The best mentors know that everyone has something to contribute. Make sure they do.
One of my best lessons in mentorship came in the form of a terrifying question.
Our firm was brought in to litigate a case set for trial in six weeks. I was the most junior lawyer on the team, having just written the New York bar exam weeks prior. It was our first team meeting. In the meeting with me were a group of accomplished courtroom lawyers, who had studied the nuances of the dispute over the weekend through the eyes of their real trial experience. To kick off the meeting, lead trial counsel and HSG founding partner Mike Shuster, turned the room’s attention to me and asked:“So, Charlotte, are we going to win this case?”
It was nerve-wracking, yes. But that question was a powerful one. It signaled to me that, like the most senior lawyers in that room, I was there to contribute my perspective. And, above all, I was there to help us win.
I’ve carried that lesson with me. Years later, ahead of a federal jury trial, our team watched HSG partner Scott Danner run through his opening statement. When he finished, we turned to the most junior person in the room, a new paralegal. He offered the most valuable feedback of the day, in part because he brought a different viewpoint—one closer to a juror tasked with understanding our case quickly without years of case knowledge and litigation experience. His feedback was incorporated at trial, where we won an $81 million jury verdict.
If you’re doing your job as a leader, the people around you will freely share their opinions and make you better at what you do. But it takes work to cultivate that environment, including paving the path for others to succeed. Before I deposed a Fortune 500 manager for the first time, Scott and I sat at a hotel desk late into the night talking through every exhibit in my outline. Before I cross-examined a C-Suite executive for the first time, HSG partner Vincent Levy and I walked through the wording of my questions, the exhibits I could use for impeachment, and my strategy for game-time decisions over continental breakfast.
Now, I am doing my best to pay it forward. Two second-year associates have their names on a U.S. Supreme Court brief for a pro bono client I brought in, after leading client interviews, legal research, and even drafting. In a high-stakes commercial dispute I spearhead day-to-day, another associate routinely leads discovery disputes. My mentors taught me that by believing in your team, you can focus on bigger challenges. You can enter new rooms where you once again are the novice—and where, if you’re lucky, the person in charge will ask if you’re going to win.
