 20:36

One is going to the grocery store and buying the groceries. You’re buying something ultimately to cook whatever the meal is. The flip side is a sports analogy. The general manager works out contracts with the players, but the coach is the one that has to make them gel and mesh together.

Tim Haley 20:57

When you think about team building from your general counsel experience, which of those roles is maybe more important or more challenging?

Jorge de la Osa 21:09

I could try to answer. I think I understand-

Candice Reed 21:10

It doesn’t matter if I understand it.

Tim Haley 21:10

Yeah.

Candice Reed 21:11

It only matters if you understand it, Jorge.

Tim Haley 21:15

This is a meta team building question for sure.

Candice Reed 21:17

Yeah. I’ll stay in my lane right over here.

Jorge de la Osa 21:21

I think I’m going to answer it maybe in a non-traditional way. I think both are important. And it depends on the size of the group right, Tim? I can afford to be a general manager if I had a strong number two in my group that I knew was somebody that I recruited, that carried my vision in terms of the culture and everything already there. Because I could let them do the day-to-day management, and I could make sure, to your point, on the back end that after reviewing resumes and stuff, that I put the right slate and the right pieces.

Jorge de la Osa 21:49

This was something that I learned in my Wyndham days, which was a much bigger organization.

Tim Haley 21:54

Right.

Jorge de la Osa 21:54

The department had over 100 people. I think it was close to 180 people within just the legal group. It was huge. I had to really on lieutenants to make sure in the different departments. Part of the way I used to do that is make sure that there was a clear reporting line, everybody knew what the reporting, and the accountability, and the organizational structure looked like. Through that, I could sleep at night because then I could let them do the day-to-day coaching, to your point.

Tim Haley 22:23

Right.

Jorge de la Osa 22:23

I could let them do the day-to-day coaching while I did more of the general manager duties.

Jorge de la Osa 22:27

Now I think they’re still both important. If you don’t have that set up yet, or if it’s a very small group, which was the case later obviously when I joined the startup division, there I’m doing both.

Tim Haley 22:39

Right.

Jorge de la Osa 22:40

I’m making sure I’m coaching the people coming in at the same time I’m working through, and instilling, and trying to set up my org chart the way I want to do it. I think both of them. And then on top of that, you add the additional layer of making sure you’re practicing law and advising executives and everything else, it’s obviously a multilayered responsibility when you end up in a GC role.

Tim Haley 23:01

Yeah, of course. It’s one of those things that obviously, I’m going to use my cooking analogy again, better ingredients leads to a better meal. But at some point, you got to use what you got and maximize whatever that is. Yeah. Both skills are important. Interesting to hear you talk about balancing both of those requirements of the job.

Candice Reed 23:28

Yeah. Jorge, I’m curious how you fall on this question, because this is a conversation that I have with a lot of our clients who we are assisting with the hiring process, whether through short term or flexible contract engagements or permanent hiring. Employers tend to fall in one of two categories. One is I am hiring for experience. I want someone with these particular skills, who has worked in this particular field, or is an expert in this particular area of law. Often this is in-house, for a more general role, so not necessarily a top-tier law firm partner who is intended to specialize, but someone who is more of a utility player or business partner. You have hiring for experience versus, or hiring for personality. I want someone who’s gritty, who’s not going to stop until they find the right answer, who is curious, who can communicate well up and down the hierarchy of the business.

Candice Reed 24:48

What camp do you fall in, or do you prioritize one over the other? Obviously, I know you’d like to have both. But when you are looking for that match or that good fit, if you are the one hiring, or when you were the one hiring, which were you prioritizing?

Jorge de la Osa 25:06

For me, it was the latter. It was the grittiness, it was the personality. It was all the intangibles that are very hard to build into somebody after the fact. For me, a lot of it was also driven by the in-house client. My in-house clients were all very different. They had their own personality and quirks. If the head of real estate for the development company was a certain way and I knew he was going to clash with somebody who was either too lighthearted or whatever, then I’d make sure that my recruiting was tailored more towards that personality.

Jorge de la Osa 25:43

I think everybody that’s already coming out of this profession as a J.D., I start from the fact that they’re intelligent. Now I’ve got to make sure I fill in the intangibles that are very hard to build into somebody after the fact. You certainly can’t change a lot of those personality traits after somebody has started working. It’s important obviously to have the right fit in culture, but if it’s also not the right fit with the client, I call them clients but they’re really colleagues. But in-house clients, if they’re not going to be the right fit or they require a particular personality, I’m going to try to find that.

