In House Counsel Are Plentiful and Plenty Happy

Rees Morrison over at the Law Department Management Blog had an interesting post today about a survey that was recently cited in Researching the Law, Vol. 20, Spring 2009 at 1.

The study examined over 4,000 lawyers in its first round, then interviewed over 70 percent of the first group along with an 26% new attorneys.

The researchers found that only 2.2% of attorneys worked in house two years after they graduated.  Five years later, however, and 19% of the attorneys were working in a corporate legal department.
Even better, the corporate counsel were happy campers.  As part of the study, researchers divided the attorneys up based on employment.  There were six sizes of firm mentioned, three government settings, and so on.  87.4% of women in the "Business - Inside Counsel" section reported that they were extremely to moderately satisfied with their careers. 

The number fell somewhat on the men's side but 77.9% of men in the "Business - Inside Counsel" category still reported that they were extremely to moderately satisfied with their career.  This wasn't the highest among the practice groups, but it still beat the number for private firms of all sizes.