Business Law Today: From a distance

ABA Section of Business Law
Business Law Today
July/August 1998

From a distance . . .
Part-time professor

By James C. Freund

This year — the second year of my retirement from legal practice — I taught a law school class and thoroughly enjoyed the experience. Because it hasn't always worked out that way, I'd like to tell you about it, since someday this might become germane to your decision whether or not to retire.

First, a little personal background. When I was in college, facing a three-year stint in the Navy, I had no idea what I wanted to do when I grew up. The practice of law (a profession with a much lower profile in those pre-Steve Brill/John Grisham days) never even crossed my mind. Writing and teaching had some appeal, but I never viewed writing as a full-time occupation and was put off by the relative penury of a teacher's income.

Then, after some shipboard experience representing AWOL sailors in court martial proceedings (Hey, give me a call if you want to swap some war stories about those fabled days of yore!), I abruptly decided to become a lawyer. It proved to be a splendid professional choice, with the collateral benefit of affording me the opportunity to write and teach on the side.

Five years into practice, I began serving as a panelist on continuing legal education seminars, which I continued to do right up until retirement. I always liked the idea of conveying practical pointers to colleagues. But I also came to realize that, even with the lively panel formats I favored (such as simulated negotiations), this was essentially a one-way process — performing for the attendees, but with little feedback or interaction.

About 10 years ago, John Feerick, the dean of Fordham Law School (and a former partner), asked me to join the school's adjunct faculty. I had this vision of embracing the Socratic method, influencing young minds, reliving The Paper Chase from the front of the room — I was hooked.

The course I taught from then until retirement was called "Negotiating Deals and Disputes." That was what I did for a living, and I had written and lectured a good deal on the subject. It was an ideal topic to prepare students for what they were likely to encounter after graduation in their law firms or corporate legal departments.

But my feelings about the teaching experience during those years were ambivalent at best. On the plus side, it forced me to think through the subject matter coherently, which led to my book, Smart Negotiating. I had the opportunity to perform in front of a live audience, which the ham in me appreciated. I felt a sense of accomplishment whenever a student provided an insight that he or she would have been unlikely to produce before taking the course. And I got a kick out of being called "professor."

But the vexations were no less real — endemic to my part-time academic pursuit, wedging school in among the more pressing concerns (read "clients") of an active practice:

I taught at night, the only time I could spare. Result: I wasn't at my freshest, and some of the students (with similar daytime pressures) seemed a little weary, too. I found myself resenting students who hadn't read their assignments — forgetting my own shortcomings in that regard as a law student 35 years earlier.
I always seemed to be in the middle of a deal, which prevented me from preparing for class with the same intensity I would devote to an upcoming client conference or business negotiation. During my two hours behind the lectern, the pending deal was still in the back of my mind — what was I missing, what was going wrong at that very moment? Sometimes I had to skip a class because of a crucial out-of-town meeting — climaxing in a series of missed sessions when I was stuck in Australia on an extended mediation and had to transmit barebones videotapes to be played for the students.
My basic concept (derived from continuing legal education) was to reach as many people as possible, so the classes ranged between 50 and 75 students. As a result — and with me arriving two minutes before class started and departing shortly after it finished — I didn't get to know the students, and in most cases couldn't even put names together with faces. And the discipline of wading through 60 take-home essay-type exams really tested my dedication to teaching.
Finally, even though I put the students through simulated negotiating exercises, I simply wasn't able to give them extensive individual feedback on their performance — relying instead on generalized tidbits of advice that didn't fit all individuals.

At any rate, I took a sabbatical from the faculty when I retired, to test whether I wanted to continue to pursue teaching. I kept putting off the decision though, until one day I again ran into John Feerick. How about it? he asked. I expressed my ambivalence. He suggested I approach it in a different way, now that (with retirement) I could devote some quality time to teaching. And — John being a very persuasive fellow — I decided to make a comeback. Only this time, I did it quite differently:

I scheduled my class for the daytime, when both I and the students would be able to focus better, and then extended each session to three hours to avoid the pressure of cramming everything in.
I limited the number of students to 20 and interviewed each one (along with other candidates), to assess their level of interest and likely proficiency before inviting them to come aboard.
With the added opportunity to observe them more closely, I got to know the students' names and idiosyncracies — they became much more than just a sea of faces.
Without the distraction of pending deals, I prepared for class more thoroughly. In particular, I was able to generate a number of hypothetical problems to help the students assess the applicability of general principles to specific situations. My mind was clear, unburdened by what was going on back at the office; and I was no longer resentful of the hours devoted to the task.
Best of all for a practical course like negotiation, I was able to use Fordham's clinical facilities to videotape students conducting simulated negotiations. This enabled me to show video highlights in class ("Let's go to the tape!") covering matters of broad applicability. Even more important, I was able to spend hours one-on-one with the students, going over the entire tape and providing minute-by-minute feedback — what was good, what not so good, how something could have been handled in a different way. The students told me how valuable this was for them. But I discovered that it was also salutary for me. I picked up on tactics, expressions, mannerisms and such that I hadn't been consciously aware of, from which I was able to generalize certain points that hadn't previously occurred to me.
And finally, grading 20 papers is a lot easier than wading through 60!

The bottom line was that I had a ball teaching and look forward to more of the same. Sure, it took a lot of my time; but nowadays time is something I have to offer. And it kept me involved in just the kind of thing I'd been engaged in for 35 years — but without having to deal with clients! I speak to a lot of lawyers who appear to envy my retirement but worry about how they would fill up the hours. If you're in that camp, think seriously about teaching. It's a wonderful use of your time — keeping your mind sharp, imparting the wisdom you've absorbed over the years to another generation. If mentoring young lawyers is an aspect of practice that you savor, here's the nearest thing to it.

And for those of you who, like me, have flirted with teaching while practicing but still feel some ambivalence, take my word — it's a lot more rewarding when you're in a position to give it the Class A treatment.