I really just need to vent. I’ve been practicing a year & a half. Because the firm I work for has no structure Ive had to figure everything out myself. The partners were sending me to hearings, depositions, mediations etc with little to no preparation. The managing paralegal decided that I needed to learn as a new attorney so no one other paralegals were to help me so often the paralegals would also give me something to do & just walk away. No quick rundown of the case or anything. Also wasn’t given an office when I first started just a table in the utility closet.
I recently threatened to quit because I was tired of how I was being treated. Now I’m getting more help but again the firm has no structure so the help is minimal. I still have to handle everything on my own like a solo practitioner. One of the paralegals only know how to do one area of law anything outside of that will result in her saying she doesn’t know and giving it back. A case she was working on for one of the partners was just dismissed because she didn’t know how to do something & claimed the partner was too busy for her to get guidance on it so she just didn’t do anything on it which led to it being dismissed. There’s no self sufficiency. Paralegals refuse to do anything outside of their scope. Our support staff honestly just sucks.
Most of the paralegals don’t have any training on the litigation. The litigation paralegal is part time & has been on vacation for almost two weeks. I never know when she’ll be in the office I just always assume she’s not coming in. I missed the deadline for my pretrial disclosures & discovery on a case because I just wasn’t aware. I’m new to litigation so if I don’t get a continuance I’m screwed. But I just feel like scheduling & deadlines is something paralegals and legal assistants are supposed to be tracking
We also have a social media employee that’s expecting me to do social media videos and other marketing things several times a week so just more responsibilities keep piling on.
I can’t quit right now because I have a few clients that I wouldn’t want to abandon but idk what to do. Every effort I make to make it a better work environment is immediately shut down. I don’t know what to do but this just sucks & is seriously impacting my mental health.