Well, yesterday was my first assignment outside of New York and it didn't go well.  My assignment was supposed to be for 2 weeks and not too far from where I currently live in Maryland.  The assignment was for 9:00 a.m. and I got there about 25 minutes early.  I am dressed in a grey suit with a green shirt, a stripped green tie with a tie pin and tie clip.  I go upstairs and knock on the door but no one answers.  5 minutes later I knock again and one of the lawyers open the door.  Upon arriving I meet 2 of the 4 lawyers I am supposed to work for.  So they show me my desk and I make myself comfortable and wait for the person who I am going to be covering for the next 2 weeks.  (See picture under Maryland Assignment).  The secretary that I am supposed to be covering for finally arrives and during the course of the morning I meet the other 2 attorneys.  It was a very small office and their area of law is injury defense.  For the next 4 hours I am showed how their office operates.  Their file management system is Word Docs which I have seen before, iManage is the most popular one now and then the next is Docs Open.  They want somebody to cover but they don't allow enough time for somebody to learn their system.  They wanted you to know how to create a new matter for a case (client matter numbers are how law firms bill for their services) which have to be copied from another case with the same client, go in and change the necessary names on the case in the caption, get the desired folders,  binders and redwells to put everything in, the next day move all of the documents to the new matter number because if a new matter number needed to be made you would actually have to wait until the next day to move all of the documents to the newly created matter number, how to access their different forms, how to maintain and update their filing system, how to use all of their different labels, how to use their copy machines which if you had to scan documents had to be used a different way, how to scan documents, how to use their postage machine, fax machine, their phone system, their mail system which one also had to stamp, plus other things all for a rate that was low!!! (15.00 per hour!!)  Now all of this is not a problem.  But give a person enough time.  Don't wait until the last day and then you want to condense all of this into 4 hours.  Well, 4 hours went by and then this lady noticed that she needed more time to explain everything.  Also, she seemed very defensive like she didn't really want to show me what to do.  Some people are scared that you might show them up or take their job but I took an hour lunch and came back.  It seemed like her attitude got even worse as the day went on.  She had even asked me if I was panicking but I wasn't because I am not a beginner.  She wasn't showing me things in any logical order she was just jumping from one thing to the next.  So finally I left and later that afternoon my agency called to tell me that this law firm didn't think it was a good fit.  This is very crazy because it wouldn't take one the whole day to come to this conclusion.  You would know basically within the first 2 hours if a person was capable or not.  I was glad not to be going back.  Everyone but the lady who was showing me the office procedures was nice.  Readers, this happens to everybody.  I have lost a number of assignments while working in New York but I have completed far more than I've lost.  If you lose one don't let it bother you at all just move on to your next assignment.  Also, I have lost an assignment at a law firm only to go back at a later date and work for years!

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Later that evening I got a call.  It was from a lawyer in Maryland lawyer who had seen my resume.  He noticed that one of the law firms that I had worked at in New York he daughter was now working at so he called her and asked her did she know me.  She told him no, but that she would ask about me discreetly.  Someone there knew me and not only had worked with me there but at another law firm and told her that I was a great worker and that was why he was calling me!  I was glad to get some good news because of what had happened earlier.  So I talked to this lawyer and he asked me how much money I was looking for.  The salary that he stated was a little under what I was looking for so I told him that I would think about it and call him later because he gave me his cell phone number.  His wife who worked with him was against it because I was a male.  I thought about it after talking with my finance and called him back later that evening and to make a short story longer  we couldn't come to an agreement so I lost 2 situations in one day.  Not a very good day.

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Today, I saw a situation in downtown Baltimore for a legal secretary and sent my resume by email.  I got a call within forty minutes.  I have yet another interview this Monday at 11:30 a.m.  Stay tuned.

This morning I had a message from the agency who is sending me out on an assigment in Maryland for 3 weeks starting tomorrow.  She called to verify if I would still be taking the assignment and also to let me know that the law firm is reserving a parking space for me which is cool.  Also, the agency that I registered with in Virginia on Monday is checking my job references before they send out my resume and they said that there was a problem with them because you couldn't reach two of them.  I corrected this and forwarded her other numbers.  More tomorrow.

