Choose a field that is consistent with who you are. If you don’t care about helping people, matrimonial law is probably not the best area for you to practice in. If you are motivated solely by money, your clients will eventually see that, and it will compromise your ability to practice at your best.
The legal field is known to be extremely competitive. Lawyers are often smart, ambitious, and highly educated. That being said, what does it take to stand out and become a “Top Lawyer” in your specific field of law? In this interview series called “5 Things You Need To Become A Top Lawyer In Your Specific Field of Law”, we are talking to top lawyers who share what it takes to excel and stand out in your industry.
As a part of this interview series, I had the pleasure of interviewing James P. Joseph.
James P. Joseph is the Managing Partner of one of Long Island’s top boutique matrimonial law firms, Joseph Law Group P.C. The firm is proud to have a record of successes and a well-known commitment to its clients and to divorce law. It’s highly regarded throughout the legal community because of its integrity and commitment to excellence. The team at Joseph Law Group, P.C. takes great pride in the results obtained, and is so appreciative of the gratitude regularly conveyed by clients.
Focused and hard-working, James says his firm never loses sight of its goal: obtaining an equitable resolution for clients without inflicting unnecessary financial and emotional damage on the family. They cater to a wide range of clientele, from business owners, doctors, lawyers and other professionals, executives, and members of the finance industry, to having represented the spouse of billionaire Ronald Perelman.
In the words of James himself, “We spend a lot of time educating our clients. Our first meeting is Divorce Law 101, for which my clients are grateful. They appreciate the time we take, and they leave understanding the process and what they can expect. The clients whom we accept stay with us — we have a very high retention rate for this field. The vast majority of our clients have been referred to us by clients we previously represented, or by other lawyers. One of the things I am most proud of is the growth of our firm which, I believe, is a testament to how we handle our cases — with zealous advocacy, speed, and focus. It’s part of my job to keep everyone grounded, everyone focused on the objective — a fair and lasting settlement.”
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series. Before we dig in, our readers would love to get to know you a bit more. What is the “backstory” that brought you to this particular career path in Law? Did you want to be an attorney “when you grew up”?
Idid not. It wasn’t until after I had graduated college that I first contemplated law school. My sister was studying for the LSATs (the entrance exam for law school) and quickly decided it was not for her. However, she urged me to take it, confident that those logic questions were exactly how I thought. At the time, I was days away from leaving on a solo backpacking trip throughout Europe. As I traveled, I gave law school more thought, ultimately booked a ticket that would get me back to the US a week before the next exam and was fortunate to do quite well. The rest, as they say, is history.
Can you tell us a bit about the nature of your practice and what you focus on?
We practice exclusively in the areas of matrimonial and family law. That means we are divorce attorneys, and also represent people in custody and support matters, grandparent visitation and custody matters, prenuptial and postnuptial agreements, and orders of protection.
You are a successful attorney. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? What unique qualities do you have that others may not? Can you please share a story or example for each?
1. Grit
I was taught from an early age the importance of having a positive impact, of doing what is right. Much of that I attribute to my mother, who was devoted her life to others as a nurse, in the 1960s as a nurse in a New York City Emergency Room, then as a school nurse on Long Island while my sister and I were children and finally as the head nurse in a locked psychiatric unit of a NYC hospital.
As a young lawyer, I was humbled by the responsibility clients placed in me, recognizing the critical role I would play at that time in their lives. For various reasons, including perhaps a fear of failure, my ego, and my sense of responsibly, once I committed to this field, I was determined to be the best. I could not sleep at night without being confident that my clients were getting the best representation possible. To this day, I continue to make sure I do all I can to ensure our team continues to provide that level of representation. As I will share below, no matter what curves life has thrown at me, I have always remained laser-focused on this goal. My parents were both born during the Great Depression and my mother grew up in the Bronx, quite poor. She would often return home from school to find her family’s belongings on the street. Yet despite that, she pressed forward, found a career as a nurse, and along with my father, provided us with a stable middle class upbringing. My mother always insisted that I could accomplish whatever I wanted, so long as I was willing to work hard to do so.
2. Resilience
Life, for most everyone, eventually presents incredible challenges. Whether it is a result of my upbringing or a genetic predisposition, I have been fortunate to spend little time wallowing in those challenges, have always rebounded quickly, and have faced challenges in stride, seeing them for what they were, but not worse than what they were.
When I was diagnosed with leukemia at age 34, at a time when my wife was 7 months pregnant with our second child, I was fortunate to not waste emotional energy feeling bad for myself, questioning “why me”. Instead, we were able to focus (most of the time) on the present, and on ensuring I received the best medical care available. I am forever grateful that I am cured, with no lasting side effects, and have done all I can to give back by supporting the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society which funded research which ultimately saved my life. While the cancer hung over our heads for nearly 10 years, I remained focused on my practice, building a great team, and doing all I could to ensure our clients always received top representation and I am confident we accomplished that.