Candice Reed 26:14

In a former episode, one of our guests, Mike Haven, referred to those intangibles as power skills. Communication, grit, resilience. How do you assess for those power skills? And then again, on the flip side, as the job seeker, how do you give examples or show a potential employer that you have them?

Jorge de la Osa 26:40

Obviously, I think it’s the hardest part. The hardest part of an interview is trying to flush that out. I think I alluded to it earlier, Candice, when I said I let the candidate talk for however long, 10, 20 minutes, however they want to in a sense, to draw out the personality. Find out what their curiosity, find out as much as I can. And hopefully it’s not all just canned questions, and go up and down the resume because that tells you something, too. I try to get it by just being quiet in the interview and trying to let them do their talk.

Jorge de la Osa 27:11

It’s hard because the other part of it is, and it may not come out in that one interview. I try to not just do one interview, because somebody can always blow one interview. I try it to be a multiple interview process where you have multiple interviews, so that you can get different people, different levels, and try to assess a little bit more of the personality that way. If I can even do a lunch interview, or coffee, or something like that, I like to do that because you get to see the interaction also, the interpersonal skills and the interaction person-to-person. Which is getting harder and hard nowadays, with everything video.

Candice Reed 27:43

Yeah.

Jorge de la Osa 27:44

I think that’s my number one. I think that’s in terms of the hiring side.

Jorge de la Osa 27:51

In terms of the candidate, the only thing you can do is, again, you want to have the right fit so all you can do is try to be yourself. Don’t change your style. Don’t try to overemphasize something that you’re not necessarily strong at, or whatever it is. Be yourself. Be completely transparent, honest, and if you’ve got the curiosity to learn, say that but don’t say that you’re an expert in SaaS contracts when you’ve only done one in your entire career. I think try to, as best you can, be yourself.

Jorge de la Osa 28:18

Remember, the interview goes both ways so that should take some of the pressure off of it. If it’s not meant to be or if the fit is not right, you want to know right from the beginning, not much later in the process.

Candice Reed 28:28

Absolutely. I will often tell job seekers as part of their preparation is to catalog or bank some stories that show a time when they were curious, a time when they successfully led others. A time when they showed grit. A time where they communicated effectively across the company. Not so that they can, in the 30 minutes they may have with a would-be employer, rattle through all of these stories. But so that they have them within reach, they have access to those stories so that they can pull one out if someone does say, “Well, tell me about some of your power skills.” Or, “Tell me about a time when you showed leadership.” That is a way that you can prepare for interviews as well. Especially high level interviews, where those power skills may be even more crucial.

Candice Reed 29:44

My own experience has showed me that not every conversation is a successful interview. I had an experience once when I was young lawyer, in fact I was in law school. I’m telling on myself here. This was many, many years ago. I’ve learned a few things since then. But I remember doing an on-campus interview where I was talking to a large firm partner. He noticed in my resume that I had spent the summer before law school as a photographer. Back in the day, my father owned a photography business. This was when not everyone had a camera in their back pocket with their phone, and we would take little league pictures, and that type of thing.

Candice Reed 30:28

This attorney asked me a question about taking pictures. It led to a wonderful conversation, at least from my perspective, where we talked for 30 minutes about my experience as a little league photographer. I did not get a callback interview. What I learned from that experience was that even though that was a great conversation, I had not given him any reason to call me back. I gave him lots of reasons why he might want to hire me for his son’s little league picture photo shoot, but I hadn’t given him any reason to think that I would be a great associate at his law firm.

Candice Reed 31:19

You want to be authentic, and natural, and show that you’re a good conversationalist, but you also want to be talking about things that are relevant to the job that you’re applying for. Thinking about some of those stories or some of those examples beforehand, I think that could be helpful. Especially if you get in there and you’re a little nervous, or you might be expected to lead the conversation a little bit, you can pull those stories out.

Jorge de la Osa 31:45

To follow that up, that thought process. You won’t forget if you’ve got your 20 minutes to go through your resume, and all of a sudden you’re not just going line-by-line, you basically have picked out something that’s relevant to the role. There’s a role responsibility or something that’s important, and you’ve tied it to that story. You’ve pulled it out of the resume, but you’ve also tied it to a story where you showed perseverance, grit, or whatever that requirement is. That’s exactly what I look for if you’re on the hiring side of a candidate that has the ability to translate, and not just communicate their experience, but communicate it in a way that then resonates and you remember for a long time.

