Sidebars

Kate Geyer: Breaking Institutional Bias

April 29, 2022 Kilpatrick Townsend & Stockton LLP Season 2 Episode 1
Sidebars
Kate Geyer: Breaking Institutional Bias
Show Notes Transcript

This episode introduces the new co-host of the Sidebars podcast, Kate Geyer. Kate is an Associate in Kilpatrick Townsend’s Seattle office. Her practice focuses on patent litigation in federal court and at the ITC, as well as post-grant proceedings before the U.S. Patent Office.

Kate is a 2019 graduate of George Washington University Law School. She graduated with high honors, Order of the Coif, and won the Rothwell, Figg, Ernst & Manbeck Award. While in law school, in addition to being a research assistant and an articles editor for the George Washington Law Review, Kate also won the 2018 and 2019 AIPLA’s Giles S. Rich Memorial Moot Court Competition and served as a judicial intern for the honorable Kara Stoll Carto on the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and as a law clerk in the Office of Unfair Import Investigations at the ITC.

Prior to law school, Kate graduated from MIT with a BS in physics and minors in mathematics and political science, then followed her passion for the intersection of technology and policy to a position as a business analyst in Washington, DC, dissecting emerging technologies for the Department of Defense and Intelligence Community customers.

In this episode, Kate shares her journey to becoming the patent litigator and fierce advocate she is today. This journey also built her determination to break the barriers and institutional biases that still persist for women and minorities in patent law, and to create a more welcoming and inclusive profession - one in which there is a seat at the table for everyone.

Highlights include:

  • Introducing the new co-host of Sidebars (0:38)
  • Turns out, learning physics and doing physics are not the same thing (2:44)
  • Finding practical ways to indulge a passion for tech and policy (3:44)
  • Participating in the arena, expanding one’s horizons, finding law school (4:47)
  • Breaking “it’s not what we do around here” institutional norms (8:33)
  • A multigenerational perspective on gender barriers and mentorship (10:59)
  • The unexpected dynamics of being a young and female litigator (14:40)
  • New opportunities for younger attorneys (15:59)
  • The importance of giving associates freedom from micromanagement (20:29)
  • Taking ownership and handling mistakes (26:00)
  • Finding a job you love (28:48) 
  • Perfectionism and not being the smartest person in the room (31:13)
  • Getting over fears with practice (37:22)
  • Crushing arguments with preparation (43:35)
  • The critical need to address the shortage of women and minorities in leadership (48:40)

Thanks for listening to Sidebars! Connect with us:


**The opinions expressed are those of the attorneys and do not necessarily reflect the views of the firm or its clients. This podcast is for general information purposes and is not intended to be and should not be taken as legal advice.

April Abele Isaacson:

Welcome to Sidebars, Kilpatrick Townsend's limited podcast series focused on women and underrepresented groups in patent law. I'm April Abele Isaacson, a patent litigator and office managing partner of the San Francisco office.

Kate Geyer:

And I'm Kate Geyer, a patent litigation associate in Seattle. We're here to discuss the gender gap in the patent bar and have candid conversations with female patent practitioners on their career paths.

April Abele Isaacson:

Welcome to Season Two of Sidebars! For this season, we are turning our focus to gender inequality and patent litigation, and I have a fabulous new co-host, Kate Geyer. Kate is an associate in our Seattle office. Her practice focuses on patent litigation matters in federal court and at the ITC, as well as post-grant proceedings before the PTAB. Kate is a graduate of MIT with a BS in physics and minors in both mathematics and political science. Prior to law school, Kate was a business analyst in Washington, DC, where she held a number of business development, strategic planning, and implementation roles, focusing on emerging technology for the Department of Defense and intelligence customers. Kate is a 2019 graduate of George Washington University Law School. She graduated with high honors, Order of the Coif, and won the Rothwell, Figg, Ernst& and Manbeck Award. During her time at GW, Kate was a research assistant, an articles editor for the George Washington Law Review and winner of the 2018–2019 AIPLA Giles S. Rich IP Moot Court Competition. Kate was also a judicial intern for the Honorable Kara Stoll in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and a law clerk in the Office of Unfair Import Investigations at the ITC. As you can see, she's very accomplished for someone who has been a lawyer for only a few years now and really excited to have her. Kate, welcome to Sidebars!

Kate Geyer:

Thank you. I'm excited to be here. Especially after all the conversations last season, excited to keep them going for another season.

April Abele Isaacson:

Well, we usually start out with our opener questions. So I'm gonna go ahead and pose that to you. And I know these are always long stories that are circuitous, but what made you pivot from science to law?

Kate Geyer:

