Most of us in the legal industry did not think of the employment market as being anything close to stable in 2020. However, as we are witnessing from the AmLaw 100/200 firm revenue numbers being released, many firms had record revenue and profits. In fact, recent reports show that the industry actually added some 5,000 jobs recently. Geoff Zodda, Chief Solutions Officer of IT Search at PearlCare Search Group, talks with us about what happened in the legal market surrounding the technology, information, analytics, and knowledge workers in 2020, and the projections for these types of professions as the industry refashions itself for a post-COVID economy. For those who are flexible, can wear multiple work hats, and can analyze data, the world may be your oyster.

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Transcript

Marlene Gebauer
We’d like to welcome Geoff Zodda, Chief solution officer IT search at Pearlcare Search Group to the show. Geoff, thanks for joining us.

Geoff Zodda
Thank you for having me. Appreciate it.

Marlene Gebauer
Great. Geoff, would you mind telling us a little bit about your background and what types of roles you recruit for law firms, accounting firms and other high level professional service companies?

Geoff Zodda
Well, I’ve been in the professional services search area for the past 12 plus years, and mostly specializing, actually, within the legal technology space. I work with law firms across the globe, different sizes, and I work on anything from C-Level to no more of the, you know, very technical engineering positions.

Marlene Gebauer
So you know, here’s the big question, since you know, you have been working in legal tech, how has the past year affected legal professionals with their job stability?

Geoff Zodda
Job stability was a word that couldn’t even be said about six months ago. It’s been an industry that was ravaged. At the beginning of the pandemic, I think a lot of firms were very uncertain of the future. As far as you know, the working situation, their clients, obviously, were hit with the pandemic as well. So a lot of people wonder, where do we go from here. So with that, people were cut jobs were furloughed. People had to take, you know, salary cuts. So in the middle of the year, once everybody figured out how to deal with the pandemic, the hiring steadily, you know, rose, and now we’re back at a situation where, according to the American Lawyer Media, the ALM, the legal industry has added about 5000 jobs recently. And you could even tell by just browsing the ILTA websites or ALA, there’s a lot of new positions and a lot of physicians, but then some of the larger firms in the industry.

Greg Lambert
You mentioned, you’ve been in this for about 12 years. So if my math is right, you came in about the time that we had the Great Recession, and we were dealing with all of the turmoil at that point. But one of the things that we saw that was really different this time around, And what happened in 2008 2009, is that and you’d kind of mentioned this is that there were alternative methods that these legal services or law firms were doing with their employees, they furloughs, pay cuts, there was deferments for some of the people coming in. And so they were trying all of these different things, rather than just the flat out layoffs, like we saw a decade ago. Now, did you see that being maintained throughout all of 2020?

Geoff Zodda
So yeah, that’s a great question, Greg, I think that a lot of times, you know, with the furloughs, a lot of people did get their jobs back in some capacity. As far as the pay cuts, some firms actually paid back the money that was lost due to the pay cuts during that time span. So they did the math and figured out how much money was lost. And they, you know, they not only brought them back up to where they needed to be. But once everybody realized that they want to stay to your ground, they actually made up for the money that was lost. And then as far as deferments for partners, I can’t speak as much to that, because I don’t do a lot of attorney searches. But I’ve heard that that was made up as well, for most, you know, most cases.

Marlene Gebauer
So you were mentioning the ALM stats about 5000 jobs that were that are now in place. But I guess the question is, like, what, you know, what sorts of jobs are we talking about? Because it’s probably not the same as it was before the pandemic hit. So what’s the most important to legal employers now? You know, how are they structuring the workforce in 2021? And, and beyond? And and how is that different from pre 2020?

Geoff Zodda
Now, that’s a phenomenal question. I’d say the key word that, you know, I’ve heard from employers a lot recently, is versatility. They really want someone that can wear different hats. A lot of individuals that may just have, you know, one niche, or one sort of role, that sort of fell out of favor, not, not from the sense of, you know, their skill sets not being in demand, more so that clients do want someone that can do multiple things. So they don’t necessarily need to hire two to one on a ratio. They know that they can rely upon, you know, Marlene, for example, to do two things instead of one. So they’re sort of squeezing the lemon a little bit more. But, you know, I do think overall, organizations are looking for that person that is willing to raise their hand, really be part of that costume in collaboration, because they even more now than ever. With a lot of remote work going on, you need to be able to speak under, you know, over many mediums in order to really have that cohesive unit that everybody’s looking for. So, I think, you know, during a lot of interviews that I’ve seen, you know, the word communication and collaboration is used a lot more than it was previously. So the versatility, and then the communication skills are the two biggest things.

