So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People

In this episode, Megan Senese and Jennifer Ramsey are joined by Emily Logan Stedman, litigation partner at Husch Blackwell, mental health advocate, and host of The Grace Period podcast. Emily opens up about her path through big law, her personal mental health journey, and what it means to practice law without losing your sense of self.

Through honest reflection and hard-fought wisdom, Emily shares how she went from quietly burning out as a mid-level associate to finding purpose in well-being, mentorship, and authenticity. They discuss how high-achievers often struggle in silence, how our identities get tangled up in titles, and what it looks like to pursue success on your own terms, not the ones handed to you.

Learn more about our guest: 
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Want to go deeper? Curious about 1:1 coaching with Megan or Jen? Or want the inside scoop on stage? Hit us up below, we’d love to chat!

Creators and Guests

Host
Jennifer Ramsey
Host
Megan Senese

What is So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People?

Welcome to So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People. Where we explore behind-the-scenes of work, law, life, and everything in between. We're your hosts, business development and legal marketing coaches, Jennifer Ramsey and Megan Senese, and we're here to showcase the human side of the legal world, from marketing and consulting to the very real struggles of balancing work with being human. This isn’t your typical, dry legal show. We're bringing you real stories, candid conversations, and smart insights that remind you that outside of being a lawyer or legal marketer - what makes you human? So whether you’re navigating billable hours or breaking glass ceilings in a woman-owned legal practice, this legal podcast is for you. Stay human. Stay inspired. Namaste (or whatever keeps you human). 

Emily Logan Stedman: [00:00:00] I learned so much about how to be a good lawyer at my first firm, but while I was doing that, I did not take a whole lot of time to ask myself what I wanted, what I wanted my career to look like, what was important to me. I was just checking boxes and moving up the trajectory. I had convinced myself I was the only one having a hard time. The only one doubting. The only one struggling. And that's where I was. That's the point I had reached before I really started digging into what is mental health and wellbeing.
Megan Senese: Welcome to So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People, where we dive into the beautiful chaos of work life and everything in between. Outside of being a lawyer or a legal marketer, we wanna know what makes you human. And with that, let's get started.
Jennifer Ramsey: Hi, Emily. Hello.
Emily Logan Stedman: Hi, guys.
Jennifer Ramsey: It is our great honor to welcome today's guest to our podcast Emily Logan Stedman, who is a [00:01:00] litigation partner at Husch Blackwell, dedicated to improving attorney wellbeing across the legal profession.
Emily's journey in law began at the University of Mississippi School of Law, where she serves as editor in chief of the Law Review. Followed by by clerkships for Judge Pamela Pepper in the Eastern District of Wisconsin. She went on to big law eventually joining Husch Blackwell, where she was promoted to partner in 2024.
Emily talks openly about the pressures and anxieties that come from big law lawyer life. She found support through colleagues therapy and meditation and the need to de-stigmatize mental health in the legal profession. She shares these conversations on LinkedIn. And her podcast, the Grace Period Off the Clock, Emily is a passionate tennis player, devoted dog mom to two English bulldogs and a college football fan.
Go Geeks, Hotty Totty, and Go Dogs. And last but not least, she is a [00:02:00] dedicated bootie.
Megan Senese: Yeah.
Jennifer Ramsey: So, Emily, welcome.
Emily Logan Stedman: Thank you. Thank you. Welcome. Thank you so much for having
Jennifer Ramsey: me. I saw that you just recently completed a marketing course at Wharton. I just think that's so cool and I just wanna hear you talk more about that because it's so rare when.
We meet lawyers who are curious about marketing and like, so much so that they proactively take a course at one of the, you know, the best schools in the country. And so I just would love to hear about that. Like what, what piqued your interest to do it? What did you learn and like what are you gonna go forward and do with it?
Emily Logan Stedman: Great question. Uh, so I'm a huge fan of Coursera, an online platform for education. That's where I've taken my, um, I've, I've discovered it when I learned about this Yale class [00:03:00] on the science of wellbeing. So took the Yale class and then actually an in-house counsel at Vanderbilt posted about taking a class on AI for lawyers through Coursera.
