© 2017 The Texas Lawbook.
By Ira Bowman
How has my father, Bruce Bowman, name shareholder in the Dallas law firm of Godwin, Bowman & Martinez, where I also now practice, influenced my career? The answer is heavily, however indirectly.
Contrary to the practices of most of the trial lawyers I know (including myself), my father is not given to lengthy explanations of what to do or instructions on what the right course of action is on any given subject. One might easily assume that my father played a heavy-handed role in my career given the fact that I summer-interned at the firm and have practiced here since graduating from law school. But it is actually his indirect influence that has allowed me to become his law partner and work with him for going on 12 years now. His influence has been by example and illustration rather than explanation or direction.
I never planned to be a lawyer (my undergraduate was an acting degree in the theatre school at the University of Texas). I took the LSAT and applied to law school without discussion with my father. At the time, I did not really know what lawyers did any better than the average American television viewer. I knew that I was comfortable on my feet in front of people (thanks to my undergraduate degree), and I knew I had a predisposition for logical analysis from lots of late night discussions with friends. Otherwise, I knew that my father was a civil trial attorney, even if I had no real understanding of what that meant. I did know that it meant wearing a suit to work and working long hours – which I found were actually two of my more accurate preconceptions.
I remember getting my first semester class schedule from SMU and asking my father what a tort was. He hit me on the arm and said that is a tort. That was probably the most in-depth discussion of the law we had ever had up to that point.
I started at the firm as a summer clerk after interviewing with the then-managing shareholder. I worked with several partners for two summers, though never working under my father. While I was not being directly influenced by my father by working with him, the indirect influence was still very much there. I felt that I needed to do a little better or work a bit more diligently than my peers in order to avoid any suggestion of nepotism. When the opportunity to engage in a mock-trial competition within the firm came up, I felt like it was an opportunity to prove myself as an individual to my coworkers and bosses alike. In winning these competitions, I drew comments and comparisons from partners to my father’s trial conduct and demeanor. I was quietly surprised because I had never considered us that similar in terms of style or conduct.
My father has always been more of the soft-sell – allowing for the other party to put the pieces of the answer together themselves based on a few salient facts.
This quiet reliance on facts over explanation is also his technique in court. I know because I have had the rare privilege of practicing in court with my father. My mother, sister, and two brothers have never seen my father argue in court (my mother always worried she would jinx him). I am the only member of my family who has actually seen my father in a courtroom, and I have gotten to do so from counsel table.
While I have worked with my father on several occasions, our practices are largely independent of each other. I have historically worked primarily for or with partners other than my father. We have never discussed this as an intentional plan of action within our firm. Likewise we have never discussed the fact that we work well together when we have been given the opportunity. My father’s influence on these aspects of my practice, while they exist, have been indirectly established or felt.
I am very proud to work at the firm I work for, and I have recently become more proud that the firm now also carry’s my father’s (and my) name. It would be untrue to say that my father has not heavily influenced my law career. Looking back on our interactions or discussions over the years, it has always just been an unspoken influence based on the facts that exist. How we have put the answer together has been up to us. I think it’s working pretty great so far.
Ira Bowman is a shareholder with Godwin, Bowman & Martinez in Dallas.
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