Yeah, I think like most people that's a long story. I went to MIT thinking that I was gonna get my PhD in physics. I wanted to work at CERN and do particle physics, and I was convinced I was gonna win the Nobel prize one day. Two years in, I decided I like learning about physics and I don't like doing physics. So it was really the first lab class I took that I just realized I didn't wanna do that kind of minutiae, detail work that you have to do to really do the science and produce the papers. I didn't wanna specialize in such a, a narrow field. I wanted to be able to learn about anything and everything and, and not limit myself in that way. So, my junior year at MIT, I had a bit of an existential crisis and started taking classes in pretty much every discipline, political science and creative writing, economics courses, and ended up falling in love with the political science side of things. I liked the interplay between technology and policy and the real life effects of, of that in the world. And I took an environmental law class that actually had a like law textbook, where we were reading cases and summarizing cases. And I thought it was a bunch of fun. It was really interesting to learn about RCRA and CERCLA, learn about nuclear waste regulations or lack thereof. So I, I knew I wanted to do something at the intersection of policy and technology. I had no idea what that was, and I knew I didn't wanna keep going through school. I wanted to get some real work. So I applied for everything. I applied for finance. I applied for policy positions and I ended up landing at an IT consulting firm in Washington, DC, that firm did, uh, it was mainly a government contracts shop. So we did a lot of request for proposals and stuff like that in the, and I eventually transitioned onto actual project teams focusing on emerging technologies for the government. And I still, at the same time kept going to things in DC. I went to talks, I went to lectures. I signed up for summer programs and there was a Duke summer program as a Duke Law summer program. And I took a class on cyber security, law and policy, or the law of armed conflict with a Duke professor, a retired major general, I think Charles Dunlap. He always called himself Charlie. And that was like the class that I think something clicked for me. I, I had worked long enough. I was ready to start thinking about school again. And I was fascinated. I was fascinated with every discussion we had. I was fascinated with the, the law of armed conflict and AI weaponry and drones and cyber. And what is a kinetic attack versus what is not, and just the unclear bounds of how new stuff fits into old law. So it was really after that class that I decided I wanted to go into law and I wanted to do operational type law in military setting. So I, that's kind of why I targeted GW. I applied to a couple others, but when I got into GW, it was a pretty easy choice for me. But when you go to law school and you have a science background, the IP people find you, they will track you down and they will convert you to their ways. So they did try and try and recruit me. And I kind of held them off for a little bit until I did moot court and moot court was kind of what changed, changed my path from being more of a policy regulatory type lawyer. I was thinking of to really wanting to do litigation so I can keep going into how I ended up at patent litigation, but that kind of at least answered the initial question of, of science to lawyering.

April Abele Isaacson:

Well, and it's interesting because there's obviously a lot to unpack there. First of all, as you know, I was in the military Navy, I know your, your husband is currently serving in, in the Navy. And I also took classes on the laws of armed conflict, but, and when I went to law school, never in a million years, did it occur to me that I was gonna become a JAG. And that was just based on relationship with a friend. I know what you mean about people targeting you for intellectual property. There were only a few of us when I was in law school, but maybe we can go back to your comment about thinking you were gonna win the Nobel prize because I'd love to know where that kind of came from, and maybe talk a little bit about kind of growing up where you grew up, and what got you to MIT in the first place.

Kate Geyer:

Yeah, I do things at 120% when I do them.

April Abele Isaacson:

I can attest to that.<laugh>

Kate Geyer:

I, I set very high expectations for myself and if I hit even 50% of those expectations, I'm doing really well. And I don't know where that came from. I, I grew up in Cincinnati, both my parents, they're engineers who went into business, but they've always, always supported everything I wanted to do. And the biggest thing that I always wanted to do was read, because I loved learning my parents. The one thing they would always do is they'd always take me to the library. They'd always take me to a bookstore. So I had incalculable amount of books growing up and, and I still do that today, but I, I think that thirst for knowledge and thirst for more is it was, that was kind of where it developed from is really just reading. And, and I think when I started really developing that, that those high expectations and really pushing for more was, was high school.'Cause high school was the first time I started being told no that I couldn't do things.

April Abele Isaacson:

And if I can interject there where, I mean, where was the no coming from? Was it teachers, uh, some of your classmates.

Kate Geyer:

So I went to an all girls Catholic high school. So the, no was coming from that setting in general, which just had preconceived notions of, of what women should do, what their roles are. And it was, it was normally just, we don't do that. It wasn't necessarily a, no, it was just like, that's just not what we do. So like for example, even like the AP classes they had, it was one of the best schools in the state, but they didn't offer the highest level AP courses in math and physics. And I was out of math classes by my junior year of high school. And so I was like, can I just do this? Can I just do this AP test? And they're like, oh, we just, we just don't offer it. So I went to the math teacher and I said, this is what they told me. I would like to take this. I would like to self-study and then work with you. And he's like, yeah, I'll totally sign you up for this. And we'll pay for the test and we'll coordinate it and we'll get it done. So I think it was more just the, the organization itself had never considered it. It was just kind of the first time problems arose and they just weren't willing to go out of the way, but my teachers were always there to find a way to make it work. I just had to push for it and I had to fight for it.

April Abele Isaacson:

So it sounds like it was a little bit more like on an institutional level per se, as opposed to the, the teachers themselves. And it is interesting because the three of us who were on here because Kristina, our fabulous producer behind the scenes, all of us grew up Catholic sounds like, but I think it's interesting with your parents talking about it sounds like, and correct me if I'm wrong, that really the sky was the limit in terms of how they supported you, but then you ran into institutional bias within your school environment. How did you reconcile it or maybe now looking back, how do you reconcile that?

Kate Geyer:

I don't reconcile it. I just think institutional bias is something to break. I think my parents, by making the sky, the limit in the first instance, by growing up with that as my, my viewpoint, I just don't accept limits that don't need to be there. So I, I don't think they need to be reconciled. I think institutional limits are there to be broken.

April Abele Isaacson:

Well, and it's really funny because, um, we did not plan this ahead listeners. I assure you, but today we are recording. It is International Women's Day. And I don't even know Kate, if you're aware of the theme this year for international women's day is"Break the Bias"

Speaker 2:

Love it.

