This week, my focus is the importance of decency in our interactions with those who hold contrary opinions to our own. After witnessing decency fail among men in the Oval Office last week and an unfortunate display of divisiveness and polarization during the president’s address to Congress earlier this week, I have to wonder how close to extinction decency is in our national politics, our international relationships, and our society.

Demonstrating strength and assertiveness is appropriate in meetings with opposing parties and during negotiations. In fact, those skills can be essential to successful outcomes. However, negotiations should never give in to hateful emotions and intentional bullying. Finger pointing, name calling, cane wagging and sign waving are not positive negotiation tactics. They are not worthy of replication.

Successful negotiations are not “gotcha” exercises followed by chest pounding. They are not opportunities for threatening opponents. Rather, those kinds of negative behaviors demonstrate a weakness in negotiation skills and mean that we need stronger examples of leadership. They mean that we need a resurgence of dignity and decency.

I have written and spoken about the importance of dignity and decency in the profession of law for years, at law schools, at bar association meetings, in law firms, and in legal media. I have included discussion of professional decency in my books, and I addressed the topic at greater length in a 2020 monthly column for the ABA Journal and in an earlier 2016 article for Corporate Counsel magazine.

Here is how I addressed the importance of dignity and decency in my book New Lawyer Launch: The Handbook for Young Lawyers (Full Court Press, 2022) :

Civility should be the goal for all lawyers. It is important that we emulate respect, dignity, and civil discourse in our disagreements and debates because the public is watching and judging our profession by our behavior and conduct. It is incumbent that you, the youngest lawyers today, do not behave in ways that damage and undermine the profession. Be decent. Be honorable. Be professional.

That may seem like a lot to ask of young lawyers when their role models often are as deficient as those on display recently. But, I do ask it of you, and you should ask it of yourselves. It is the thing that may determine the success or lack of success in a career that you have worked hard for and value.

Opportunities for retakes after a showing of a lack of dignity and respect are rare. Second chances do not come easily. It is important to put your best self forward during your first opportunity and at all times afterward.

Be decent. Be honorable. Be professional.

Getting the attention of those above you on the career ladder can be very challenging. I have heard this lament from many young lawyers over the decades that I have been meting out advice to them. The complaints usually start with “The partner just won’t listen to me” or something similar. I know that it is frustrating, and I have been on both ends of that particular ladder.

The practice of law is very demanding, as we all know, and it allows many opportunities for frustration and emotional responses. My answer, to this particular brand of frustration, always is strategic. The answer always stresses the importance of taking the long view. Winning the battle can feel good at the time, but winning the war should be the objective. In other words, you need to fight the impulse to lose your temper because you feel that you are not being respected when your ideas are not immediately embraced. You need to be creative and even a little manipulative. You need to try to make that idea your supervisor’s idea. It is not the time to get your feelings hurt. It is the time to get your idea over the goal line and into the end zone.

If your idea is a good one, and let’s assume it is, you should be able to explain it in such a way that engages your supervisor and gets his or her attention. And when it reaches that level of importance, it should not matter whose idea it is. It is better that your idea is moving along than if it is still stuck in the gutter because you were not capable of selling it and were not even interested in trying.

Some people do not buy this approach. I once had a fellow panelist vehemently disagree with me about this. That person could not believe that I would allow someone else to claim my idea. I could only assume that she preferred to see a good idea die a quick death, have herself a good sulk, and complain to all who would listen about an opportunity lost. Honestly, neither of those approaches makes much sense to me.

This does not mean that you should allow other associates to appropriate your ideas. Not at all, and I cover that scenario in my book New Lawyer Launch. On an even playing field like the one between associates, that is not to be tolerated. But selling your idea to a superior is in a different league. And it takes a different approach.

It is no secret that law firm partners do not feel compelled to listen to the ideas of associates. That is just a fact of life, although it sounds harsh. Law firm partners have a lot on their plates, and it can be difficult to get their attention. The same is true in the public sector where agency heads do not always have time to listen to the ideas of their reports.