So I've taken a. Bunch of Vandy classes on AI prompting and I, um, have recently completed, um, some training on what it's like to be in-house counsel. And, you know, I don't have an MBAI have, you know, in a dream world do I go down to Chicago on the weekends and complete an executive MBA. Sure. Um, but one way to figure out if that's something I wanna do, Wharton puts its business foundation classes online through Coursera.
It's five modules. The first is marketing lawyers are salespeople. It's like taboo to acknowledge that, but we're selling our services. I've spent five years developing this brand. I know [00:04:00] nothing about marketing and I love to learn. So I was like, great. And marketing just happened to be the first. Set of modules in this business Foundations program through Wharton and right.
What did I learn? What drives pricing? How to make pricing decisions? There were color analysis. What various colors in your branding mean? How to keep your brand up to date over time, whether through small or big changes, whether to be product centric or customer centric, like just true, I'm sure like you know, some freshmen at marketing major at any university is learning these things.
But I've never done that. Um, and so it was great.
Jennifer Ramsey: Oh, I love that. That's so cool. I saw the certificate on your LinkedIn and, and then I clicked on it and it said like all the different topics like customer experience and branding and strategic marketing and like I love that. So I could geek out about that stuff all day.
And so anyway, I just thought it was such an [00:05:00] interesting, and then of course it piqued my interest too, about. Your interest and taking courses about wellbeing for lawyers? Um, and maybe I am, maybe I'm being too specific. Maybe it's just wellbeing in general. I don't know. Can you talk to us about that as well?
Like how you got into that and is that something that you do on a daily basis? Are you, are you actively talking about it, speaking about it? How do you practice it?
Emily Logan Stedman: Yeah, so I talk about mental health and wellbeing every day. In the beginning, it was a personal thing. I was really struggling while mid-level associate at my first firm did not feel mentally healthy or strong in any way, and I must have found the happier podcast.
And then that led me to the free online course through Yale, and it was like, you know, I'm an elder millennial. [00:06:00] I'm 39. I very much came up in a world where we did not talk about our mental health. I've been anxious and a worrywart my whole life, but we never talked about it. I figured out how to deal with it.
I entered big law all of a sudden, could not deal with it on my own anymore. Like everything about being in a big firm. So having multiple bosses with all their different expectations, having people pay for my services. I met my husband right before I entered the firm, so trying to manage like, you know, this life altering relationship, um, and, and my ambition.
Um, all of that was just, I was really struggling and. So I took that class. It really empowered me to keep focusing on that. I found meditation. I found therapy all around the same time. And when I became President-elect of the Young Lawyers Division for the State Bar of Wisconsin, that was my topic. I had no goals or plans for it.
I just knew at every meeting I was gonna talk [00:07:00] about it and. Through that, it started to shift more into lawyer wellbeing, so I worked with the state's biggest malpractice carrier to host A CLE on mindfulness for lawyers. It was extremely well received. Then I got tapped to be on the Wisconsin Task Force for lawyer wellbeing.
And I chaired the committee on making the business case for wellbeing. So that really changed how I viewed wellbeing within a firm. And around that same time, I was looking to change firms and I took a webinar, another webinar. I guess I'm, I'm just a nerd. Learn. Yeah. So I took a class on leveraging LinkedIn just to make sure my bio was up to date for the job market.
It was 2020, so who knew what that was going to be like. But through that updating on my LinkedIn profile, I started following people like Amanda Haverstick, Jay Harrington, and I saw people using LinkedIn like a blog, and I was like, [00:08:00] oh, I love writing. I've dabbled in blogging off and on my whole life.
There's something here, and when I would talk about the work we were doing on the Wisconsin Task Force for lawyer wellbeing, the feedback was immediate, thank you for talking this about this. Please keep talking about it. And I ran with it from there. So yeah, I talk about it with anyone who will listen.
Most of my LinkedIn content is around that I now give keynote and panel and all kinds of speaking engagements on that topic.
Jennifer Ramsey: Oh, that is so cool. It sounds like it's serendipitous too, like when you, like 2020 was kind of this inflection point and you had started getting into it, and then it just, it became one of the most important, I think, topics in the legal industry, right.
