Her Story
About Mariah
Mariah Givens is an attorney based in Washington, DC, where she has practiced for the past 5 years. After completing her undergraduate studies at Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University in 3 years through dual enrollment and earning her law degree from Florida State University College of Law, Givens began her career with internships at local law firms during law school. Her first post-graduation role was at the state attorney's office focusing on criminal law, but she transitioned during COVID to a private firm handling both criminal and personal injury matters, ultimately focusing on the latter. Today she specializes exclusively in personal injury cases from auto accidents, managing a team of 4 to 5 case managers responsible for intake, gathering documents, speaking with adjusters, and preparing materials for negotiations that may occur via phone, in writing, or through mediations, primarily in the pre-suit phase though she occasionally files lawsuits. Givens previously served as Director of Corporate Giving for the Innovative Community Engagement Foundation from 2019 until last year, supporting underserved communities through this volunteer board role. She attributes her success to being humble, showing respect to everyone, and working hard to deliver strong work product, while emphasizing kindness in her professional interactions and advising others to treat every person they meet as important.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Mariah
01What do you attribute your success to?
I would just say being humble, showing respect to everyone, and working hard. Like at the end of the day you could make all of the connections that you want to make if your work product doesn't if your work product isn't good it doesn't matter. Like you still gotta show up and you still have to perform.
02What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
I always give everyone the same advice and that is to treat every single person you meet as if they're important because they are important. So especially when you're a lot of law students go on their first internships or their first jobs while they're in law school treat and we say the janitor but treat the janitor the same way that you would treat the CEO because they're equally as important.
03What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
Obviously AI and technology changes are really impacting the profession right now especially when you have clients who are coming to you for advice on the but then they're also logging whatever prompts into ChatGPT for example and then they call you and say well ChatGPT told me that I could get $100 million.
04What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
Kindness is really important and I would say that I bring that into my work life. Like obviously there's a time where you do have to be the bulldog right but you don't have to it can be that all the time and you can get a lot of things done by being nice or showing you know if opposing counsel asks you for a one day extension depending on the circumstances you might want to give back to them right you don't have to make it a conflict with every single thing that you do.
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