Tim Haley 32:24

Yeah. Candice, I was going to piggyback on your story just to say I think there’s a place for stuff like that, depending on where you are in the interview process. If your interview seven or eight, and you’ve had all of those different stories, I’m emphasizing a part, a part of the process is to show that you’re a fit personally in addition to professionally, and with your skillset, and personality-wise. If you’ve got a common interest with somebody, I don’t think there’s any harm taking maybe three or four minutes to share that interest.

Candice Reed 33:01

Yeah, not the whole interview.

Tim Haley 33:04

Not the whole interview, right.

Candice Reed 33:05

That’s the point there.

Tim Haley 33:07

Yeah.

Candice Reed 33:07

Don’t think that just because you’re talking and you’re having a good conversation that it means you’ve sold yourself and you’re getting the job offer.

Tim Haley 33:17

Yeah.

Candice Reed 33:17

There are those nuances. Again, I was not an experienced interviewee, or interviewer. I don’t know which one I was at that point. I’ve learned from that experience as well as many others. There is a time and place, as with all things. Then also, you have to be cognizant of how much is packed into those 30-minute conversations, or one-hour conversations. As you mentioned, whether this is a coffee versus the seventh interview that you’ve now had with the same person. All things to just be swirling around in your head, both in preparation for an interview as well as while you are in it. Just being cognizant of, “Maybe this story has run its course.”

Tim Haley 34:19

Right.

Jorge de la Osa 34:21

Candice, to that point, I had a candidate just recently who hit it off phenomenally well with a client. Now it was a happy ending, but the interview was 90 minutes.

Jorge de la Osa 34:34

I think I would tell a candidate just be mindful of how much time you have-

Candice Reed 34:39

Absolutely.

Jorge de la Osa 34:39

Because if they’ve allotted and the general counsel is telling you he’s go 30 minutes, you don’t want to have a 30-minute conversation about your growing up in the same city.

Tim Haley 34:48

Right.

Jorge de la Osa 34:48

But if the general counsel has an hour-and-a-half to give, then by all means, obviously the connection is important, but you’d better get to also the fact that you’ve got to prove that you can do the job.

Tim Haley 34:59

I think that some of the best … I did some litigation back in my practicing days. But the clearest way to think about it sometimes, an interview, is it’s almost like a deposition. A friendly deposition where you get to ask questions and you have to answer questions, so you’re on both sides of the table for it. But you also go into a deposition with goals, and you try to get as many of those goals accomplished as possible. Because depositions are timed, too. There’s a lot more time and there’s a lot more specificity that you have to get to. Just going into it with three or four goals, and then being conversational, and open-minded, and listening to the other side so that they can accomplish their three or four goals as well. I think that’s a good interview.

Candice Reed 35:45

Good point.

Candice Reed 35:47

Jorge, as you look back over your career, and also consider the work that you’re doing now with Latitude, what’s the number one piece of advice that you would give to the person sitting in the hiring seat? And then what is a piece of advice that you would give to the person who is being interviewed?

Jorge de la Osa 36:08

I think if you’re on the hiring side, I think my advice is allow the candidate to have time to decompress at the beginning of the interview, and then let them be themselves for a while. I’ve been through a lot of interviews personally, where you go into 20 questions, one after the other, and you don’t get a chance to necessarily show yourself or your personality. If that’s important to you, I think you’ve got to give them the chance to be themselves for a little while. It’s obviously the way that I interview, but maybe not to everyone. A lot of people are more formalized in their interview process, but I like to have at least a good five, 10 minutes of letting the candidate do their thing and that way you get a good sense of who they are.

Jorge de la Osa 37:00

Advice for the candidate? Advice for the candidate is be careful going in full of expectations. I think Tim’s right. I think you come up with your goals, I think you have an open mind about the role in a sense. I think coming in with preconceived notions, whether you think, “Oh, I’m never going to get that,” or whether it’s, “Oh my gosh, my resume is so good, it’s going to be a slam dunk.” I think you set yourself up for failure or success based on the attitude you take into the interview. I’d say go in there a little bit humble, but also open-minded. Learn about the role, be interested not just in going through and talking about yourself, but be interested in the culture, the fit, the people. Get a little bit more at those power skills. At least find out how the person that you’re talking to feels about those power skills and how they maybe see them within the team, or they don’t.