Mental health coming out of that because of, of the pandemic and, and here we are. I was
Emily Logan Stedman: at the right place at the right time. Yep. In terms of talking about it and. For whatever reason, I don't know exactly what I had the gumption [00:09:00] to do it.
Megan Senese: Yeah, well, you had nothing to, nothing to lose, I would assume at that point, right?
In terms of, I mean, yes, your career, but I also think when you're talking just that, um, I, I think there's a lot to be said though about, you know, putting yourself out there and, and how much opportunities can come your way. That's how I found you as well, right? In terms of. Someone who is being outspoken and trying to align in that way.
And I think obviously 2020 for a lot of reasons was a turning point for so many people and what they were willing to tolerate or not tolerate anymore going forward. How do you define wellbeing? I think there's a lot of, so I'm, I'm a mom. I'm also an elder millennial. I just had a milestone birthday though.
I'm 40, so yes, it's fine. It's um, I did break my toe and had to get a tooth pulled all within the last, like, since I've turned 40. So I hope that's not in the cards for you because I am an elder millennial, but also a mom. The shit that's shoved down my throat is like. Take a long [00:10:00] shower, um, go grocery shopping by yourself.
Like, that's, well, that's what I'm allowed to have as wellbeing, right? Because I'm, I'm a parent and, uh, I know you have some doggies and you are, you're a big law partner and so I'd love to hear your definition of wellbeing and what that means for others.
Emily Logan Stedman: Great question. Um, and when I give any kind of talk, even when I give a talk on time management, which is another weird passion of mine, I give these two definitions of wellbeing.
One is from Psychology today, one is from the A, BA. They have the same foundation. And before I give them, I say we tend to equate while being with mental health. Which is part of it, but not everything. Or with like spa days and yoga. Yeah. And taking a nap. All of which might support your mental health, but that's not it.
And I should have these definitions memorized, but I don't. But the, the essence of them is that wellbeing is holistic. It's about who you are and how you take [00:11:00] care of your. Physically, mentally, spiritually, professionally, intellectually, and really recognizing that you're a whole human being with all these various parts, all these various interests, and doing things to support all of those interests.
And it may not be all of those interests at one time. That would make you go crazy, and it's not about being perfect at any of them. It's really about recognizing that we have all these. Innate human needs that are gonna need various levels of support over time.
Megan Senese: Yeah. That, I mean, that, that definitely speaks to, to me, and, and so much of the reason why our pod, you know, our podcast exists to find the human side of legal, but it didn't, that wasn't something that I thought we were going to do right when we launched.
So we're, I like to say we're still like a baby, a baby business. We're just two and a half year old toddler company. When we, when we launched, we wanted to focus on empathy and connection, but it really wasn't until the further away that I've got [00:12:00] from being in big law and writing very honest content on LinkedIn where I have had a lot of people and have a lot of people reaching out lawyers who are suffering, really suffering, struggling.
And I, and that's really where this, this podcast came to be, so that we could share the human side of legal and that there are. Lawyers out there that are nice, there are lawyers out there that want to have a better industry. There are lawyers who don't wanna just be tied to their desk all the time and wanna live life and focus on their mental health and, and their wellbeing.
And so it's, it's. Always really refreshing and, and I think impactful to have people like you on our show and talk about things that are important to them.
Emily Logan Stedman: That is, is just it. It is about being your whole human self. And when I was making a transition between firms, I learned so much about how to be a good lawyer at my first firm.
But while I was doing [00:13:00] that. I did not take a whole lot of time to ask myself what I wanted, what I wanted my career to look like, what was important to me. I was just checking boxes and moving up the trajectory, and there started to be this tension between, oh, this is what I actually want, and. I don't know if I can do that here.
And so when I changed firms, I said, I'm gonna be my full authentic self. I'm gonna be my whole human self. If it doesn't work out, I'll leave. And my firm has been remarkably, maybe miraculously supportive of that in every shape of the word. But if I can help one person reach that point much sooner than I did, then I've done what I've set out to do.
And that, that's just it. And to your point about a lot of attorneys struggling. We are, and we don't tell anyone about it because we think no one else is. And that's where I was. That's the point I had reached before I really started digging into what is mental health and wellbeing. I had convinced myself I was the only one having a hard time, the [00:14:00] only one doubting, the only one struggling.