April Abele Isaacson:

So appropriate for this conversation today. And I think as our listeners know, and I know Kate knows, you know, she and I are very much different generations and I'd like to think that things would be different for someone who's in their early thirties compared to someone in their in their mid fifties where I am. But it sounds like you're still dealing with some of the same things that were happening for the last 50 plus years, which is really interesting.

Kate Geyer:

Yeah. I think it's, it's probably at a different level. I think it's a little more understated. I think it's, I think there's a lot more support at higher levels. Like from the generations that have been through it before, there's a lot more female mentors now who are willing to help break the system and recognize the issues and quite frankly, a lot more male mentors as well. I think it's not something people are afraid of talking about, but there is just some of that gut stuff that's still there, still being the one that asked to plan the potluck, still being the one asked to take notes at meetings. Some of that stuff is still pervasive and there's now opportunities to call it out. But, yeah, I think there's some stuff that's, that's still, it hasn't been fixed, but it can be fixed and the conversations can happen now to start fixing them.

April Abele Isaacson:

And I think that nowadays there aren't as many of what we would call the ladder pullers that I ran into. So the generation above me was kinda like, well, I had to work really hard, no one supported me to do it. So I got where I am. I'm gonna pull the ladder and then good luck to you. So it sounds like from your experience, you're finding that female mentors, as well as male mentors are really rising up to the occasion to give you opportunities. Is that accurate?

Kate Geyer:

Yeah, absolutely. I, there is, there are still some ladder pullers. I, I ran into them in my prior career before becoming a lawyer, but they are few and far between and very much the exception. And they're normally in, I'd say even kind of the generation ahead of you as well, they're much more senior and generally not senior at the company, more just senior actually in age and, and less level of experience, which I also found very interesting

April Abele Isaacson:

In terms of male mentors. How have you, well, how have the conversation's gone in terms of, you know, they obviously don't have the experience that you have as a woman, but wanting to be supportive of you as a young new attorney. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Kate Geyer:

Yeah, in general it's gender, hasn't played into those conversations very much. It can be when I, if I share an article or talk about it specifically, but the basis of most of my mentorship relationships is truly just, we just click and they think I do good work and therefore they're willing to support me and give me those opportunities. There is definitely times though, when, and when there have been comments, like we've had judges who would treat the female on the call differently from the male on the call. And it wasn't necessarily me. It may have been someone else on our team in the case, but they've also been willing to call out those situations and just say,"Hey, giving you a heads up. This might be some, some dynamic we have to deal with in this case." And it's trickier as a lawyer, right? Is when it comes from a judge is we don't really have a lot of, there's not a lot of pushback you can do there. It's more, how do we figure out a way around this and how do we be advocates, the best advocates we can be in these situations. So that's, that tends to be how gender comes up a little more frequently, at least in, in the last couple months,

April Abele Isaacson:

Have you had any situations? And I know it's delicate when you're dealing with a judge or someone like that, that has obviously a position of authority over you personally, but as well as advocating on behalf of your client, have you had situations where someone has kind of stood up for you, so to speak and been your voice to try to kind of buck up against the authority? Because I know that that's difficult.

Kate Geyer:

I actually think I've had almost the opposite problem, or not. It's not, not necessarily a problem, but being young and female, I think I've been able to click with some of the older male judges in a different way and that it, it feels almost like they listen to me more and they, they kind of don't have those gut reactions. And I, I feel, I don't know, it's not, and it's not in a condescending way. So I, I haven't felt like I've had the need to be stood up for, but it makes me wonder about how much of that is because I'm young and how much of that will change as I become more senior, because the problems when they've been called out to me have been junior female partners. It is when the female is taking on the leadership role in the case, as opposed to, when it's very clear that I'm the junior lawyer getting the opportunity to, to argue.

April Abele Isaacson:

And along those lines, I know that within the federal court system, obviously where we both practice and then also in the USPTO, there are a lot of pilot programs now that are in place to give junior attorney opportunities. Those did not exist when I was at your level. And I'm not saying that as a complaint, it's more of just an objective observation. How important do you think, you know, just based on your experience for the last few years, those types of programs are?

Kate Geyer:

I think they're, they're radically important. I think the PTAB is one that does it really well. They have, what's called the LEAP program. Essentially, if you have less than I think three or five arguments under your belt, they allow junior lawyers to take on a piece of the argument. But I think one of the important things is they also give more time. So there's actually like a benefit to the client. A real actual benefit. You can explain to say, this is why you should let a junior lawyer do it. And I think that that kind of extra gravy is important for a lot of clients, because if the client thinks it's an important issue, like a PTAB hearing, you get one hearing, that's it, this is not a discovery motion. This is that's your case. They may be less likely to give junior lawyers opportunities if there's not something in it for them. So I, I think the more, I think those programs are important, and I think the more they can be designed to give the client a benefit, the more useful they'll be overall, the district courts do something similar there's judges who, who won't give arguments, or who would normally not give an argument on a motion, but will give an opportunity to argue if junior lawyers do it. So, it's not just time for the junior lawyers to get trained up, but the client gets the benefit of actually, if there's nuance to the argument, there's now time you get in front of the judge to, to make those points. So I, I think the, the fact that those exist and the fact that there's benefits to clients means clients push for them too. So I've started seeing clients like their external counsel notes or their guidelines do now even have those. We like to give junior lawyer opportunities built into them too. So I, I like that it started with the courts and I think you're starting to see it now filter into client expectations as well.

