Former Reed Smith partner Douglas Wood. Courtesy photo Ex-Reed Smith Partner Gets Candid About the Back End of Legal Careers
In a conversation about his new book, Douglas Wood pushes firms to help support aging attorneys as they come to "embrace irrelevancy."
July 16, 2024 at 03:03 PM
6 minute read
Q&A
The original version of this story was published on The American Lawyer
What You Need to Know
- Former Reed Smith partner Douglas Wood's latest book focuses on helping attorneys generate business in the start of their careers and confront the realities of aging when it comes time to plan for succession.
- Wood encourages firms to begin investing in their senior attorneys, highlighting missed opportunities for innovation.
Douglas Wood, a now-retired media and advertising partner at Reed Smith, wants Big Law lawyers—with help from their firms—to be both measured and proactive when it comes to winding down a successful career.
His new book, titled "From Dawn to Dusk" and released in May, is part manual, providing worksheets to help analyze opportunities and crunch numbers, and part memoir, unfaltering at the flood of emotions that come with understanding one's mortality and the fear behind surrendering power and relevancy.
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