Greg Lambert
Do you think that that’s good, that’s limited to the remote work environment that we’re in that obviously, there needs to be a better communication process? Because, you know, there there are lots of people that have been hired this last year that have never physically seen their co workers. So is it? Do you think that that’s just an effect of, or a byproduct of the current situation? Or do you see this as going as something that will go forward?

Geoff Zodda
I think that it’s going to be a trend that continues to move forward. Main reason being, I don’t know, when we’ll see, you know, workers 100% in the office. So with the hybrid schedules with not everybody being in the same place every day, everybody’s going to be forced to doing a Zoom to messaging on Teams, so it’s going to be different meetings, you know, for people to communicate. So, you know, not only is that the verbal communication, that’s important, it’s also you know, how do you write? How’s your emails? You know, to ensure that everybody can work together, and really collaborate and communicate in a variety of different ways. So I to answer your question, long winded wise, it definitely is going to continue.

Greg Lambert
Just to kind of follow up on that, because of the remote working situation, just the decentralized process of the work environment right now. We’ve seen a lot of technology coming into effect, whether it’s Zoom, whether it’s Teams, you know, there’s a number of collaboration type processes out there and software’s. So what kind of technology changes are you seeing? And what is it that the firms that you recruit for, what are they looking for right now, as far as skill sets and technology?

Geoff Zodda
So that the skill sets within technology that I’m seeing the most, there’s a few central areas that I think are being hit the most, as far as you know, me getting calls on. First and foremost, cloud, that’s an area, you know, as I’m sure you both know, that really took off before the pandemic, but I would say that law firms more than ever, are apt to making that change to at least a hybrid environment, where they’re, they’re putting some of the stuff on the cloud there, they’re not going to dip completely into the pool, but they’re gonna, you know, put, you know, half their body in and say, we’re willing to put this on there. So having the professionals that are able to do that, maybe even taking someone from outside of the industry that’s done this, in the past moved an organization to a hybrid model, or a full cloud, you know, is something that I’ve been getting a lot of calls on. So another area that is really hitting the ground running. And this has been something that’s been over the past few years. But I think, you know, in the middle pandemic, I’ve been getting a lot of calls on this, as well as the Knowledge Management area, both of you are extremely familiar with this. It’s not only knowledge management in general, but it’s the niche positions within a knowledge management team, because a lot of firms obviously are going to a variety of different products, both being built in house and you know, through third party vendors that they’re utilizing. So they need to find people that that have good skill sets that fit the model that they’re looking for, as far as the delivery is concerned, the innovation and the origin, within the knowledge management so that that’s a hot area as well. And then another area that I think both of you can speak to as well, is the security area with the remote work, it’s essential to have a strong security team it was before and I think it’s going to continue to rise, as far as you know, the need to build that strong teams, and not to use third parties as much on the security side. So bringing in a strong team in house that, you know, someone could wear different hats, they’re doing third party risk, they’re dealing with some you know, audit factors, but then they have the ability to engineer solutions, you know, really deal with incident response, security operations, those are all areas that are being sought after. And I think that’s going to continue to gain theme.

Greg Lambert
Well, Jeff, I I had to laugh at one of the things that you’ve said and we’ve talked on the show about this before is the need to to have a cloud solution that is much more prevalent now than it was three years ago. And I joke in you know, internally as like, if I ever wanted to kill a project, I would just tell the IT group that it’s cloud based, and they would automatically be nixed. And now it’s almost like you can’t really even bring in you know new products or new features, without there being some type of at least hybrid cloud interface with with that. So now one of the things I did want to follow up on that for you is, are you seeing different approaches based on the size of the organization? So are large law firms taking a different approach, then their smaller counterparts?

Geoff Zodda
Yeah, I actually do believe that large firms do have the luxury of being able to be, you know, a lot more aggressive, you know, in their hiring patterns, because one bad hire is not going to make or break the organization. So,

Greg Lambert
I can see that I mean, it is your when you have a smaller staff than, you know, each hire is very important. So

Geoff Zodda
it’s Yeah, it’s it’s almost do or die. But you do, you do see that the larger firms are, are getting extremely aggressive, it’s almost becoming a little bit of a frenzy to get really talented people that are willing to move during the pandemic. So the firms that are showing that they’re building and they’re on the, you know, apptech tend to get this the strong candidates right now, good mid size and smaller firms, while they are doing some higher, and it’s a little bit more selective, it’s one off for this group, to offer this group, as opposed to saying, Hey, we need we need five financial systems engineers to build that our team or, you know, we really want to go to the cloud, for example, we need an engineer, we need an admin, and we need someone that’s working the security behind that. So I think that the small midsize firms are being a little bit more, you know, I use the word cautious. And the bigger firms are trying to get the best talent available that can you know, check off the boxes.

