Susan, I agree with you wholeheartedly: “The skill comes in assembling colleagues around you to create your own working apprenticeship so you can avoid the landmines and pitfalls that accompany any new business. Smart soloists do just that.”

Yes, absolutely. This is essential. And yet quite a challenge. Many soloist aren’t getting feedback on their performance, and thus make the same mistakes time and again. How does one go about “mak(ing) sure we have someone spotting us at all times”?

Years ago, I met with an alum from my law school, the highly respected Judge Phillip Pro. Judge Pro sits on the Federal bench in Las Vegas, Nevada, and he told me that the reason he went to Nevada as a new lawyer was for the simple reason that he could practice law, on big cases, from Day 1, an opportunity he never would have had in San Francisco.

The very idea that other attorneys (especially in the same firm) are invested in a new attorney’s success is a pipe dream to anyone who has ever been caught up in law office politics. Until clients started pushing back on fees, the only thing that mattered was the 2,000 to 2,500 billable hours a new attorney generated per year.

Simply put, if you don’t know what you are doing, you are shown the door. And, if you are very good at what you are doing, you threaten the senior associates and junior partners.

If this is the balancing act you crave, then go for it. But, it is not necessary to be a good lawyer, much less a successful lawyer.

For example, not once did a law school professor show us what an actual document was suppose to look like. Oh, we discussed pleadings ad nauseam in our first year civil procedure class, but never did we see the real deal. To me, it is analogous to spending a year locked up in a room with one hundred people discussing how to play a game of bridge without ever seeing what a deck of cards looked like.

The same for my third year civil appellate writing class of all things. I would have been completely lost had I not scrounged around for documents from outside sources. … Whenever any of us asked a professor for a copy of a certain document, we were told that that was something that concerned secretaries.

Regardless, yes a very, very determined law student can go from law school to solo practice providing s/he self-educates. (I doubt “self-educates” is a word, but it works for me here.) The biggest hurdle, however, is giving yourself permission to succeed. Yes, I do mean “permission”.

Often, law students are so beaten down by the law school process and then the bar examination that they revert back to a helpless toddler mindset. Instead of reminding themselves what got them thus far, they obsess on perceived shortcomings.

As far as I’m concerned, the best nugget of the NYTimes article discussed hiring of law school professors at top-tier law schools since 2000; the median amount of practical experience was one year, and nearly half of faculty members have never practiced law for a single day. … And, these are the people who do not believe that a law student can go directly into solo practice. Perhaps they are projecting their inadequacies on their students and recent grads?

The American model of legal education has long assumed that an essential part of learning “how to be a lawyer” actually takes place outside of law school. Law school was not/is not designed to provide “the whole pie.” Since the invention of law school, it has been understood that one becomes a lawyer by serving as a kind of apprentice to older and more experienced lawyers as part of the professional journey. Field-based learning is part and parcel of the road to practicing law. Just as a new med school graduate becomes a full-fledged doctor by first serving as an overworked resident in a hospital, a newly minted law school graduate becomes a full-fledged lawyer by serving as an overworked junior associate in a firm.

This “extended apprenticeship” model worked quite well so long as there were positions for junior lawyers to fill. But now that the junior positions in law firms have disappeared, the NY Time article asks an important question: Where will new grads go to learn the ropes? While hospitals still need residents, law firms apparently no longer need junior associates. Shifts in the economy have resulted in apprenticeship doors being closed. Without “apprenticeship” opportunities, this generation of law school graduates is receiving only a partial legal education.

It is hoped that law schools will begin to recognize the need to ensure that their graduates receive the full complement of educational opportunities, and do more on the apprenticeship side. Since the the market can no longer provide the hands-on training, the schools need to find a way to fill the void.

But in the meantime, one fact is clear: a person can not, by themselves, as a soloist, learn what they need to learn all by themselves, or by going to seminars. Why? Simply because there is too much to learn, especially about the business and client side of practicing law. Furthermore, half of what a professional needs to learn falls into the category of “tacit knowledge.” Explicit knowledge can be passed along in the classroom or on blogs. But tacit knowledge is passed from generation to generation by people working side-by-side. You learn to deal with a difficult client, or learn to pick a jury, or learn how to finesse a settlement agreement by being present while those things are taking place. It is crazy to expect a lawyer to pick up such skills by themselves, in the absence of guidance and feedback.

The practice of law is not a “techne.” It is a craft. As such, law must be practiced in the company of other practitioners who are invested in each others’ success, and who are willing and able to provide each other with real-time feedback about their performance. Trying to do to much alone is a recipe for frustration and failure.