Editorial
Front Page - Friday, December 11, 2009
Successful lawyer, mom balances practice with family time
Stephanie Coward
For two years Valerie Epstein, attorney at Berke, Berke & Berke, carried a pager and was on call 24/7. But she didn’t particularly care for getting called out of bed in the middle of the night, so began considering an exit from the medical profession.
“After two years of being on call, that was enough,” she said. “My grandfather said ‘Why don’t you go to law school?’”
Epstein’s grandfather, Jim Hitching, was one of the founding attorneys at Miller & Martin, and several other members of her family were attorneys. She was also dating her future husband at the time, Eron, who was on his way to a career in law.
“So I was sort of surrounded by attorneys and they said, ‘You should go to law school. You won’t have to carry that pager anymore.’”
So she did.
Epstein had her first child while studying law. At that time, she was in Knoxville and her husband was in Chattanooga.
“And that was interesting … so we rented a parsonage in Athens, which is halfway, so we would commute back and forth,” she said.
Epstein became a licensed attorney in 1989, joining the in-house council team at (Unum) Provident.
“It was very nice because I had the opportunity to sort of try a lot of different types (of law),” Epstein said. “It was a great place to work coming right out of law school because I had regular hours and I already had my son, and then I had my daughter while I was there. It was a good place for a woman to work.”
Epstein, who is licensed to practice in both Tennessee and Georgia, appreciated the regular work hours at Provident. With two small children at home, she was able to attend important events during their younger years.
“I would say, for a lot of women, flexibility is the most important part of what you have as an expectation for your job. And when I say ‘flexibility,’ that’s feeling as if you can go and attend your child’s play and miss a couple hours of work and come back and make it up,” Epstein said. “My law practice is very important and I love what I do but my family is very important.”
Quantity and quality of family time matter to Epstein. “We always try to have family dinner together,” she said.
Epstein joked that she actually has two jobs. One is her day job as a practicing attorney while the other encompasses mom/wife/cook/cleaner in the evenings.
“And they’re both very important,” she said. “You have to be able to have a flexible job and that is an advantage of practicing law, is that if you are in the right position and with a firm that’s willing to acknowledge that you other responsibilities outside the firm, you can make it work. And I think it’s a great profession for women in that regard.”
After leaving Provident, Epstein took some time off to be with her children. During her hiatus, Epstein remained active with the Chattanooga Bar Association and other organizations. While many fields are difficult to re-enter after time away, Epstein said the transition back into law was an easy one.
Epstein opened her own firm on Cherry Street, where she focused on many areas, but specifically on arbitration and mediation.
“I like the ADR field just because … when you practice law, you sort of see that there can be common ground a lot of times between the parties. And one of the provisions in the Bible is ‘justice, justice, you shall pursue’ and that being the peacemaker is a good thing,” Epstein said.
While she does quite a bit of civil litigation and practices in the business arena, Epstein thinks it is nice to have a part of her practice that is “helping the parties resolve the disputes, not creating the disputes in the sense of going through the litigation or advising your clients as to the strength or weakness of their position in some sort of legal maneuver.”
Epstein also greatly enjoys her business practice. “I love it when people come in here and they say, ‘Man I need your help on this. I need to copyright this or trademark this because I’ve got this great idea.’ They bring in the most fascinating things that you just, you’re like, ‘Wow, this is incredible,’” Epstein said. “And you can sense their excitement and helping them walk down that path, like when they form a new company and they have a new idea. It’s kind of like a little mini birthing of this baby and you put together their operating agreement and their charter and you give them their seal and they’re just so excited. I love doing that.”
In time, Epstein decided to close her solo practice. Her grandfather wanted her to join Miller & Martin but that would have meant his retiring, due to anti-nepotism rules.
“And I said ‘do not do that’ because he loved the practice of law,” she said. “And I personally think that if you love the practice of law, you don’t need to retire.”
Instead, she joined the office of Berke, Berke & Berke.
“When I was a solo practitioner, I really didn’t have that community and you feel very isolated,” Epstein said. “The Berkes are really fine lawyers and they are just wonderful mentors, they’re very supportive.”
As is obvious from her work history, Epstein has a strong work ethic, which she attributes to her mother. A single mom and CFO for a Fortune 500 company, Epstein said that her mother always made time for her children and they always spent the weekends together.
“As I say to people, women especially, that it’s 40, 50 or 60 hours out of your life no matter what you get paid so why not get paid at that level for which you’re educated?”
The schedule of an attorney combined with the schedule of a mom/wife/cook/cleaner would take a toll on most people – not Epstein.
“I don’t feel like I’m burnt out because I’ve had that ability to have a lot of flexibility and a
lot of balance,” Epstein said. “My assistant, Amy Finney, is great. And I think most lawyers will tell you that an important practice of law is that you’ve got assistants that you can rely on. I really try hard when I’m at work to be fully engaged at work and to get it done so that I’ve got that time at home.”
Epstein has sat on numerous boards throughout her career, including public television channel WTCI, Reflection Riding and the CBA, among others.
Information about Berke, Berke & Berke can be found at the firm’s Web site, www.berkeattys.com.
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