“Uncertainty In Remote Vs In-Office Hiring” with Marc Zwetchkenbaum of Marc Z Legal Staffing

Nathan (0s):
Welcome back radio entrepreneurs, listeners, and fans. I’m producer Nathan Gobes filling in again for Jeffrey Davis this morning. I’ve got at my side, Peter Meyerson author and retired attorney. Welcome Peter.

Peter (13s):
Thank you, Nathan. Great to be here. Impossible to fill in for Jeffery.

Nathan (18s):
Yeah, we do try though, regardless. It’s great to have you as a cohost. And of course our guest for this segment is one that our listeners and viewers probably know. Well, mark Z, president of mark C legal staffing. Welcome mark.

Marc (36s):
Thanks Nathan. Great to be here and great to participate with yourself and, and Peter. Great to see you, Peter.

Peter (44s):
Great to see you, mark. Always a pleasure.

Nathan (47s):
Yeah. So I know you have a specific topic for us, but maybe real quick, before we dive into it, it was occurring to us. Off-air before we got on that, it’s been a while since we’ve given the listeners and viewers an overview of what it is you do tell us about mark Z legal staffing in general, and, you know, tell employers, business owners, how they can utilize your services and then we’ll get into your topic.

Marc (1m 16s):
Thank you, Nathan. Thank you, Peter. So our company Marci legal, we have two areas that we really focus on that is the, the, the contract or the temporary side. And then the full-time recruiting side under the March, the legal recruiting, we specialize in all aspects of legal recruiting, starting from attorneys at all levels in all types of organizations, in addition to law firms. So whether it’s a university biopharma technology company, nonprofit, in addition to law firms, we placed the attorneys at all levels, as well as paralegals mid-level managers and staff on the contract temporary side, we do the same thing.

Marc (2m 10s):
We, we do a lot of extensive work in providing temporary contract attorneys for coverage of healthcare leaves or needs that employers have our clients range from solo practitioners to multi-million dollar law firms and the, we, we were again represent the universities, the biopharmas technology companies, any kind of space. We provide contract assistance and really, really interesting organizations in every organization have some kinds neat needs, legal assistance in some way in the same capacities we provide not only contract attorneys at different levels.

Marc (3m 3s):
We have part-time opportunities. We have full-time opportunities. We have assignment based opportunities. We have temp-to-perm opportunities. And again, in addition to attorneys, paralegals mid-level managers, support staff compliance, any need affecting some type of legal services. We provide that and we’ve been doing that for over 35 years. Now,

Peter (3m 35s):
Do you have, I don’t want to avoid your topic cause I think it’s very interesting one you’re going to talk about, but do, do you solicit the employees to get in touch with you also?

Marc (3m 52s):
Yeah. So what, what we do again, when we have two different divisions under the recruiting model, we have, we have organizations, whether it’s a law firm company or any organization, they retain us to find, to find attorneys, to find paralegals attorneys at all levels, partner, general counsel system, GC, specialized paralegals, to find the right fit. It could be a corporate paralegal business. Paralegal could be a paralegal for, for trial, lawyer, litigation, family, law, commercial, and residential real estate.

Marc (4m 32s):
In all these areas, we place all from attorneys to paralegal, support staff. At the same time, we work with a lot of attorneys at all levels and assisting them with their careers. So attorneys will come to us and they’ll say we reached a certain point in our career where we would like to go in-house we would like to get an, a partnership prac. We would like to work for a bigger firm, a smaller firm. We would like to have more career balanced, meaning less hours that we, where we have to build. So for example, we recently placed somebody that the billable hours were 1500 billable hours.

Marc (5m 16s):
Whereas whereas some firms, the billable hours are 2200 billable hours. And so we really, when we meet people at different stages, primarily attorneys or paralegals or mid-level managers, we strategically will work with them and try to find out what they’re specifically looking for, and then try to match them with an opportunity that fits that need at the same time on the organization company or law firms side, we’ll work with those firms, organizations and companies to try to find the right fit, to recruit people that have the skillset and experience that would be best for those roles.

Nathan (6m 5s):
Excellent. Excellent. So I know you wanted to talk to us today about the changing role of hybrid employments. You know, it, it comes it’s, it’s been coming, it’s been going, but where, where does it fit into the, the hiring world and staffing world today? And I know this conversation is what’s great about your Marcy moments is that these are not just applicable to legal staffing, which is of course what you focus on, but your conversations, these are trends in staffing and hiring overall. So why don’t you tell us what, what you’ve been seeing?

Marc (6m 41s):
Thank you, Nathan Willie, the whole issue with hybrid and the, the, the market, the labor market, excuse me, has been uncertainty organizations, law firms, companies, and individuals. They, they really have a lot of uncertainty in terms of what would be the right balance to protect the health of their employees. At the same time, have a productive work environment where people will benefit. For example, during COVID a lot of companies and firms and organizations, they look to hire people, but they had to onboard them remotely.

Marc (7m 34s):
The, the employees were not allowed in the office and if they were allowed in the office, it was for a limited time. And a lot of times the attorneys that they supported or worked for in some ways might not even come into the office then, or if they came, it was on a limited timeframe and they weren’t getting the mentorship, they weren’t getting the responsibilities and they weren’t bonding with the people they were supposed to support and work with as well as their colleagues. And so the employers wrestle with what works best. And a lot of people excelled working remotely with these, with the companies and organizations and firms and for law firms.

