Her Story
About Judy
My journey to law started differently than most. I began college with a pre-med mindset, but slowly learned through college that medical school wasn't what I was interested in, and I didn't want to see myself in a lab all the time. What I heard a lot was that I wrote really good lab reports, and I enjoyed writing. People started recommending law school, and I began to think about it seriously. At the time I was at Iowa for undergrad, which had a great writing program and a great law program. I took a leap of faith and decided to apply for law school, thinking that it's only 3 years - if I don't like it, it won't be the end of the world. I was getting a chemistry and finance undergrad degree at the time, and I didn't see how it would fit together, but law school seemed to give me the better shot through exploring that journey. I definitely took that leap of faith, especially because I don't have other lawyers in the family, so I was definitely the only one. It's been a good journey so far. Now I specialize in intellectual property law, primarily in litigation, handling patents and trade secret disputes. I manage and lead teams for litigation, whether defending or enforcing IP rights. The journey is always more important than the destination for me.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Judy
01What do you attribute your success to?
I attribute my success to family. Family shaped my journey and continues to be what I attribute my success to.
02What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Be bold. I can't state enough how important it is to know what you want, but if you don't know what you want, figure that out sooner than later. Because once a woman knows what she wants, we're living in a time right now in which there's so many options to get to that destination. It's always better to figure out your journey and figure out the next steps to get there than to wait. Because waiting can be hard, and before you know it, the opportunity you're waiting for might not be there anymore.
03What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
From my perspective, there's a lot of different paths right now for one to build a style, especially as a litigator. Authenticity is super important. Technology is definitely creating a lot of opportunities to get work done faster and more efficiently. At the end of the day, balance remains in terms of training, in terms of getting those opportunities that technology and artificial intelligence cannot substitute for. I think the opportunity and challenge may be that artificial intelligence is both - it's creating the opportunity for legal practice to change, but at the same time, the challenge is to make sure that, especially for women, staying on top of those developments and making sure that they're able to utilize them to innovate efficiently in a way that's professional, that won't take away from their future ability to literally represent their clients.
04What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
The values most important to me are integrity and responsibility.
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