A friend of his father's was looking to hire a litigation paralegal, and Laskowski got the job. Instead of preparing him for law school, the paralegal profession became a beloved career, and Laskowski has excelled.
He was recently named one of the Top-15 Paralegals in America by paralegal author Carole Bruno and will be featured in her upcoming book.
Laskowski, 28, credits his success to enthusiasm, hard work, and supportive mentors.
"I think the best thing is just being adaptable, not saying no, and viewing everything as the next challenge, and being a team player," he told LawCrossing. "If you attack everything with the same enthusiasm, I think you are bound to do well eventually. It also helps to have the right people around you. I lucked out with my team in my bankruptcy department. They're all just wonderful attorneys and secretaries, and we all just really support each other."
Laskowski started his legal career with a small New Jersey firm and gained experience in medical malpractice, construction, and other areas of litigation.
"There were a lot of questionable cases that came across my desk," he said. "I'm not going to say I didn't see any that looked legitimate, but there were a lot more that didn't. And that's the big problem right now that's clogging up the courts. It isn't substantiated. Somebody who smoked three packs a day for 20 years, and they think it's the asbestos that they came in contact with for five minutes."
Two years ago, the firm stopped representing the mine; and Laskowski went to work for the bankruptcy department, which handles commercial cases from both creditor and debtor sides. Although experienced in litigation, Laskowski knew very little about bankruptcy law when he started.
"I basically had to learn bankruptcy and get up to speed on a trial that had been going on for years in a matter of months," he said.
He enrolled in a continuing education course for bankruptcy law, read all the bankruptcy books in the office, and asked a lot of questions.
Laskowski said his computer skills—he builds his own computers as a hobby—have helped his career significantly. His specialty is creating slick visual displays for trials. In the past, he said, the firm tones down evidence displays to avoid looking like the "big, bad corporation," but those days are changing.
"But nowadays, I think juries want to see neat animations. They want to see documents on the screen. With bankruptcy court, there's no jury. It's a bench trial," he said.
During a recent bankruptcy trial, Laskowski said he thinks the high-tech presentation of evidence impressed the judge.
"I think she just thought that everything was neat-looking anyway, and we really got her attention, because she didn't have to fumble through papers. She just had to look up at a big screen," he said. "We're dealing with thousands and thousands of documents and all these big binders, and it would have taken forever for her to flip through to figure out what we were talking about, and this just made it all nice and seamless and kept things moving."
Laskowski said Porzio attorneys appreciate his tech skills and that the firm is known for its sophisticated paralegals. The managing partner started his career as a paralegal at Porzio, and the firm now tries to maintain a 1:1 ratio of paralegals to attorneys.
Laskowski, who is treasurer of the Legal Assistants' Association of New Jersey and actively involved in national paralegal groups, said it's important to learn all you can about your job and area of law, but urges paralegals to network outside of the office. He also has been published in various paralegal journals and said it's as important for paralegals to get their work out on a national level.
"There's this whole other universe outside the office, interacting with other paralegals— networking, getting published, writing articles as you get more experienced," he said.
But Laskowski said he believes it's also important to have a full life outside of work.
"A lot of people get bogged down in their work," he said. "For me, my outlet is hockey. I've been playing since I was three, and it's a nice stress relief, and I hope other people have similar kinds of things to wind down."
