De Novo Legal: Houston

"Let me begin by saying that De Novo's Houston office once had a respectable reputation amongst document review contract attorneys. However, there is a new project manager at the Houston office (A. F.) and she is running the office into the ground. Beware of accepting a document review position at De Novo: Houston because you may be signing up to work in a modern day sweatshop. While working there on a project that averaged between 50 and 100 attorneys (the number of attorneys on the project fluctuated weekly) I experienced and/or observed the following:

1. A complete lack of respect for contractors as individuals;

2. Internet access was removed from each computer workstation;

3. Approx 100 attorneys had to access the internet through only 1 computer;

4. Talking was not allowed and seating arrangements were often shuffled in an effort to discourage conversation between attorneys;

5. The work schedule was sporadic at best. Some days you worked, other days you were laid off, then you would be called back to work, only to be laid off again...and sometimes all this would happen in the course of a week and there was at least one occasion where this happened during the course of one work day.

6. Some days there would be no water to drink and the project manager's response to that would be that it is not De Novo's job to make it's contract attorneys comfortable.

7. Attorneys were told to close the blinds in their room, because the project manager did not want them looking at other attorneys through the window. One contract attorney made an effort to simply waive hello at the other attorneys she could see through her window and the project manager closed the blinds and scolded the attorney for communicating with other attorneys.

8. Some attorneys had to work in small conference rooms with NO AIR CONDITIONING during June in Houston. There were other workstations available for these attorneys working without air conditioning, but because of De Novo's desire to keep talking to a minimum the attorneys had to work without air conditioning for several days...that's right...a modern day sweatshop....contract document review attorneys working without air conditioning in the HOUSTON HEAT !!!"