And when a colleague opened up to me about what they were going through, it allowed me to share my own struggles with them. It just kind of set off this light bulb and I started having more conversations with that colleague, with friends at other firms, with my parents. And I just had this watershed moment of like, of course type a high achieving people are struggling and not telling anybody about it and think we need to be invincible and that if we're feeling these things we're failing.
Jennifer Ramsey: Mm-hmm.
Emily Logan Stedman: And, and normalizing That is really my goal. And. I think the other goal is you don't have to leave big law to find that you can. I understand why people do. I will never knock those decisions. There's real reasons why people leave, but I like being a big law attorney. I like being a corporate employee.
I like my office downtown, and so I had to figure out how to make that work.
Jennifer Ramsey: I'm not a, what did you [00:15:00] guys call yourself? Something Millennial. Oh, an elder. Elder. Millennial. Elder.
Emily Logan Stedman: Millennial.
Jennifer Ramsey: Okay. So I'm like 10 years older. So am I like an elder Gen Xer? Yeah.
Emily Logan Stedman: You're probably right in the middle of Gen X.
Okay. Mm-hmm. So
Jennifer Ramsey: it's interesting to hear you, Emily, because um. My, my path was, was very similar to yours. You know, when I graduated from undergrad and I went into corporate finance before I got into marketing, and it was, it just, it felt very one dimensional, right? It was like I had to show up at the job, at my job, and I was one dimensional.
I was a professional. So I just, everything that I showed of myself was just my professional side. Um, nothing else really, you know? I mean, I did have friendships. I luckily, I worked at Arthur Anderson's, now defunct, but I met lovely people there in Minneapolis, actually, I'm from the Midwest. And, but throughout the course of my career, it was always very, you know, your definition resonates with me of wellbeing because [00:16:00] I, there was no like holistic.
Self-reflection happening whatsoever. You know, it was just, I have to do this job. I have to make money. And I hate my life. Mm.
Emily Logan Stedman: Yep. I think generational differences are so fascinating. And at my first firm, at our very first first year associates training, they brought in an expert on generational differences.
Jennifer Ramsey: Okay.
Emily Logan Stedman: First thing I realized is. My chambers that I had been in while clerking was the perfect microcosm of millennial Gen X and Boomer, and we displayed all the stereotypical traits. But one thing that really stood out to me was this idea that millennials wanna be their whole human selves. At work. And that's what I try to, well, two things.
One, gen XI think does ultimately agree, and most Gen Xers are appreciative that millennials are talking about it. Yes, agreed. [00:17:00] Yes. And then with boomers. I try to tell them, you know, millennials have been dubbed entitled and lazy, and we don't wanna work hard. That's not true. Mm-hmm. I wanna work hard. I like working hard.
It's all I know how to do because I was raised by two former parents who worked hard, but I don't want being partner or equity partner to look exactly like they did it. I want to achieve maybe the same outcomes, but I want it to look. Slightly to very different. Yeah. And that's, that's the rub I think for millennials in the workplace.
And Gen Z's gonna bust it wide open. Yeah. Right.
Jennifer Ramsey: Yeah.
Megan Senese: I mean we, we've, we see that too, even with our associates that we working with in training who are, you know, first year there's a big difference between. A midyear, you know, mid-tier associate or a mid-level associate and someone who just graduated and, and entered in and they're like waiting for their bar admission to come through.
Right. It's, there's a big difference. And [00:18:00] actually we talk about that. I think you know him as well, but we talk about that with Jonah Perlin and how he has to train, you know, these BA babies, poor babies, these baby lawyers, right? And what that looks like. Turning 40, I have realized, like I am on the older side now compared to these people.
Mm-hmm. These younger, these younger associates and, and they don't wanna post on LinkedIn, which is not what we're gonna talk about for the rest of the session. But it has been very interesting to see their pushback on, they don't want social media, they don't wanna share anything with anyone. They only want real in-person connection.
It's been very interesting to see all those, all of those generational differences, you know, come up. How they approach law and how they approach business development and how they approach mental health. And having to check yourself a little bit too, where they're like, I'm taking off for a mental health day.
And you're like, what? No.
