Career Path: Breaking With the Law

By Kevin Crilly

Many children dream of being a firefighter or police officer. Few aspire to become a gift planner. And I certainly didn't think I would go through four years of college and three years of law school, take the bar exam in two states, serve in the U.S. Navy for four years, and then become a gift planner. What a long, strange trip it's been.

To be frank, when I began law school more than two decades ago, I didn't even know the field of gift planning-then called planned giving or deferred giving-existed. My undergraduate degree was in political science, and I had always expected that I would go to law school, set up a solo practice, get into politics, and change the world.

But something happened along the way. I still wanted to change the world, but I didn't want to do it through law. I came to the realization that the traditional practice of law was not for me. Even though I had worked before law school as a paralegal in a large corporate law firm, in two small law firms, and in the federal government, I never quite took to the practice of law. I felt it was either too boring (reading cases and writing memos) or too confrontational (I felt as though I was arguing with opposing counsel on the phone, through the mail, or in court).

When I ended my active obligation in the Navy JAGS Corps (no, it was nothing like the television show), I landed in California during the throes of a deep recession. You may recall a time when there was a president named Bush and a presidential candidate named Clinton. I had been interviewing with law firms in San Diego but was feeling sick to my stomach at the thought of practicing in the area of law into which I was being pigeonholed: medical malpractice. My Navy experience had been as a trial attorney and in a hospital.

By lucky coincidence, my first-year law school roommate came for a visit when I was still interviewing with law firms. He was directing the Sierra Club's planned giving efforts, and he encouraged me to look into the field. I also had just read an article in the Ameri­can Bar Association's magazine by two former attorneys who had switched careers and, as I recall, had become psychologists. The article discussed the results of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator test, which they had administered to 3,000 practicing attorneys in the Philadelphia area. The results of your score were supposed to reveal certain qualities that good lawyers should have. I took the test from the article, and my score revealed there were 14 different personality types that better fit the practice of law than mine did and only one whose fit was worse. No wonder I never could seem to get the hang of practicing law.

I seem to remember a statement in the article that was something like this: If you are in one of these two lowest categories, you will have a difficult time in the practice of law. If you do choose to practice, the survey results suggest that estate planning and education law would be likely areas of success.

My path was now clear: Planned giving or bust. I started to network in surrounding counties and was ready to relocate if necessary to land a job in the field of gift planning. Through various networking circles, I found my first job at Childrens Hospital Los Angeles.

It was baptism by fire. I had to learn about marketing, planned giving techniques, and estate administration, to say nothing of the politics in a nonprofit. Fortunately, the profession in LA was strong, and I pursued as many educational opportunities as I could through the Planned Giving Roundtable of Southern California and the National Committee on Planned Giving.

I believe that having a law degree was a major advantage to my smooth entry into the field of planned giving. Lawyers are trained to consume significant amounts of information, analyze it, and make reasoned judgments about it in short periods of time. This background helped me with the technical side of the job. Seeking out mentors in the profession, constant networking, and attending seminars helped me with the softer side of fundraising.

I now tell those seeking a career in the profession that there are two ways to learn: Jump into a small organization and learn all you can by trial and error, or obtain an entry-level position in a well-established program. Both choices have benefits. At a smaller shop, you grab hold and teach yourself the ropes. On the other hand, learning from someone with experience can help you learn to manage challenging situations.

A little more than three years ago, I came to my current position as director of gift planning for the University of California, Berkeley. When I entered law school 23 years ago, I simply could not have imagined that I would be living in Berkeley, California, and working for one of the most prestigious universities in the world. I believe that I would not be in this position without a law degree.

Even so, I do not think that a law degree is essential for success in gift planning. A law degree helps; but lawyers in gift planning must understand that they represent a great mission and not a client, and that they must pick up the phone, talk with donors, listen to their issues, and close gifts. Other­wise, they will be merely lawyers in a gift planning office instead of gift planners who happen to be lawyers.