What was it like being a big firm M&A associate in 1993?

Original Post on LinkedIn.

What was it like being a big firm M&A associate in 1993? Here's what I remember:

1. "Good morning, this is . . . " "Good morning, this is . . . " "Good morning, this is . . ." As you walked down the hall to your office, a cascade of speaker phones all starting the same daily message from an office managing partner who had yet to transition to email.

2. "Just pick up the phone." Redlining and exchanging drafts, from hand markup to Doc Processing to fax or FedEx, was expensive. So, invariably, partners would direct you to work out as much as you could by phone with opposing counsel. Every comment resolved in the air was one less you had to deal with on paper, and this is exactly how we learned to be persuasive negotiators.

3. The chron file. I still dream about my chron(ology) file. Sitting out on the ledge in front of your office, it contained, in perfect sequential order, every single fax, memo or piece of correspondence you had sent or received. To this day I have never found a more accurate, pleasant-to-use system of record.

4. The hours list in the lunchroom. Every month the firm would post the hours of every attorney in the office on a simple sheet in the lunchroom. I very quickly realized that there was no margin in being anywhere other than the top or bottom of the list. At the top you got some kind of bonus kicker and at the bottom you made exactly just as much as everyone else in your class.

5. "Non-Equity" Partner day. Watching the senior associates slowly lose their composure and then cry as it was announced that, for the first time in firm history, the "up" part of "up or out" was now qualified.

6. Being done for the day. My first apartment was at Union/Mason and I still recall the feeling of walking up Columbus in my cap-toe Allen Edmunds after a long day knowing I was done. Done in a sense that maybe no longer exists. If your home phone didn't ring (and get answered), there was no expectation of availability until the next day.

7. "Are you taking the weekend off?" On the other hand, I distinctly remember this awful phrase being a perfectly ordinary question on a Friday.

8. Bounds. These strange, leather-bound books that memorialized a deal with gold lettering. An achievement to get your first with your name embossed on the spine and in practice an incredibly handy resource for the history or terms of a deal.

If you want to know between then and now which environment I found more conducive to careful, thoughtful work and stronger relationships on both sides of the table, the answer isn't even close.