April Abele Isaacson:

I saw, I think it was in November, there was a panel of federal district court judges, at a conference and one of the female, and she's about the same age as me. So she's definitely put up with a lot of mansplaining and a bunch of things in her career. So she's certainly a tough cookie and I respect her a lot. She made a point of saying that if you have an argument and you'd like to have a junior attorney make the argument, just let us know ahead of time, just let chambers know, and we will do what we can to set aside that extra time. And then going to your point, because I was a client, as you know, I was in-house counsel for almost five years and managed all of our litigations. And I remember having people call me up where there'd be all of a sudden we have a Markman hearing that's gonna be scheduled. And they said so and so is not available who was the white guy with gray hair. And I said, as the client, I don't really care because you, and it happened to be a woman. You're the one that knows the issue. So, you know, you can do the argument and you figure out how you guys wanna split it up because I'm not gonna micromanage it. How important do you think those types of client reactions to things are for you, you know, at your level?

Kate Geyer:

I think they're very important. I had a similar opportunity my first year as a lawyer where I was a Markman hearing and there were a couple terms that were small niche things we could carve out for me. And we went to a major client who their guidelines said, hey, for big hearing, you gotta have the lead partner argue this, but we asked them, we're like,"Hey, this is an exception to the case. We, we, she worked on the claim construction. She managed this process. We'd like her to argue it." And they said, sure. So I, I think clients being able to, to express the support for, but also the confidence in junior lawyers is really important. We don't get a lot of face time with the clients on, on a lot of cases, some are better than others. So I think just even hearing that from the client, even getting that validation, is just, I think it's really important to, to building confidence as well as, as giving junior lawyers the opportunity in the first place.

April Abele Isaacson:

And then I'd like to ask you a question would be helpful maybe for partners and people who are senior associates to know about associates. And I know of course you don't speak for all associates, but, you certainly are a strong voice for that. How do you like to be managed?

Kate Geyer:

I subscribe to the, throw me in the deep end of the pool and let me figure out how to swim, learning style. I am very much, I need to do things to learn and I'm willing to put in the time to do it if given the opportunity. So I like, I like like someone just letting, just setting me free and telling me, go ahead and figure it out. Here's a go by, come to me with questions and then just letting me kind of figure it out because I, I need to do that time that digging into it, to, to wrap my head around what the important stuff is. And then all the conversations that kind of flow along the way of, well, why do we do it this way; is this important to think about that really helps me wrap my head around whatever the assignment is. So I, I appreciate less guidance more than more. I know there are many associates who are the opposite. They kind of like knowing where they're going and they like seeing an end result and they like a little more structure to it. But yeah, I, I just like being told to do something and figure it out.

April Abele Isaacson:

Well, I guess it goes, it goes to a few points. It goes back to your loving to read and learn. And so it's kind of taking that and being resourceful. And I think it's a message to all of the micromanagers out there that, that doesn't really work all that well. But to that point, how do you deal with micromanagers?

Kate Geyer:

It's a learning experience. I have found that early and often communication is, is the best way I can do it. I need to figure out what their expectations are, what their timelines are and figure out how much leeway I have when it comes to the assignment. So even something simple, like, can you do case law research on this brief on this narrow topic? There are some partners where I will just edit the brief and say, based on my case law, I put some cases in and I kind of edited our argument because I don't think we had it right, but for more micromanagers, it would be more of a formal, here is my finding. Here are the cases, here's my recommendation. And I wouldn't, I wouldn't necessarily take the next steps because I think they'd wanna make the decision. I'd figure out whether they, at what level of detail they wanted to decide what to implement, what they liked and just not, I'm a little less I'm of less proactive with micromanaging partners, which I think makes me less effective as an associate, but that's kind of how I figured the best way to work with them is give them exactly what they want and then do my best to tell them the next steps without actually doing it.

April Abele Isaacson:

I was just gonna say, it sounds like it kind of holds you back really from being able to be your fullest self in terms of being an attorney. Is that, is that a fair assessment?

Kate Geyer:

I think so. I, I think I still get the sense that like I still get to make the recommendation, right. Like, instead of putting something in the draft, I can say, here's how I'd edit the draft and pretty much do the same work. It's just communicating it differently. But it does, I, I don't think as many steps ahead because I'm, I'm not supposed to. And, and I can't because I have to wait for the feedback on that first step before I go to the second and third steps. So I think it, it hinders that kind of learning that long-term strategic thinking. So, yeah, I, I think, yeah, I would say it does hold you back in kind of developing as an attorney and, and really thinking through implications in a case.

April Abele Isaacson:

Do you have any kind messages to set out to those who are micromanagers about maybe how it feels or how it might be helpful if they could just give up a little bit of that control?

Kate Geyer:

Well, I'm very sympathetic with micromanagers because I am a control freak and, and I was one, um, at one time. So I back in college, uh, I was head of my sorority and, and huge micromanager would not let anything go, like did not trust anyone to do anything. So I, but it also created more work for myself. It created more stress and, and there were never problems. Like the people did stuff fine. And if there were problems we could fix them. So I think, I think the, the message would be it's okay to let go. You hired good people and you're training good people. And these, they, they do good work and there's always time to fix problems. There's never gonna be a problem so severe that you won't have time to fix it and that you can't build in time to fix it. And the more leeway you give these junior associates, the less you micromanage them, the faster they're going to grow so that you don't even have to be worried about it anymore. So I would, I think it's more think of your own long-term benefit, think of your own, the time you spend micromanaging and it will get better. It might be scary at first, but when you kind of let go and let the associates develop, uh, it will take less time for them to, to know how to do things right. And know what to get you in a way that you can build that trust better.