I have been fortunate to always face adversity without wasting energy on “why me” but instead seeing each “obstacle” as an opportunity to grow, to better myself and our team.
3. Mentorship
To practice law at the highest levels requires, in my opinion, constant growth. The law is always evolving, and therefore, you must keep learning. However, the demands of the practice are such that it can be exceedingly difficult to both practice law and run a successful firm. Yet the two are necessarily intertwined. Without a well-run law firm, lawyers simply do not have the tools, the time, nor the energy to focus on providing top legal representation. Fortunately, early in my career I began working with Atticus, a management consulting firm that works exclusively with lawyers to help ensure they build great practices. To this day, I continue to be coached, and have also coached other top matrimonial lawyers from around the country, so that we can be as effective as possible for our clients.
Do you think you have had luck in your success? Can you explain what you mean?
Certainly, having been raised in a stable suburban middle-class household, with hard-working, parents who had a strong sense of ethics and morals, was pure luck that provided me with a significant leg up on success.
Along the way, I have had a lot of “luck”, including finding the consulting firm, Atticus, addressed above. I was lucky to believe that I could control my destiny and so I quickly signed on with them. All these years later, I am still coached by Atticus and through Atticus have coached other prominent matrimonial lawyers from around the country. They gave me the skills needed to ensure that I could create a mission-driven firm where my team had the platform to perform their best, to ensure that our clients received the best possible representation, and our lawyers and staff could not find a better law firm in which to work.
I was certainly lucky to have been cured from cancer (and perhaps not so lucky to have gotten cancer but again, we all have something).
I believe strongly that luck opens doors, but that we also can create our luck. I was lucky to be cured, but my wife and I also worked hard to ensure that we understood the disease as best we could and made sure we found the best care possible. When luck opens a door, I do all I can to ensure that I make the most of that opening.
Do you think where you went to school has any bearing on your success? How important is it for a lawyer to go to a top-tier school?
I went to a very good, second-tier law school, Hofstra Law School on Long Island. If one’s goal is to work in one of the big international law firms, certainly a top-tier school will help pave that way. But the vast majority of lawyers work in solo or small firms, and I believe they are better served by attending a school local to the region where they intend to practice. The network I developed in law school has been incredibly valuable to my success.
Based on the lessons you have learned from your experience, if you could go back in time and speak to your twenty-year-old self, what would you say? Would you do anything differently?
I am not a fan of hindsight but… “You don’t know what you don’t know!” As I grow older, that adage becomes ever more impactful in my life. It has increased my curiosity, allowed me to explore and devote energy to things that have been so beneficial to me, but things that when I was younger, I might have simply passed on, not being able to see any potential benefit.
This is not easy work. What is your primary motivation and drive behind the work that you do?
I care deeply about other people. I have been fortunate to have a wonderful wife, who is my best friend, great friends and children who we love dearly and are so proud of! We truly enjoy our lives. To provide people in unhealthy marriages the opportunity to live such a life humbles me and drives me.
Similarly, too many divorce lawyers are miserable, buried in work, with no time for family and friends. To create a firm where my team can also enjoy a great life, while providing unparalleled representation gives me great pride and is part of the legacy I hope to leave.
What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now?
I’ve been invited to speak at an annual summit organized by Atticus, the management consulting firm I had mentioned earlier. We have an outstanding reputation at Joseph Law Group, P.C. for our ability to consistently achieve positive outcomes for our clients. This is largely due to our being efficient and proactive, which are qualities that stem from forming good habits. So that will be my topic of discussion — the importance of building and maintaining good habits.
Where do you go from here? Where do you aim to be in the next chapter of your career?
I plan on maximizing the impact of our firm on our local community by growing our practice, bringing on top talent so that we can provide top representation to as many people as possible.
Without sharing anything confidential, can you please share your most successful “war story”? Can you share the funniest?
When I started my own practice, I was 5 years out of law school and was referred a case from another lawyer who I just finished a case against. He explained that he was too busy to take this matter and it was a dead loser. It was a divorce involving a highly litigated custody dispute, the trial was scheduled to start in two weeks, the judge would not adjourn the trial and the court and the attorney for the child did not like my client. The referring lawyer also told me the client was a great guy, deserved custody but couldn’t win under the circumstances but he needed representation.
