As I’ve mentioned before, I had no idea what Dwellworks was when I read the job listing. But it still stood out. It asked a simple question: “Are you ready love your summer job?” Though no one should willingly answer that question with a “no” you’d be surprised at how many of my law school classmates voluntarily subject themselves to jobs they know they’ll probably hate in pursuit of higher paychecks after we graduate and add an Esq. to our signatures.
But I’m not so much one of those people as I am a person in search of the most robust experiences from the limited days I’ve got on Earth. I applied to Dwellworks both because I didn’t have to write a cover letter to do it, and because the listing sounded too good to be true. I was ready to love my summer job, and I was unwilling to do anything else if I could help it.
That being said, I was somewhat apprehensive. As great as the listing made it sound, 3 major concerns emerged in my mind:
1. This isn’t a law firm. In the most traditional sense when it comes to legal work, you’re supposed to work at a big firm the summer after your second year so they can hire you on permanently following graduation, particularly if your grades are good enough. If they’re not, you’re presumably supposed to grab a job at a not-so-big firm (or a government job) and hope they hire you long term. Dwellworks isn’t any of those options. It’s a non-traditional step. I’m not afraid to take non-traditional steps, but if there’s anything law students worry about, it’s getting jobs after school ends. Taking a much less future-assured route isn’t typically encouraged.
2. It’s something of a traditional internship in the summer-before-junior-year-of-undergrad manner. Obviously the legal intern position doesn’t fit that mold, but it does mean the internship includes some tailoring specifically toward people more than 5 years younger than me. I am a few years older than the typical rising 3L, having waited 3 years post-undergrad to start law school. But even so- it’s a very different world, law school from undergrad. I had no idea if I could or would want to work with a bunch of people who can’t legally buy alcohol, let alone who lack even bachelor’s degrees to this point.
3. Property management sounded boring, at least. Because it’s hard to understand what Dwellworks does from the outside, PM was the only phrase I at all recognized on the website. If my summer was going to be nothing but security deposit laws, I wasn’t sure how into that I’d be. My path runs through the world of federal taxation, not small claims bickering.
Having fully fleshed out my concerns after I’d applied, I basically forgot that I even applied, and kept looking for other summer employment opportunities around Cleveland. I actually applied to two other positions, but, as luck would have it, Dwellworks was the first that called. As it turned out, luck had nothing to do with it.
My interview was barely about Dwellworks or legal work. We mostly talked about food and all of the incredible places to eat around Cleveland. You may have realized this from last week’s post, but that’s one of my favorite things about living in Cleveland. It might not have been the most formal interview I’ve had, but it was probably the most honest. More than a face with an impressive resumé, Dwellworks hires people who fit into the overall culture. I knew within the first five minutes that loving my summer job was just the beginning of what it meant to work at Dwellworks.
It’s something of a gamble, to go into your last year of law school without future employment lined up. But what is that really worth, if your future employment equates to 16 hour days including weekends? There’s a difference between lacking life-work balance, and lacking life altogether. If anything, the life-work balance at Dwellworks points more toward life than work; at least and especially as an intern.
But I didn’t just take this internship because I didn’t want to work as much as my classmates at bigger firms. That’s just a collateral bonus, because no job (particularly jobs defending corporate clients who have maimed innocent people- it’s a stereotype, but it’s far too often true) is worth 97% of your waking life. No amount of money pays for the years of lost time. Perhaps, for some of them, it’s exactly what they want to do, and they get the sort of rush a good job can give you from it. To them, I wish all the best. But I know I know that’s not for me.
Dwellworks fits the life I want to live. It should be and can be as simple as that, but it doesn’t end there.
Dwellworks is a young company: I’ve been out of high school longer than it’s been a company (as loathe as I am to admit that. Time, it always passes). There are unique challenges and opportunities for working in such a young company. It’s not quite a startup anymore, by any means, but there’s certainly the sense that we’re all learning how to do this together. I wouldn’t trade the experience of helping build a nascent company for much of anything else. My initial impression when I first applied, that this would be a bunch of banal landlord-tenant research all summer, was dead wrong.
In the end, I’m even glad that I’m part of a more traditional undergrad-style internship program. I just had my 5 year undergrad anniversary this past weekend: it’s been awhile since I’ve really engaged with people in that stage of life. But there’s a certain freshness and excitement college graduates tend to lose, that seemingly every college student embodies. I’m glad to get to work with some pretty outstanding people that see the world in a way I just wouldn’t (or perhaps can’t anymore).
I don’t know if I realized how boxed in the world becomes, when the only people you talk to are other law students and attorneys. You start to see the world in terms of nothing but the law. I don’t think that’s inherently a bad way to see things: indeed, it’s a skill one has to develop. But the tragedy lies in believing it’s the only way to see things. This summer, I’ve been able to break out of that rigid box and work with accountants, finance specialists, marketing students, and any number of other, non-law experts and students. It’s not the most traditionally elite law resumé addition. But it’s hundreds of times more valuable to me, as a person and a burgeoning professional.
So why did I take this internship? Because this is the only place in the world quite like it. Who I’ll be at the end of the summer will be a better, kinder, more equipped person, for whatever my next step is. Maybe it won’t be the big law firm world. Truth be told, that’s likely for the best.
-Zack
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