April Abele Isaacson:

Well, I can give them a sense of freedom, so to speak because you delegate to a team around you that you trust can do a good the other thing I'm interested in is you're right. Things can be fixed, a mistake can be made and it can be fixed. Have you had situations? And obviously I don't get into any specifics, but you know, things happen. Hey, we're lawyers, nothing is perfect. But in terms of making sure whatever the issue is, it's immediately addressed so that it can be handled. Do you have any, anything that you could talk about just on a high level?

Kate Geyer:

Yeah. I missed a discovery deadline. I just had it written down and just didn't get some discovery responses out in time. And I was, I was able to flag it for the partner. I was able to kind of finish it that day on a rush basis. Get it reviewed. The partner just reached out to opposing counsel, asked for an extension and it all ended up being fine. It was kind of two or three days of a little bit of panic, because if you don't respond to discovery request, everything can be all your objections can be waved and it can put you in a bad spot. But I, I mean, that was just one time where I, it was like the first mistake I made as a lawyer, I felt terrible. It was missing a deadline. Like can't do that kind of thing. And it ended up being just fine. It took a couple emails. People had to crunch on some or done some work for a couple hours, but I'm glad that happened earlier in my career because I, I realize that there is time to fix things.

April Abele Isaacson:

Well, that's the thing is I try to explain to people and certainly I've had the same thing happen myself, where mistakes get made, and it's more communicating immediately. As soon as you realize there is the mistake. And then coming up with the game plan of how to fix it.

Kate Geyer:

I was just gonna say, that's, that's exactly. It is just, it's owning it right away. Just saying, I, we missed this. This was for me, it was like, Hey, this was due yesterday. And I just noticed we didn't serve these. I am working on these now, can you please request an extension? And then I, we would've game plan if opposing counsel didn't agree to our extension, but there there's, there's a way to fix, fix everything.

April Abele Isaacson:

And then, for myself personally, as a, I will call myself a recovered perfectionist. I totally sympathize with everything you're talking about, but I think as I've gotten older, I've learned to give up some of the control and especially having people like yourself that you can work with as a team and trust to do the work helps, helps with that immensely. And it definitely gives me a sense of freedom. Having people like you, that I can can work with on things. The other thing I wanted to know is what motivates you. I know you've talked about a bunch of different things in terms of your path to where you are now, but is there something specific that motivates you?

Kate Geyer:

I love my job. I, I just love my job and I having had previous jobs, I didn't love, and I, I really struggled, like didn't even wanna go in every day and would call in sick just because I really didn't wanna go in. If nothing was going on, this job just is, I have a lot of passion for this job. I love the people I work with. I, I think it's fun. I have, oh, there was a term, there was a term I learned today and I need to find it because it's so perfect. Ego drive. I have a very strong ego drive, which is a need to convince of things even if it doesn't matter. And so I think that part of being a lawyer that, that need to convince people, the enjoyment of arguing for not necessarily for the sake of it, but because I enjoy people arguing against me, I enjoy being challenged. And I enjoy trying to come up with with ways around their challenges, especially when they have a good point. Those are things that just bring me a lot of joy. And that's a lot of what our job is. Whether it's talking about strategy of a case, whether it's writing a brief, whether it oral advocacy. I just love that part of the job.

April Abele Isaacson:

It's funny because I remember I was, I think 15 or 16 and my dad overheard me on the phone talking to someone and it must have been the point counterpoint and I was very calm about it. And he said to me, and this was way before I ever even imagined that I would be a lawyers. Like, I feel like you're gonna be a lawyer.<laugh>

Kate Geyer:

Yeah, no one in my family was shocked when I told them I was going to law school.<laugh>

April Abele Isaacson:

Well, and then I wanted to go back to MIT because I know you had shared with me that it wasn't like you showed up day one and you were, you know, just crushing it in terms of the grades. I mean, it was from what I gather a bit of a struggle. Can you talk about that a little bit?

Kate Geyer:

Yeah. I, from, from kindergarten through graduating high school, I was pretty much the top of my grade when it came to academics. Like I just excelled there always. And it was, I never struggled with it. Like I was challenged by it, but I, I never struggled. And I felt, I was often one of the smartest people in the room. But when I went to MIT, I was never the smartest person in the room. I went to school with the smartest people, probably in the entire world. And I was very, very average there, which it was just the first time I was average. It was the first time I didn't stand out academically. It was the first time I was getting B's consistently that I got a D in one class and had to retake it. And it was the first time I felt like I had not necessarily failed, but I, that I wasn't good enough because I, like you April, I am hopefully a recovering perfectionist, but at the time I was very much a, a gungho perfectionist and I wasn't perfect anymore. My grades weren't perfect anymore. It took a lot of work and it took a lot of hard conversations and a lot of crying, but I think it also taught me how to not be the best and how to fail and how to have that not define me, which I'm glad I went through that early because I now don't, I don't own, it's not necessarily ownership, but I don't feel it personally if I lose an argument or if someone shoots down, out my, my argument or if the judge doesn't like it, or if someone like it just, it's not something that bothers me anymore. But I think I had to go through that discomfort of, of being average and knowing people are smarter than me. But I think at the end, I came out being a, a stronger person and a stronger lawyer in a lot of ways.