Marlene Gebauer
That’s actually interesting, because it just seems like we get so much feedback that it’s like, we’re we’re trying to contain costs, and like, you know, even large firms are keeping their staffs very, very lean. And yet, you’re getting this feedback that Yeah, we need to we need to hire the best and the brightest. And just, I’m just, I’m just, you know, I’m just, I’m just noting, I was like, you know, cuz, you know, that’s not the message I’m hearing that we can just like, Yeah, we got to go get these people. It’s all like very, very cautious about bringing new people in and in fact, cutting and keeping things cut.

Geoff Zodda
Yeah, I think it’s, it’s so interesting, because I think from firm to firm, it just varies so much. It all depends, because the revenues came out, you know, at the beginning of the year for how the firm’s actually did in 2020. And surprising enough, a ton of the firm’s beat their year over year. So, you know, these firms are saying we still have, we still have projects that we need to complete, we still have programs that we spent the money on up front. Now we just need to town. So that’s where the saying is, let’s go out and get the talent to match it. It’s not just let’s hire anybody, you know, it’s more so they’re being selective, of course, you know, and I want to be quoted on that.

Marlene Gebauer
They are being selective, Yes.

Geoff Zodda
They are. They are being extremely selective, but they are hiring, which, which is a great thing for everybody.

Marlene Gebauer
Yeah. So, you know, what particular jobs do you think have been hit the hardest and, you know, either may be reduced or changed forever? Because, you know, if there’s people out there that are in those positions, they’re going to need to pivot and try and do something else. And on the flip side, and this is also for those people, you know, did did the pandemic crisis, create new types of jobs, or make existing jobs more important, I guess, or more at the forefront?

Geoff Zodda
So I’ll start off with the the negative that a lot of admin positions, as we all saw, were hit pretty hard in the industry, the ratios of, you know, admins that are needed for different groups or practice areas were definitely cut and hit pretty hard. On the IT side, I saw as well, that some of the desktop, you know, area was hit decently hard as well. It coincides with everybody going remote, but I that was one area that I saw, you know, more so than not, you know, individuals that are looking for new opportunities or got let go or furloughed, that was the area that I saw, you know, definitely was hit the most. And then on the other side, an area that definitely has grown a lot due to the sort of quantitative value of each individual person that’s in the organization is data analytics. This is an area that is really building up speed at a rapid pace. And whether it’s, you know, statistics or someone that’s just doing data analysis, there are a lot of firms that are looking for people that can really quantify the value of each individual person in the organization. And then obviously, all the different trends that are going on, whether it’s office space, or per partner, or different ways that they’re spending their money, they need someone to analyze it even further than just the FP&A Czar. It’s It’s a deeper dive using technology to do it.

Greg Lambert
Are you seeing those data analytics positions being in accounting and in the finance groups, or where were they landing?

Geoff Zodda
And Funny enough, they sit in IT, because they are using so much technology. I know, originally, everybody would look at SQL as a tool that was, you know, used for that sort of stuff. But it’s all the third party tools now that are that are being used for whether it’s SAS, data, R, you know, you’re doing testing with everything. It’s just Tableau, just to name a few, there’s so many tools that are being used, these firms want to find out what matches, you know, the platforms that they have, and then hire teams of people that are going to help utilize tools that they have to sort of utilize that information, you know, to better the business.

Marlene Gebauer
So if they’re sitting in IT, you know, if if, you know, you know, how are they… how are they partnering with the subject matter experts? Because they may know how to use the resource. But, you know, from the business side of the house to do they know how to put together something that has business value?

Geoff Zodda
Absolutely. I mean, it depends upon the level that they’re coming in. The more senior candidate will have the ability to cross functionally work with different areas within the business, they’ll have a sense within a professional services environment, who they need to touch, and you know what the value is and who the stakeholders are. But the junior the junior candidates are culling the data, cleaning the data, making sure that it’s usable, and in a great format for the firms to move forward with. So it all depends upon the level of personnel.

Marlene Gebauer
All right, and I just want to wrap it up with some positive notes. But what’s the good news? Generally, what can people expect, you know, in the job market sort of moving forward?

Geoff Zodda
I mean, good news is, is welcome. And I think that, you know, the job market is definitely trending upwards. If you look at any of the major job sites, whether it’s Indeed, Dice, you know, the amount of open positions, and

Marlene Gebauer
I can tell you, there are a ton of like information type roles in healthcare. Incredible.

