Built to Support Growth

Vanessa Soriano Power
Partner, Litigation

Transcript

I have been at Stoel Rives for over 20 years. The reason I am here is because of the people, but it is also the quality of both the people here and the lawyers, but our clients as well. We have a great mix of clients. Part of the joy of being a lawyer is that it is the practice of law; it is a daily practice. In thinking about that, Stoel really takes and highly values the work that it takes to mentor young lawyers. We put a lot of time into it, and this is not just bringing someone onto a case and teaching them as you go. We have what we call our Litigation Academy, where we are training lawyers at every stage as they are developing. When someone joins Stoel, whether they are a new associate or a lateral partner, we put in place an integration plan. We care about making sure that anyone who is a part of the firm is someone who is able to be integrated into the full firm. It is not just your practice group, it is not just your office, it is the firm as a whole. The best way to do that is to be intentional about it. The best way to be intentional is to have a plan. We love to plan. So that is what we do with every person who is joining the firm.

One other item on mentoring, there is a lot of talk right now about artificial intelligence and what impact that is going to have on the legal profession. I will tell you that I do not know the answer to that question. What I can say is that it matters for us to stay ahead of the curve and understand what programs are out there and what software might be useful for our clients so that we can adopt the right types of tools that are useful for our clients. I do not think it will replace, at the end of the day, what our clients come to us for, which is our judgment. And so it is still important that we continue to have a practice that is mentoring our associates as they are coming up so that they have that good legal judgment to offer clients for the long term.