Emily Logan Stedman: Come to work. So I remember the first time I heard a couple [00:19:00] older attorneys, they're not really older one's, five years older than me, one's 10 years older than me, and I just said to them, are you upset that this person's taking a vacation? Are you jealous that. You didn't feel like you could and you know, that is the reality of some of it.
On the flip side, you know, younger associate, I am jealous and I'm proud of you for wanting to take these vacations, but you gotta communicate right. And you gotta communicate well enough in advance so you're not leaving people hanging. And you have to build a reputation so people trust you and you can bank on that trust to take the vacation.
And that's what I've started saying is older attorneys, which in some rooms includes me. We are gonna have to accept nos more than we want to. That's how they're gonna be. And I don't think we're gonna be able to change it. But to younger attorneys, which still in some rooms includes me. You are gonna have to say yes more than you want.
If your goal is to make partner, if your [00:20:00] goal is to go in-house and become GC one day, you're gonna have to take on responsibilities that are gonna interfere with your life. And those are the trade-offs, right? For retention and advancement.
Megan Senese: One of the questions that we had flagged, and you flagged it as well in terms of something we wanted to talk about, was about self identity.
And I think a big piece of that, right? Like you're, you already kind of summed it up. All work related. I'm a high achieving worry, reward lawyer, big law. Right. Um, you know, Jen's listing all these colleges that, you know, just like no big deal, like fancy, fancy ass colleges, really impressive places that you've been, uh, and will read your bio and you have all these other accolades.
So how do you, how do you identify your new identity now? Right. Because I think a lot of coming into terms with your. Wellbeing is maybe either leaning more into one side or disassociating from certain pieces of [00:21:00] yourself when your whole identity in growing up was being a hard worker and I'm gonna become a lawyer and I'm gonna become a big law lawyer.
How, how do you, how do you reconcile that with your wellbeing now in this new, like almost 40 enlightened, I know, I'm gonna just keep throwing it at you because, you know.
Emily Logan Stedman: You know, it's a good question and I found out I made partner in late September, early October, 2023, and as part of new partner orientation, the firm hired an executive coach for all of us.
Cool. And she, in one of our sessions, asked me, who is Emily? The only thing I could say was, I'm an attorney. Sure. That's, that's, she kept pushing me back, that's your job. Who are you? I'm like, I don't know. I genuinely, it was such a wake up call. It was so sad a little bit that that was all I could come up with in that moment was that I'm an attorney or.
You know, I would say I'm a wife and a daughter, and she was like, well, those are your roles. Who are [00:22:00] you? So I've never until very recently had not given that any thought. Um, or, yeah. And I've spent some time over the last year and a half trying to figure that out. And now on LinkedIn, in my bio, it says something like ambitious woman.
I think what I've really had to come to terms with is sometimes what I perceive the expectations of others to be are also my goals, my personal goals, and that's okay. And it is okay for me to identify as a high achiever, as a high hard worker because I like how that feels. Um, and I am the kind of person that that comes before most other things in my life, and that's okay.
And there's nothing wrong with me for embracing that and wearing that hat. Um, particularly as a woman, you know, it really wasn't the last, until the last year and a half that I [00:23:00] really embraced the idea of being a female attorney. Mm. And what that means for the associates, particularly female associates coming up behind me.
Um, but I am a lot of other things, um, and for my mental health and who I am as a whole person, I, and a lot of these are gonna sound like roles, but we'll just ignore that for now. Um, I play tennis. I've played tennis since I was five. It's always been my biggest and best outlet from work. Um, I just love getting out there and hitting the ball with my coach and hitting it hard.
Letting out from that. I, uh, never liked dogs until we got our own, and I have two English bulldogs that are my whole life and the whole world. I am not from the Midwest originally, and so I don't identify as a mid-Westerner yet. I've lived here 12 years. I, I. Am a southerner. Yeah. Um, that's also something I've struggled with, how to be proud of that when there's some real negative connotations in the Midwest about being from the South.
Um, [00:24:00] so that was long-winded,
Jennifer Ramsey: but yeah. Lots of things. No, that's beautiful. That question is so hard. I've, I've heard it a million times and I've heard it on podcasts. I, I love to listen to, we can do hard things with Glennon Doyle and, and I've, they talk. I swear that questions come like, who are you? And then you try to answer.
