“If thou look'st busy, thou shall remain employed.” As news of cost-cutting permeates the legal industry, the appearance of an active practice has never been more important. For some, however, even the best ruse can’t save the inevitable pink slip. Take, for example, Melvin Crumstack, an associate in Foley and Lardner LLP’s corporate group who was axed last week.
According to numerous reports, Crumstack last worked on a billable matter in “late 2008,” but he kept his office as cluttered as possible over the past seven months in order to give those who walked by the impression that he was buried in work. “Oh man, Crumstack was really legendary,” commented an anonymous fourth-year from Foley & Lardner when Litination contacted her yesterday. “Even though it was common knowledge that he had jack squat to do, you would always see him in his office sifting through a mountain of papers while audibly sighing and running his fingers through his hair.”
Apparently, over the past four to six weeks, Crumstack decided to start piling binders around his desk and window ledge as an attempt to build an impenetrable fortress of pretend business. A closer inspection of these binders after Crumstack was fired uncovered that many of them contained old deal documents printed out over and over again. “It was kind of sad, actually,” explained Crumstack’s next door neighbor at Foley. “I mean it was like Melvin was pretending to run old deals the way a kid pretends he’s shooting the winning basket at the NBA Finals on the hoop in his driveway.”
Other associates aren’t that far behind Crumstack in their antics. While conversation amongst lawyers almost always touches on billing at some point, talk of “small matters” or vague “meetings with clients” that wouldn’t pass the smell test two years ago has become the norm. Some attorneys are also rumored to have not opened their office door in weeks. What are they doing behind these closed doors? Some are buffing their resumes, while others are simply curled up in the fetal position hoping that this too shall pass and the days of actually being busy will return.
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