Jorge de la Osa 37:52

I think take the time to go through and allow the interview to take its course without pre-judging, “Oh my gosh, I bombed that question, or I bombed this question.” You never know. At the end of the day, you never know. Even if you feel you didn’t do well, you could have nailed it and been fine with it. I think you just go in and be as confident as you can, but at the same time be open-minded about the process and let it carry out.

Candice Reed 38:18

I do think that’s so important to approach the interview from both sides as an honest conversation, where both sides are trying to determine whether it’s a good match.

Tim Haley 38:35

Right.

Candice Reed 38:35

It’s not one person trying to impress another person, or one person trying to trip up the other person or uncover a secret stash of ingredients that will automatically suggest that this interviewee is the right person for the job. It really is about entering into it with the mutual goal of determining whether this is a good match. Because if it’s not, it’s obviously not going to work well for either side if it’s not working well for one side.

Candice Reed 39:19

We have found you don’t have to do this job for very long to recognize that lawyers are extremely bright. And a lot of times, they know what the quote-unquote, “right answer” is for some of those canned questions that we all expect. They will have worked out their answers to those questions ahead of time. Where you really get to know someone is in the conversation. I love your advice about starting the interview gently and letting someone reveal who they are, and then once their comfortable, asking them more about their experience and listening for some of those power skills or the intangibles, the soft skills that you mentioned that are so critical.

Tim Haley 40:13

Yeah. Especially for lawyers interviewing other lawyers, knowing your audience, too. An HR professional podcast might have totally different advice for their crew on just the way that they’ve got to do their interviews, too.

Candice Reed 40:29

I do have one last question. When is it appropriate for a job seeker to reach out to someone like you, a recruiter, for assistance?

Jorge de la Osa 40:42

Well, my advice to my kids is in a sense, you’re always looking for your next job. You think you need to keep a pulse on the industry. If you’re a lawyer, you need to keep a pulse on the industry you’re in and always look for opportunities. The opportunities may not always find you, but if you’re prepared for it and all of a sudden, you aren’t looking and you find it, it may be a good time for you to make the move. I think you stay prepared. I think you look and see what’s out there. You look at whose hiring.

Jorge de la Osa 41:12

It’s not that you’re dissatisfied. I think some people say, “Well, I’m not looking because I’m happy with what I have.” It’s not about that. It’s a little bit about, maybe to Tim’s point, what’s down the road? What do you want to be doing in five years? You don’t know unless you’re keeping a pulse on what’s out there. I think it’s important for attorneys, for candidates, for anyone to keep an eye out with what’s going on in the industry.

Jorge de la Osa 41:32

Our website’s easy because we obviously have clients in a bunch of different industries. You can always be looking at it, it doesn’t mean anything, and you never know what’s out there. But I think you might find something, you’d be surprised, that might all of a sudden pique your interest, and there might be a great fit there.

Jorge de la Osa 41:48

I was never afraid to make the jump. Some people I think are, and it goes against human nature maybe to make the change. I think part of my advice is don’t be afraid. Don’t be afraid to keep looking because you just never know what’s out there. It doesn’t mean you’re committed. It means I think you’re smart if you’re thinking your pulse on what’s out there and what may be available.

Candice Reed 42:08

I think it also can make you a better leader if you are in that position in your current job, to know what the market is, to know what it might take to add to your team, or what some of your team members might be considering so that you can remain relevant and make sure that you’re keeping your great talent onboard, too. I think that’s great advice. It’s just about being aware, not necessarily looking. I know that’s a great time, typically, to have a conversation with a recruiter, when you’re not necessarily desperate to make a move.

Tim Haley 42:51

Right.

Candice Reed 42:51

But where you can ask some thoughtful questions and mull over the answers and do that soul-searching that you mentioned a couple of times, to see if a move might be right at some point.

Candice Reed 43:10

Well, thank you so much, Jorge, for sharing your story and your career with us. We’re so happy that you’re with us at Latitude, and you’re helping so many attorneys find that right match. We appreciate the practical advice.

Jorge de la Osa 43:27

It’s been great. It’s been great joining you guys. I appreciate the time, and obviously the topic.

Tim Haley 43:32

Thank you for joining us today. If you found this content valuable, please tell a friend or colleague about us. Also, if you can, please give us a rating and a short review on your podcast listening platform. The more ratings and reviews we have, the more people will find us. If you have a question, reach out to us at latitudelegal.com.