For this interview the distance that I have to travel is farther than going to Washington so I get up at 5:00 a.m. to arrive in Virginia by 11: 00 a.m. leaving from Maryland.  I get myself out of the door by 7:14 a.m.  I should have been at the bus stop by 7:00 a.m.  again I am late for the interview.  But this is just the agency interview.  If everything goes well in this interview this agency will send my resume out to the actual law firm.  There is still no excuse for lateness.  The same way that I went to Washington is the same way that I have to get to Virginia but the distance is farther.  Also, when I arrive in Virginia I will have to catch a bus.  I call when I get halfway because I know that I am going to be late.  I finally arrive in Virginia at 12:00 p.m. - one hour late.  (See pictures in Virginia interview).  I have to complete an application and take a typing test.  This agency is just like the many I've seen in New York, Washington and Maryland.  It is a family operated business.  I first spoke with the daughter and then the mother.  After my application I had to take a typing test.  Remember I have already taken the Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel tests online.  After I finish the typing test in which in only typed 78 words per minute I am first interviewed by the daughter.  She asks me general questions and we go over my resume.  She says that she wants to edit it a little before sending it out.  She then introduces me to her mother and her mother tells me that I did well on the tests and that she has a client that she wants to send my resume to in Washington.  I shake her hand and at about 2:00 p.m. I leave to get back to Maryland.  I arrive home at 7:00 p.m.  What a day.  Thursday will be my first day for my first temporary assignment in Maryland.  Stay tuned.

O.K.  I've completed the tests.  Here's the rundown.  What I tried to do was copy snapshots of each question so that I could pass it along to you the reader in a document so that you could see what the tests look like.  But when I got to about the 15th question the test informed me that I could no longer exit back and forth outside the tests.  See, what I would do is complete a question, do a screen shot and then paste it in a word document as I was taking the test so I could show you the readers other kinds of tests besides that ones that I cover fully in my manual.  The system was so smart called Centrix mainframe that it knew that I was going outside the test and it cut my option of going to different programs at the bottom of the screen!  So what I did was to write down all of the questions from that point.  It was hard trying to take 3 tests with my step-daughter running around and also writing all of the questions at the same time but I did it nonetheless for you the readers!  These tests don't really prove anything anyway because some of the questions that are asked don't even apply to a legal work setting.  On the first test which was Excel I didn't do so good and I got 7 wrong from trying to attend to my daughter, copy questions and taking the test at the same time.  But as I got used to what I was doing I only got 4 wrong on the PowerPoint test and 1 wrong on the Microsoft Word test.  All 3 tests were 35 questions long.  For you the reader I did manage to save some of questions as snapshots.  I noticed that if you kept going in and out of the test that the Centrix mainframe would shut you down.  So for the PowerPoint and Microsoft tests I only did it 2 times each and I didn't do it back to back.  The document that you can take a look at is called testassessment saved in my public document folders to the right.  If you want to see a sample of snapshots and questions go here http://7legalwordprocessorsecretarytraining.com/sneekpeek.aspx.  Within the next 3 weeks I will add the complete questions from these tests to my manual that already have the complete list of questions from the Prove-It tests and also other harder tests and this is only one chapter from my manual.  Oh don't forget your typing.  I do have one more test to take and that is typing when I actually get to the employment agency and I will be practicing all weekend.  As I told you I am striving to type 100 words per minute by next summer if not sooner and I also give you information on how to do this in my manual "How To Become Successful In The Legal Secretarial And Word Processing Markets".  See you next week.

Within my job search I have registered with about 5 agenices in Maryland and about 3 agencies in Washington, D.C.  Last week I saw on the internet that one of the agencies I had registered with in Maryland had a temporary position which is a legal secretary position at a law firm.  I thought to myself to call them and remind them of who I was, that I passed their tests with high marks and to resubmit my resume along with my current typing speed.  Later that day my counselor there called me and said that she would submit my resume to the law firm.  Yesterday her manager called me to tell me that the law firm liked my resume and want me to work there for 3 weeks while someone is out.  I am going for orientation next Thursday from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. and next Friday will be my first day.  The rate ($15.00 p/hr) is not what I'm used to being from New York (average rate $22.00 p/h for first shift) but the cost of living is different here, it will be a little money in my pocket and I'm also interested because this is my first temp assignment outside of New York and it gives me something to write about for you interested readers.  As I write about in my manual you have to be aggressive and even if you have registered with an agency many times it is not enough to get work.  You don't stop there, you call them every week so that they know who you are and in that way opportunities open for you.

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