April Abele Isaacson:

Going back to that point where, I guess maybe you had that epiphany that you were average. Right. I wouldn't describe you that way, but that's how you described your self, but feeling that way. How did you reconcile that? I know you crying in some thought, but how did you reconcile that after all of those years leading up to that feeling like you were, you know, the smartest in the room and then going to a place like MIT, which is obviously filled with all of the smartest people who came from all over the world. I, how did, how did you kind of mentally deal with that?

Kate Geyer:

Therapy- I mean, just very bluntly. Like it, it took therapy, it took just talking it out and, and perspective. I don't think I fully got over it in that sense. I just realized that I would not thrive in a, in a area where I, I couldn't Excel or where I was ever. So I think for me, it was more of learning that that was not something that I wanted to do. And I had to find something in my life where I could excel to be happy. So I think after MIT, when I started working again and getting back out and to just like around normal people, it helped because I, I was able to excel again. I was able to stand out again, and that might be like a little egotistical to say, like, I need to be really good at what I do to be happy, but I, I just accept that about myself as if, if there's something I'm, I'm good at, but not really good at, I'm just not gonna like doing it as much. Well, except for a couple of things, but in general, and for my work for my work world, that was something I needed. I just needed to know I was good at something, or one of the best at something be competitive at it. You mentioned earlier that, for example, if you were to have to get up and make an argument and I'm paraphrasing, of course, and maybe it's a loser, or maybe you feel like, okay, you're not necessarily gonna win. How is it that you went from that perfectionist and then going through the, you know, feeling average and then kind of coming out of that, that kind of made you what I will describe as fearless in terms of going in there and advocating. Can you, can you explain that a little bit? Honestly, I, I wish I knew. I, I love how you phrase that and I'm not sure where in that transition had happened, but I did develop a love for the underdog arguments. I, I like the stretch arguments. I like making new legal arguments that haven't been made before. And I wonder if it's just, I don't, I always did play it safe. And I'm not sure where along the way I learned that it's okay not to play it safe and maybe it was MIT, right? Maybe it was learning that not being the best at things doesn't mean I'm not going to be successful. It doesn't mean that I'm not going to enjoy it because I'm not afraid to lose anymore. I'm not afraid to lose arguments. And I'd actually rather take the hardest argument. I'd rather actually take the loser because I think they're more fun, especially when you win<laugh>. So in some ways they're low stakes, because there's no expectations, but when you come out on the other side, realizing you did convince the judge, there's almost a lot more satisfaction in that.

April Abele Isaacson:

I think it takes a lot of people, a really, a long time to get over the fact that everything is not the end of the world. And it sounds like you were able to figure that out quite early in your career, which I think can be a lesson to a lot of people that are my age and, and older, that truly feel like every little thing that doesn't go perfectly is, is the end of the world. I'd like to go back to, um, the AIPLA moot court competition. And can you talk to me or our listeners really a little bit about that experience for you and how it kind of led to, to where you are now in terms of what I'll describe as fearlessness.

Kate Geyer:

You know, it's funny because it actually, it, it was two years of competition. So at, at GW to be the representative in the AIPLA competition, you actually have to win the internal, IP moot court competition. So I was on Moot Court board and we had to do a moot court competition just to meet our requirement and my poor partner, poor Tyler. I convinced him to do the IP one, just, just to get it over with. I was like, we'll just do an internal competition. It'll be easy. We don't have to travel. Like you can take the non-IP issue and it'll just be fine. We'll just, we'll just do it once and then be done low and behold. He's a really good arguer,<laugh> he was really good and I was really, and we ended up winning the internal competition. I< laugh> something funny about me is I used to be the person who oral presentations used to make me faint my freshman year in high school. I, I almost fainted like twice when I had to give up and give like, we're talking five-minute presentations, not even someone asking me questions w hen interrupting my flow, just getting up and talking f or five minutes would give me so much anxiety. And I actually did a lot better when someone interrupted me and when it was a conversation. So I think I started building a lot of confidence through that moot c ourt competition and through doing that and, and I loved it. I, I loved the back and forth with the judges. I loved the skeptical questions that I got a chance to, t o, t o say my point of view. And then the second here, when we did the AIPLA one, it was, it was kind of the same thing. It was just more, more opportunities, more arguing, and eventually getting up to arguing in front of Judge Bryson. And, u h, at the time[USPTO] Director Iancu in our finals, I wear a heart rate tracker watch. My heart rate was 130, that entire argument. I'm not sure it came across in my voice at all, but the nerves were there. But at that point, i t, i t w as, i t was just the confidence building of just doing it repeatedly over and over and over again that I knew they weren't gonna, they weren't gonna ask something. I probably hadn't been asked before. It wasn't true. They did. But even if they did, I'd be fine because I, I knew this inside and out, it was a smaller record than any case I see today. And I had, my partner was really, he, he did as much practice as I needed to. He asked me questions. He would make faces as me when I argued just to like practice, not getting distracted. And so I, I think that that just built a lot of confidence in, in j ust standing up and doing mo ot c ourt stuff, which is why I think I'm, I, no w t hat I feel confident in the presentation aspect of it and I, I can learn whatever the argument is. Um, a s, but now I know I can kind of stand there and not faint<laugh>.

April Abele Isaacson:

So I, I did moot court and I was on the moot court board as well. And actually I'll give a shout out to my moot court partner. We, we did well, but not at the same level as you, but it was Tom Calendar. And he was awesome as well. I remember almost feeling like I was having a little bit of an out of body experience because I was doing so well and had so little expectation of myself. Did you, did you have that kind of an experience?

