🎙 Episode #049 and #050: David J. Ribner (CFIUS & International Trade Compliance) & Ellyn Haikin Josef + Tiffany M. Graves (Pro Bono Counsel)

And some exciting announcements about 2022!

👋🏻 Greetings from Washington, D.C. and an early Happy New Year!

Thank you. Thank you for joining me on this podcast journey in 2021! Whether you have listened to one episode or all of them, I appreciate you and your support. As always if you want to find an episode to enjoy they are always available at howilawyer.com.

I set an audacious goal for the year of 50 episodes and I am excited to share that I actually hit it! That is more than 40 hours of recorded content with more than 46,000 downloads to date.

Information about this week's two wonderful episodes is below. But before we dive in, a quick note about 2022. I am excited to share that How I Lawyer will continue in 2022 and it will (I hope) be better than ever starting in February after a brief break to recharge.

First, I am pleased to share that LawPods has agreed to be our inaugural sponsor!

LawPods is the country's best and most well-known law-specific podcast producer and advisor. LawPods will provide professional editing for all episodes of How I Lawyer going forward and founder, Robert Ingalls, will be advising me on ways to expand the podcast and make it even more valuable to you and all listeners. I am super excited for the collaboration and am open to other collaboration discussions if anyone is interested (just send me an e-mail by replying).

Second, I have a long list of potential guests for year 2 but I am always looking for a more interesting, diverse, and exciting set of stories to feature. If you have a recommendation (yourself or someone else) please let me know here.

And with that here are this week's episodes and the final two of the year.

In Episode #049 I speak with David J. Ribner who is a CFIUS and international trade compliance lawyer in the Washington D.C. Office of O'Melveny & Myers LLP. His practice focuses on counseling clients in the United States and abroad on regulatory matters including securing national security clearances by CFIUS (Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States) as well as counseling clients on compliance with U.S. economic sanctions, export controls, customs laws, and the FCPA (Foreign Corrupt Practices Act). David has been recommended as a leading lawyer for international trade by The Legal 500 US and recognized as an “Up & Coming” CFIUS expert by Chambers USA.

In our conversation we discuss the unique nature of his cross-board practice; how to gain expertise in a very technical area of law; the ways that trying different practice areas can make you a stronger specialist in the long run; what its like to work with international clients; how to prepare for a phone call with a client; and how he manages his time while working with dozens of clients each day.

In Episode #050, the final episode of the first year of the How I Lawyer Podcast, I speak with not one but two incredible law firm pro bono counsels about their careers and how to integrate pro bono work into any legal practice.  

My first guest is Tiffany Graves who is Pro Bono Counsel at Bradley where she runs the firm's pro bono programs across ten offices. Prior to joining Bradley, Tiffany was the Executive Director of the Mississippi Access to Justice Commission an organization created by the Mississippi Supreme Court in order to improve access to civil justice and civil legal aid. She also served as the interim director of the University of Mississippi School of Law's Pro Bono Initiative and Executive Director of the Mississippi Volunteer Lawyers' Project. She is also an adjunct professor at the University of Virginia School of Law and the Co-President of the Association of Pro Bono Counsel. 

My second guest is Ellyn Haikin Josef who is Pro Bono Counsel at Vinson & Elkins based in Houston, Texas. Ellyn has been leading Vinson & Elkins's pro bono work for 13 years and is a recognized expert in the field. Prior to joining the firm, Ellyn was a staff attorney at the Houston College of Law Legal Clinic. 

In our conversation we discuss what they do each day in the role of pro bono counsel, the ways in which their firms select pro bono projects, the professionalization of their field and its impact on the quantity and quality of pro bono law projects to lawyers today, how all lawyers (not just junior lawyers) can and should build pro bono into their practice and what they can gain personally and professionally from the experience, what questions law students can ask to determine the actual commitment of individual firms to pro bono work, and what you can do in 2022 to use your law degree (or future law degree) to help your community. It was an inspiring conversation for me and I am sure it will be for you as well.

As always, if you have any questions or suggestions for the podcast you can just respond to this e-mail. And if you liked the episode and can share the podcast with a family/friend/colleague and/or leave a review on iTunes I’d appreciate it.

See you in February (and thanks again),

Jonah