About Me
I'm Emma Larson. I'm a partner at Freshwater Counsel, a legal recruiting agency focused on lateral attorney placements. We work mostly with patent litigators and complex commercial litigators.
What we do differently is interview prep. Most lawyers walk in and re-explain their resumes. But your resume already got you the interview. What partners actually want to know is how you think under pressure, how you exercise judgment, and whether you'll make their cases easier to run. We build customized prep for each conversation, matching a lawyer's experience to the specific person they're meeting with. One lawyer we worked with had strong credentials but low confidence. After we prepped her, she advanced at every firm.
I started my own practice because I wanted control over the direction of my career. I wanted to choose my clients and my market. Right now that's patent litigation, which is strong and getting stronger.
My son just turned 3. My husband Khurram and I have a tradition where we take a half day on his birthday and go to the terrarium together. Running my own agency means I don't have to ask permission for that. The flexibility is what pulled me into entrepreneurship, and the definition of it keeps expanding. It used to be about time with family. Now it includes being strategic about my practice direction and making time to stay physically strong. I brought my son to the gym recently because I wanted him to see that there's always time to take care of your body. He played with his monster truck while I worked on form.
I write here about recruiting, interview strategy, and figuring out how to build a business and a family at the same time. If you're a litigator thinking about a move, or you just want to understand how the lateral market works, start with the articles below.
The best way to reach me is on LinkedIn or through the Freshwater Counsel website.
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