Speaker 2:

I think so. I had, I probably had secret higher expectations, but when, when Tyler and I always talked about it, we were just like, we just did it. Like, we just let's just go, we don't need to win. Like it was, it truly started as a, we just need to get this credit done with, to meet our, meet our requirements. So I think because we went into it just, just to do it, it became easier. And, and as we got further and further along though, it was like, Hey, if we're in the finals, let's just win it. Like, let's just go let's, let's do our best. And, and we ended up doing it so.

April Abele Isaacson:

Well. And then I, I remember there were people that I think had very high expectations of themselves and then really did not do well. And then they looked some, some of the teams that were successful and were almost a little bit shocked by it. That was one thing, another thing I noticed, and I don't wanna generalize, but you know, there's something to it. There were certain people and maybe they weren't female that were more than happy to be completely unprepared and stand up as though they knew what they were talking about, which I, I was completely shocked by. Did you experience that at all?

Kate Geyer:

I did. And I, at the time I had thought it was a coaching problem, because our coach told us from day one, you have to know the record that is more important than knowing the law. You need to be able to cite to the record every page, every fact, every detail. So I thought when people weren't as, as good on the record, they might be great on the law. They might know their briefs inside and out, but they didn't know the record and moot court competitions are what, 10 pages, if that of record, I actually, I always just thought it was a coaching thing, but now that you've, you've phrased it that way is, is there were, there were definitely teams that had, I mean, they were generally mostly male teams and they, they did have kind of just an air of expectation of like, I am good at this and I'm going to do well and I'm going to win. And it was more, you could see it when, when the judges would announce who won, which, which competition, sometimes they were shocked. And it was a little odd to me because I think their perform from the performances, it was pretty clear who won most times, but yeah, there definitely was it, if you come into it expecting to be the best and expecting to win, it felt like people were kind of just resting on, on that, which seems odd in a moot court competition.

April Abele Isaacson:

The other thing I've noticed and you know, this is of course not the case all the time, but I have found that when I'm in court or in trial in particular that I'm underestimated I don't know if you've had the at experience as well. You know, for example, I've had to do a cross examination of a CEO, who's male and pretty alpha male thinking he's gonna have one kind of an experience. And it turned out very differently than, than he was expecting, but I kind of was able to use some of that, being underestimated to my advantage. Have you had that experience?

Kate Geyer:

I have not yet. And I think that's because most of my experiences have been in more formal settings and I have been told my oral advocacy skill or style is, is that of an immovable mountain? So I think when I start speaking, I don't think they would underestimate me based on how, how I just come out of the gate. And I think a question or two in, it's pretty clear that I'm not going to move and that I have an answer for everything. So I, I, and again, that's, that's been more formal settings. Most of my, my experiences have been just me presenting to the judge and the judge asking questions. I've had some meeting confers that I've had people show up less, less than prepared when I have come incredibly prepared. I'm not sure if it's a junior thing. I'm not sure if it's a woman thing. I'm not sure if it's people being busy thing, because these are good lawyers from good firms. And it's, it's sometimes a little surprising how unprepared they are for, for simple things related to discovery. And again, I'm not sure if that's a hubris issue, if that's a, this is beneath me issue and I'm not sure if it's an underestimating issue, it could be kind of a lot of things, but I, I haven't quite had that experience yet. I'm expecting yet as I get a little bit more, I expect it with experts sometimes; actually that does remind me the, there, there was an expert on a case, the reaction when he was told that I was going to take his testimony was a very, very long silent pause<laugh> with, we were on videos so we could see faces too. And I, I'm not sure if it was underestimation. I'm not sure if he felt he wasn't getting the respect he deserved by having the senior lawyer take his testimony. But that was kind of the first time I had gotten a reaction of someone being unhappy that I was doing something. So that, that was a relatively recent experience that probably comes the closest to someone underestimating me.

April Abele Isaacson:

Well, what I will tell you is nothing is more rewarding than doing a killer cross, especially of a man who has underestimated you. And then you just absolutely crushed them and get, get cited in the federal circuit appeal, um, that you would in, by the way. I'll just, I'll add that. So something for you to be able to look forward to.

Kate Geyer:

Can we put that case cite in the, the notes of the episode?<laugh>

April Abele Isaacson:

Exactly, exactly. I'll I'll cite to that. The other thing I was curious, just on a high level, what, what are your goals?

Kate Geyer:

That's a very good question. I think most of my goals I really think about, or are a couple years out. I, I still don't, I'm still feeling out the profession. I'm still feeling out all the opportunities out there and, and where I want to be. Right now, I think my end long term goal is I just wanna be a trial lawyer. I love pre-trial if anyone, a lawyer to go to trial or do I don't care if it's exhibit objections and exchanges, if you need someone to do depo designations, I love that kind of strategic thinking and bringing that case together at the end and, and thinking about how to convince 12 of our peers off the street to side with us, I haven't actually been to trial yet. So that's, again, that's one of those things where it's like, I need to go to trial. I need to see, or those three weeks or two weeks, however long it is to, is that actually what I want to do or do I just love everything up to trial and I'm pretty sure I wanna stay probably in private practice, just based on that, especially in patent litigation, there's not a really, a lot of other opportunities to do trials if you're not in private practice or at least again, none that I'm aware of. But I think shorter term, I, I wanna keep building those skills. So I, I want to do oral advocacy as well as being a trial lawyer. I really love appellate arguments. I, I do wanna be a go-to person at the federal circuit. It would be my absolute dream to argue a case in front of the Supreme Court one day, that that would kind of be the, the icing on the cake and still looking for opportunities to do that. So, yeah, that's kind of the long-term stuff. There's a lot of steps along the way. I wanna clerk at the federal circuit someday, hopefully clerk at the Supreme Court. You know, that could happen too. I don't how many federal circuit clerks they get applying. So hopefully you can stand out there. But I, at the heart of it is I just wanna keep growing. As a lawyer, I wanna get better at it and I wanna keep doing, I wanna keep trying new things. There's still a lot to learn. I've only been practicing two and a half years, and I wanna keep loving my job the whole time too<laugh> and so far that hasn't been a problem.