And it's like, well, no, that is your role, that's your job. That, and I'm like, how the hell am I supposed to answer it? But I love how you answered it because it's like, you know, like, like yes, you love tennis. Like I'm a lover of life, right? Like I. I love my husband and I love my friends, and like I
Emily Logan Stedman: should say that I love my husband too.
I'm married. Oh my God. Yeah. I wouldn't be where I am. You know, I, I talk about that pretty openly. I met him before my clerkship wound down. I'd already accepted the job in big law, but hadn't started yet. So he's literally ridden this thing with me the whole way through the highest of highs and the lowest of lows.
Jennifer Ramsey: That's incredible.
Megan Senese: There's an article or some studies about, [00:25:00] I think it only imp applies to women, but like the most important financial decision you can make is who you marry. And that could be one way or the other, right? So if your partner is very jealous of your success. Then they're gonna hold you back if they are supportive, right?
Both of our husbands were like, yeah, you wanna quit your big salary jobs and launch a business with no clients? Go for it. Right? Like that. That's not an easy, you have to have a supportive partner for all of those things. It's not really surprising to me to hear that you were answering, you know, who are you?
I'm an attorney, versus over and over and over again. A lot of the question, a lot of how I set up our first instances with. Coaching individual lawyers who are on partner track is to ask them, is that what you want? And then they just look at me. They're like, what? I'm like, do you want to become partner?
And it's every time it's at this point, now I have expected this response, but in the first couple of instances I'm like, hello, are you still there? [00:26:00] Because no one had asked them.
Emily Logan Stedman: No one. It's sort of like big law. I mean I, that's what I say about big law. If you do well in law school, that's where you're pushed.
And I was skeptical of it and part of wanting to clerk was to take time to make sure whatever came next. 'cause I knew it was gonna be a big commitment. Whatever came next was what I really wanted to do, and that's what got me in trouble at my first firm. I was just riding the wave, going along, never asked myself, and I was extremely, you know, I, life happens the way it's supposed to happen.
The man who interviewed me for the firm I'm at now who took an extra 30 minutes, so we had an hour long interview. Who took an hour long call with me after I got the offer to talk me through what that would look like, who became my mentor at the firm. He was the first person I felt comfortable looking in the face and [00:27:00] saying, is it worth it?
Do I want this? Oh
Jennifer Ramsey: wow.
Emily Logan Stedman: And you, you have, I feel like you have to go through that. Um, and that kind of goes back to what I said about my identity. Yes, it was what I wanted. Um, and I've sometimes struggled with the fact that my goals are what I think other people expect of me and like should I, should I do something different at some point?
But yeah, it was so important for me to have that conversation and make sure it was what I wanted and then to approach it in a way that was authentic to me and that aligned with my goals.
Jennifer Ramsey: It's very cool when people have strong mentors in their life and they can point to them, and I've certainly. Been the beneficiary of, of strong mentors.
What would you consider yourself a mentor now and, and, and how do you feel about like paying it, you know, passing it along. You've had a strong mentor in your life. How does mentorship show up for you now?
Emily Logan Stedman: I think being a mentor is the [00:28:00] single most important role I have professionally at the moment. I didn't really realize the impact I was having until I made partner and an associate wrote me a note congratulating me.
That was maybe the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me other than my mom and the, I really realized that, you know, we talk about representation mattering, but at the same time there's a lot of talk about whether cishet white women are. Need in need of representation. And I realized in that moment, yes, in, in some spheres, very much still need that rep representation.
And I am that representation for many of our associates, our female associates. And I did have to take a class, I'm, I'm taking all the classes, but the firm to, to get billable credit for mentor hours. As an associate, you had to take some sort of. Class every year on what it means to be a mentor and mentee, but I don't really know that I've had like [00:29:00] true formal training on it.
What it is for me is, and I actually might have a post coming on this on LinkedIn soon. It's about leading by example. It's about being for them what your favorite mentor and manager did for you. It's about pausing and thinking who was my worst manager and how do I not be like them? And a lot of over communication.
And some people will hear this and think, well, that takes so much time. Yeah, it does. And if we wanna bring it back to the billable hour and um, I, I've mentioning King and Spaulding a lot lately. They, um, just got went viral for their productive time hours. But mentoring is a productive time at your firm.