Marc (8m 20s):
It was a Bonanza as far as billable hours and bullies, especially employees with families or large commutes, they were able to cut that down. And so some of the employers that were more of the suburban or small firms outside the city, they did have people come in from on a regular basis, but they had a hybrid schedule. The bigger firms they were sort of in a flux eventually in the last month or two after several, not false starts, but starts that were changed due to the dynamics of the way the, the co-variants were coming in.

Marc (9m 6s):
Now, the employers are having set schedules employees when they came in, they wanted to know when they came in to start their job, they were, when they came in for interviews, what is the schedule? What are your expectations for, for in-office work versus remote work? And gradually employers carved out policies. Some policies were, were set in stone and some policies were variations. And so that’s where we are now. We’re moving to the direction because the new variant is supposed to not as, not as to be, not as effective.

Marc (9m 53s):
And, and to be the re to be one where employees can bounce back quicker. So employers are, are now giving set schedules and that’s coming the last, within the last few weeks to the last month. So you have employers now giving set schedules, giving employees what their expectations and when there are, and when they’re hiring, they’re letting employees know where we’re doing. And it’s in the offer letters. It’s three days in two days out for you’ll have a rotating day if you want. So a lot of the scheduling, is it becoming more set in stone versus fluid because previously employers just didn’t know.

Marc (10m 41s):
They didn’t know what to say because they were fine. They were following the CDC guidelines.

Nathan (10m 49s):
Peter, any thoughts or questions for mark?

Peter (10m 51s):
No. I mean, it’s, it’s really an interesting problem because, you know, employees want to have some idea of what they’re doing and employers want to have some idea what their employees are doing. And, you know, this has just been a very complicated time, period. I, you know, know you sound like you’re really on top of this process, mark. I mean, so I kudos. It’s, it’s a tough problem.

Marc (11m 21s):
It should. It changes with the day Peter. I mean, we’re right in the trenches is, you know, as far as doing deals, trying to recruit for positions where employees are asking, can I work fully remote? If I can, I’d be very interested if I can’t, then I’m staying in my job. Or if I can’t, then I’m not interested in your opportunity or, you know, the whole vaccination process. There’s still a lot of people that aren’t vaccinated. Well, what reason are you not vaccinated? Is it, is that a medical or religious exemption? Can the employer making a combination?

Marc (12m 1s):
And as everybody goes back and understands, COVID better than it’s a whole, it’s a whole different dynamics to what works for the employer and what works for the employee. We’ve had a lot of deals that haven’t gone through because people wanted to know what was set in stone. And we’ve had a lot of deals that they got tabled that eventually worked out. Once everybody came to some kind of solid understanding, but it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s more constructive. Now, at least there are guidelines that employers can work with.

Marc (12m 43s):
I think just this new variant and guidelines. And yes, yesterday I heard news in terms of that masks are going to be lifted and on airline flights and public transportation. And that, that could be a good thing. That could be a bad thing because what happens is not with COVID, but a lot of disease that used to spread is now the flu and other, other different people are gonna start getting these when they didn’t, when they didn’t get it before, during COVID, it wasn’t just COVID it prevented them from getting other diseases. You know,

Peter (13m 24s):
It’s a really interesting problem because so many people got used to the idea of working remotely and it’s now I think become kind of a condition of certain people’s employment.

Marc (13m 37s):
Right, right, right. And that’s part of the negotiation. And if they can have least one or two days remote, that’s becoming a factor. Whether or not they will even be interested in the position.

Nathan (13m 53s):
Yeah. Well, and like you said, markets, it’s changing day by day, which is why we bring you back very, very regularly on our show for these mark Z moments, these staffing and hiring updates. I want to thank you for joining us. Mark. If people want to reach out to mark Z legal staffing, have questions or have hiring needs or their, an attorney or paralegal or anything in the legal field, and they are looking for positions, any of those or more, how could people reach out to you?

Marc (14m 26s):
Well, first of all, Nathan, it was been a pleasure talking to you and Peter, and really appreciate the opportunity to be on the show. The way that people can find us is first of all, Google mark Z M a R C, Z. And just Google that. And may RC and the letter Z and Google vac, or mark marketing, legal.com, M a R C XE Legh l.com or 6 1 7 3 3 8 1 300.

Nathan (14m 58s):
Excellent. And Peter, I know you are an author. You’re a retired attorney, but you’re all, you’re also an author. How can people reach you or find the, your book books, plural, or second one’s coming

Peter (15m 13s):
Second one’s coming. They can, you know, reach me at my email, which is P Meyerson that aol.com. And if they want a copy of the book electronically, they just go to Amazon. And in the search bar type, my name and my book will come up. If they want a printed copy, they go to some place called the book patch and it produces incredibly good print on demand copies. And they’ll send out a copy to anybody who wants for

Nathan (15m 46s):
Great. And of course, if anyone wants to find more mark Z moments, they can head to radio entrepreneurs.com. We’re also on LinkedIn, of course, YouTube. Be sure to subscribe to us there or on your favorite podcast channel where streaming on most. So you can catch more content from radio entrepreneurs. We’ll be back with more after this.