Anyway, the client was a great guy, I worked day and night to prepare and we went through a grueling trial. The trial judge reprimanded me repeatedly against exploring certain issues, issues which when he issued his 35-page decision granting my client custody, he expressly agreed with me on those issues. I remained close with that client for many years, and was most moved when he shared that after his ex-wife had another child, out of wedlock with another man, he became the regular babysitter for that child. He explained that just as his ex-wife would always be the mother to his children and so despite what she put him through, he would always treat her with kindness and respect, this was the half-sibling to his own children and it was the right thing to do.
Ok, fantastic. Let’s now shift to discussing some advice for aspiring lawyers. Do you work remotely? Onsite? Or Hybrid? What do you think will be the future of how law offices operate? What do you prefer? Can you please explain what you mean?
Maybe I am old school, but I continue to believe in-person is ideal. As a divorce lawyer, being face to face with our clients in invaluable. Further, we are always learning, always benefit from each other’s views, and being in-person provides us with the opportunity to regularly brainstorm. Our team does enjoy the flexibility of some remote work, as we recognize the value of healthy lives outside the office, both on our employees and on their ability to provide their best when working.
How has the legal world changed since COVID? How do you think it might change in the near future? Can you explain what you mean?
Just like in any industry, we are more cautious when interacting with others, more sensitive to anyone who may be displaying symptoms, and try to be more flexible if people need to take time off to tend to their physical health and well-being. Remote work is certainly a more widely accepted option now. Client consultations and court conferences are also often done virtually. The plan is to continue down this path for as long as needed.
Based on your experience, how can attorneys effectively leverage social media to build their practice?
Social media is a great way to educate an audience and build a community around any relevant topic or issue.
Excellent. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 Things You Need To Become A Top Lawyer In Your Specific Field of Law?” Please share a story or an example for each.
Work hard but work smart. This is not an easy field. The stakes are quite high and if you litigate you are often under attack, by opposing counsel certainly, but at times, also by the court and even your client. Constant stress and long hours compromise your brain’s ability to function best. If your firm is not well-run, you will be unable to provide the best possible representation to your client. When I was a young lawyer, working long hours, 6 or 7 days a week, was a badge of honor. I now understand how unfair that was to both myself, my family and just as importantly, to our clients. All too often, I speak with a lawyer on a Monday morning, and they are already strung out, yelling irrationally. I will remind them that I am not the client and often, that we are friends professionally. They will then apologize but share how strung out they are, having worked all weekend and dreading the week ahead. This is so sad, so unnecessary and so counter-productive to their goal to help their clients.
Choose a field that is consistent with who you are. If you don’t care about helping people, matrimonial law is probably not the best area for you to practice in. If you are motivated solely by money, your clients will eventually see that, and it will compromise your ability to practice at your best.
We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might see this. :-)
My “person” is Muhammad Ali, for many reasons. But most of them can be summed up by this quote:
“Champions aren’t made in gyms. Champions are made from something they have deep inside them: A desire, a dream, a vision. They have to have last-minute stamina, they have to be a little faster, they have to have the skill and the will. But the will must be stronger than the skill.”
This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for the time you spent with this. We wish you continued success and good health!
About the Interviewer: Eric L. Pines is a nationally recognized federal employment lawyer, mediator, and attorney business coach. He represents federal employees and acts as in-house counsel for over fifty thousand federal employees through his work as a federal employee labor union representative. A formal federal employee himself, Mr. Pines began his federal employment law career as in-house counsel for AFGE Local 1923 which is in Social Security Administration’s headquarters and is the largest federal union local in the world. He presently serves as AFGE 1923’s Chief Counsel as well as in-house counsel for all FEMA bargaining unit employees and numerous Department of Defense and Veteran Affairs unions.
While he and his firm specialize in representing federal employees from all federal agencies and in reference to virtually all federal employee matters, his firm has placed special attention on representing Veteran Affairs doctors and nurses hired under the authority of Title. He and his firm have a particular passion in representing disabled federal employees with their requests for medical and religious reasonable accommodations when those accommodations are warranted under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (ADA). He also represents them with their requests for Federal Employee Disability Retirement (OPM) when an accommodation would not be possible.
Mr. Pines has also served as a mediator for numerous federal agencies including serving a year as the Library of Congress’ in-house EEO Mediator. He has also served as an expert witness in federal court for federal employee matters. He has also worked as an EEO technical writer drafting hundreds of Final Agency Decisions for the federal sector.
Mr. Pines’ firm is headquartered in Houston, Texas and has offices in Baltimore, Maryland and Atlanta, Georgia. His first passion is his wife and five children. He plays classical and rock guitar and enjoys playing ice hockey, running, and biking. Please visit his websites at www.pinesfederal.com and www.toughinjurylawyers.com. He can also be reached at [email protected].