Here’s how one of my favorite authors, Sue Monk Kidd, puts it, “If you need something from somebody, always give that person a way to hand it to you.” In other words and in the context of sharing ideas with superiors, if you want approval for your idea, make it easy for that person to embrace your idea, embellish it and hand it back to you as his or her own. Suddenly that idea is over the goal line and into the end zone. If he or she gives you any credit for the idea is not a given. But what you advocated for gets done, and you were part of getting it done.

At certain times in your career you need to be satisfied with a result like that. It may not be fair, but it is what you can expect.

I remember when my husband, in the fall of his third year of law school, was invited to join the US Department of Justice as an honor hire. The DOJ Honors Program was such a sweet plum to harvest, and he and I — a mere 1 L at the time — were so excited. All of the hard work he had done to make himself eligible for that job had paid off. He went on to spend the first five years of his practice at DOJ, using his combined background as a fighter pilot and a lawyer, defending the United States in plane crash litigation, which was all too prevalent at that time. He received excellent training at DOJ, which resulted in a strong foundation for the next 45-plus years of his practice.

Not much changed for those lucky enough to be DOJ honor hires until a few days ago. It is a highly select program. In 2024, as few as “more than 100” lawyers were hired in that program according to the National Association of Law Placement, and we could have expected a comparable number in 2025. But all that changed in the blink of an eye when the White House froze salaries and hiring at all agencies, and those hired in this year’s class were notified that they no longer had jobs.

All agencies of the federal government. In one fell swoop, jobs for thousands of 2025 law school hires disappeared. Currently, the freeze is being fought in the courts, but there is no guarantee how it will end up.

This is tragic. This should not happen. And now all of those lawyers are in complete disarray as they contemplate a very different future than the one they thought was before them.

As bad as it is, this is not the first occasion of such freezes. For more information on that history, see https://www.yalejreg.com/nc/hiring-freezes-and-job-offer-revocations. But this may be the worst.

Fortunately, I have seen programs announced in the last few days to help victims of these freezes find employment in state and local government and non-government jobs. I hope some of you can access that help. Your law school career services offices should know about these programs and should be able to help you.

So, make an appointment with your career services office asap. They are not just there to take credit for your job successes based on all your hard work. They also need to be there when things fall apart. Press them until you get the help you deserve.

After all, rent does not wait. Student loan payments do not wait. The basic necessities of life do not wait.

Good luck to all of you. Some of you suffered similar blows during the pandemic, and, for sure, you do not need this. But keep in mind that you are not the biggest losers. The biggest loser is the United States Government and the agencies that will not get benefit from the talent you present.

By design, I am not often political in my writing. But I also need to be cognizant of things which appear to undercut the messages that I have sent in support of women lawyers in the last 15-plus years during the life of the Best Friends at the Bar project.

I have advocated for women lawyers in my first three books, and I have delivered scores of programs on the subject to audiences in this country and abroad. I also have said, without exception, that I do not expect accommodations for women lawyers. What I expect is a helping hand down from leadership in recognition that women in the profession have different challenges than men in the profession. And that mother lawyers have different challenges from all other members of the profession, both men and women. That hand down is also to retain the immense talent that women lawyers represent in the profession. Astute industry leaders should not want to lose that talent.

In cases where I think that preferences for women lawyers have gone too far, I have called them out. I respect women lawyers to be able to compete without accommodations because they are capable, strong and resilient. Having said that, I do not want to see the “baby thrown out with the bathwater.” In instances where it has gone too far, the remedy needs to be to change policies, not to cancel them.

I fear that with the recent emphasis on cancelling considerations of diversity and inclusion is doing just that. Throwing the baby out with the bathwater, not just for women but for other diverse groups. And that will set our country and our profession back so far.

Equity is not bad. Inclusion is not bad. What is bad is overreaction. As lawyers, we are educated to be prudent. Recent actions do not appear prudent. I hope that those of you who have respected voices will be prudent in safeguarding the progress that has been made on behalf of women lawyers to date and work hard to assure that it continues into the future.