Geoff Zodda
It’s amazing the amount that we’ve seen, sort of, not only in the legal industry, but overall, how technology’s really taken precedence over over almost any other area in most industries, where the value that we’ve started to see in the legal industry over the past several years is actually transposing into other industries. And I find that to be exciting. I think that it’s good news for anyone, you know, if someone wants to stay within the legal industry, great, that’s a good career path. But if someone wants to take their skills, and move it to a healthcare industry, they’re able to do that as well. So you’re able to pivot your career pretty nicely at this point, if you have a great skill set, and you’re, you’re willing to work at it.

Marlene Gebauer
What about more flexibility? What about an ability to kind of create your own role a little bit?

Geoff Zodda
I was going to actually mention that, regarding good news is that a lot of firms and this is very interesting, are more than willing to have a person sit remote. And if it’s a New York based firm, they don’t necessarily need to sit them in New York now, or in the in the tri state area. They could have someone you know, in Houston that’s doing the job. If you have someone that’s strong in an area, and it’s in a, you know, niche skill set, they want to have someone sit that’s been in a different time zone where before that wasn’t even possible. So that’s more good news right there that that employers are being a little bit more flexible on where the persons want to set. So, you know, I think things are starting starting to come together in a lot of different ways.

Greg Lambert
Yeah, I think a lot, a lot of people are still a little bit nervous as far as wanting to, you know, reach out, start looking at new jobs. But as we have said around here a few times, you know, you shouldn’t let a crisis go to waste. So if somebody’s looking for a new job role is now the time or what are you advising for people that are looking to kind of stretch their, their limbs and get out there?

Geoff Zodda
Yeah, I think it’s a constant look in the mirror. And I think that this is a situation where you want to, you want to figure out what you’re good at. And if you can really, really break down what your core competencies are, as an employee that an employer is looking for, and something you love to do, you can do it, you know, I think now’s the time to maybe explore that option. And then on the other side, I’m definitely urging my candidates, you know, if they have a passion in a certain area to explore, you know, certifications that may match that, for example, you know, if you really, you know, have the love for the cloud, you may want to explore an Azure certification or if you’re someone that you know, really wants to get into the systems area, explore the MCSA MCP. cetera. So, you know, look in the mirror, and then also, you know, see what you can do to educate yourself on your own time to match your your passion for what you want to do move forward.

Marlene Gebauer
I think that’s pretty good advice. Well, Geoff Zodda, thank you so much for joining us. This has been a great conversation. Very inspiring. And thank you.

Geoff Zodda
Thank you, Marlene. Thank you, Greg. I appreciate your time and have a great one.

Marlene Gebauer
You too.

Marlene Gebauer
Well, that was a great conversation with with Geoff, I think it was good to sort of hear where we were, and sort of where we are, and then where we’re moving toward. And I mean, I think he had some really good thoughts in terms of where people might want to focus in terms of well, where people and and organizations might want to focus in terms of different types of job roles.

Greg Lambert
Yeah. And I was a little surprised. I don’t know why I haven’t seen this. But when he mentioned that there were 5000 jobs added in the legal industry that that kind of caught me a little off guard, I knew that law firms were having really, really good years, but I thought they were kind of having really, really good years, because they were doing it was less.

Marlene Gebauer
Yeah, well, that was kind of I was thinking too. So I mean, I also was surprised at that, that statistic. But hey, if that’s the truth, that’s a good thing.

Greg Lambert
Yeah. And I still think that some places are being a little hesitant on hiring people that will stay remote or hiring people that are outside of their normal region. So if they’re in New York firm, and in hiring people in Texas, I think that I think just as, as we start fighting over talent, though, they’re going to have to give up on that and, and understand that people are going to work where people are going to work and you get it you get to get the talent where it is rather than move the talent to where you are.

Marlene Gebauer
Yeah, it’s, you know, I think that that, you know, there’s there’s probably some flexibility, like if organizations have offices in different locations, you know, that’s, that’s one thing versus, you know, having somebody, you know, completely in a state where they don’t have have a practice. But I agree with you. I mean, I think that that, you know, it’s sort of a new area for for firms. I mean, we, we had talked about remote work for a while before the pandemic, but, I mean, this is this is different. This is this is like remote work. And, and, you know, our, you know, firms are, I think, are hesitant, because they’re not completely they’re sort of struggling with, okay, how do we, you know, how do we make sure that work, you know, continues to get done, like, how do we track that, like, how do we keep, you know, you know, apprised of that when someone’s not in the office, and I mean, I think it’s you can do it, of course, and of course, someone being in the office doesn’t necessarily mean you know, work is getting done either. So, you know, we just we just have to be creative and experiment with that.

Greg Lambert
Yeah. Well, thanks again to Geoff Zodda for taking the time to talk with us.

Marlene Gebauer
Thank you, Geoff.