It's part of your job. It's how you move yourself and your career forward. And so, yeah, that's part of my 2,400 hour package is. All that I'm giving back, um, and paying it forward and hoping they have better experiences in the beginning than I did and that they know they can, it's okay [00:30:00] to tell me if they don't wanna be partner one day or have that conversation.
And I, it's just, it's critically important and I have a lot of mentoring relationships that are a one 30 minute meeting and a lot that, you know, progress. Anyone listening that needs someone to have a 30 minute one-on-one with, I'm an open door. Like I take every single one of those calls.
Jennifer Ramsey: I love that so much.
That's who you are. That's who you, and that's beautiful.
Emily Logan Stedman: And it goes back to what you said about people did that for me. And when people ask me why I do the one-on-ones or thank me at the end of a one-on-one, I literally tell them, my only expectation is that five years from now when you're getting these calls, you take them because that's how we make the profession better.
Megan Senese: That was gonna be the next question. What's the one thing that you think the, the profession can use to, to be better?
Emily Logan Stedman: We have to be [00:31:00] vulnerable and we have to be authentic. We have to stop hiding behind the prestige of our jobs. Like no matter what job you're in, going to law school, passing the bar, there's a level of prestige and importance that comes with that.
And it's okay to like it and enjoy it. And have that boost your ego. It does for me. That's fine. But we have to be honest and open about. Who we are as humans, what we like and don't like, have the hard conversations. Not default to this is how it's always been done, or I was treated this way, so why would I change it for how I treat, you know, the people that are reporting to me.
And I think just be much more candid and authentic and vulnerable. I think that'll change in two ways. One, because more women are sticking around. And two, because younger millennials and Gen Z are gonna demand it.
Megan Senese: So in addition to your door always being open for, for mentor conversations, people should this, I don't know if this happens to [00:32:00] you, so I'm going to just phrase it up this way.
If you want to reach out to Emily. Make sure you actually schedule it and not make the person, not make Emily do all the scheduling. This happens to me a lot. I was just telling this to Jen that people ask to connect with me and then I'm like the one chasing them to get on my calendar. So don't do that.
You can also follow your content on LinkedIn. They can also listen to your podcast, the Grace Period, and what else Follow your Dogs. Does your dogs have an Instagram account? I
Emily Logan Stedman: do, I have, uh, cleansed my relationship with social media, so I'm not terribly active on any of the others anymore, but I will just second what you said, Megan.
So, if you're gonna be a mentee, if you wanna be a mentee, you have to own and drive the relationship. Um, and I've actually really honed how I used Bookings, which is my Microsoft's version of Calendly. And so now if you email me, I'll respond and say, under my signature block, there's a link where you can pick a time.
[00:33:00] Um, and some people are like, this has been a hot topic lately. Some people are like, are you too lazy to schedule? Is it really that hard to send one more email? Yeah. Yes. Mm-hmm. Some days that is the thing that pushes me over the edge, having to coordinate one more. Schedule. So here's the link. You do it
Jennifer Ramsey: well, and, and I, I'll give a little plug to Emily's LinkedIn post about your time management blocks and how you were, it was fascinating to me because you were gonna get all of this stuff done by like a 2:30 PM game with LSU versus, um.
Ole miss Ole, miss one. We're now ranked number four in the country. Uh, congratulations. And I, I just, I thought it was such a great, um, you mentioned you like to talk about time management and wellbeing, and, and I, like you said, I they are related. They're correlated for sure. I see.
Emily Logan Stedman: Time management is self-care.
Jennifer Ramsey: Yes. Yes. And so anyway, I, anybody who, you know, go back, look at Emily's post on this because I thought it was a really good post on. [00:34:00] How you break things down to be able to get them done, and there's no magic to it. It is just. Thoughtfulness and discipline and I learned something from it. 'cause I'm always like, oh my God, I dunno how to get all my stuff done.
And so like it was, it's a great post on time management. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. Oh, we loved having you. This was so great.
Megan Senese: That's it for today. Join us next time on So Much To Say: A Legal Podcast For People. Can’t get enough of us? Visit us at www.stage.guide.