April Abele Isaacson:

Well, first I'll put a plug in because it is official that Kate will be arguing in the mock competition at the Federal Circuit Bar Association Annual Meeting this year. So, uh, look out for that. I'm sure that's gonna be an awesome experience. And then that does segue into one of the things that inspired this season of Sidebars was a federal circuit bar association meeting that was extremely informative. And some of the guests were from companies and others were from Temple University and they had written a really excellent piece that was about gender inequality and patent litigation. And I can say, as someone who's been doing this for quite some time, it is real. It is something that I absolutely faced throughout my career of every single client for the most part, expecting the white gray-haired man to be the one that's doing certain things. What was your takeaway from reading that paper? And just the context of that from your perspective,

Kate Geyer:

It was actually very disappointing because it kind of solidified the trend that I had seen both in science and in law is that women and minorities are very represented at junior levels. There's, there's a pipeline, we're here, but somewhere along the way we get lost, whether it be as senior associates, junior partners, and clearly to senior partners. And it was more, the long-term trends that I think were disappointing is because I was hoping to see progress and there really hasn't been progress. So I, I think it, it kind of left me with a sense of, well, what are we doing about it? And I don't know that we are, besides talking about the issue. I don't know that firms or clients or anyone is really trying to get at, why are women leaving? Why are because leaving the profession is part of the problem. And then why aren't they getting the opportunities? Why aren't they making it into the upper echelons? Like where is the pipeline drying out along the way? Because at every level there's just less and less women and minorities. And I, I'm not sure how serious firms are about solving the problems because everyone acknowledges the issue. But I haven't seen firms. I haven't seen clients. I haven't seen people being really innovative about trying to fix it.

April Abele Isaacson:

One of the things I've, I've talked to you about a little bit, and I know I've talked to Kristina numerous times about is that there's know your value that's, you know, for women empowerment, they've been doing something with Forbes recently in the last few years, that's absolutely fabulous. And one of the things is kind of the 50 over 50, but also having the 50/30 combination, which is obviously what we are, how important to you is are those types of relationships in terms of female empowerment?

Kate Geyer:

I think they're critical because at the end of the day, while male mentorship is important, seeing someone who's done it before you and seeing how they did it, who looks like you and who has similar considerations you do and has gone through the biases and has like dealt with those issues. Those are things I can talk about with like male mentors and stuff, but they don't, they haven't lived it. And that's, that's different men don't understand, like for example, like kids, I gotta, like, I gotta make some decisions about my, well, my husband and I have to make decisions about kids in, uh, probably the next five years or so, but that physically will affect me in a way that it will never, ever affect my husband. They might be, they might be fathers. They might be very attentive. It literally might be a 50/50 split in the household. Like every best case scenario you can have, they still don't physically go through through pregnancy or postpartum. And there are just things that are different that I think just seeing women who have done it before is important. Because I I've heard from parents that sometimes it just seems impossible. And there are seeing that someone has made it through on the other side and stuck with it and how they got through that's important. They, someone else has figured out the solutions for you. It feels less like you're breaking new ground. There's at least a place to start. So for me, sometimes that's a little scary when I look at where I wanna be and don't see how anyone got there. And it's like, okay, all I've learned now is how not to get there. Now I need to figure out how to there and doing that path by yourself is scary. But by having someone who is there or who has done that path before or who has tried it and failed, it gives me a little more comfort and it's a little less daunting.

April Abele Isaacson:

Do you have any, you know, I hope that maybe you haven't had as many of these occasions as maybe people who are in their forties or fifties or older, but do you have any advice for anybody that finds themselves as the first or the only in the room or in the courthouse or something of the like,

Kate Geyer:

I'm not sure I have the best advice is because I haven't figured it out either and I'm pretty sure what I wish I I could do is not what you should do.<laugh> I think embracing it would be the best advice I can do. Um, you do stand out. It's not always in good ways, but you stand out and there is power in standing out. And I think there is ways to harness that power and make it beneficial in our line of work again, when, when the power with some of the power dynamics, it's, it's hard to stand up for yourself. So some of the stuff I wish I could say some of the stuff I wish I could do you just can't do it without professionally tanking yourself. And I think that's a that's again, why it's, it's helpful to have more senior female mentors who have been there and who have navigated those difficult situations. When you just have to bite your tongue and deal with it. It's not easy to do and you shouldn't have to do it, but it's kind of when you don't have the power, there's not a lot of options. So I think find someone who can help guide you through those tough situations. Someone you can talk to and be honest about, and someone who will be honest with you about: you can try and change the world. Here's what might happen if you do it though. Because that's, that's what I need. I normally need people to pull me back a little bit because I will blow things up if I don't like them and that's not always the politic solution and it's not the best. It's not always the best for the client, which in our line of work ultimately is, is what we have to consider.

April Abele Isaacson:

And I know, Shirley Chisholm, she's someone I actually had when I was in college and she was absolutely a force of nature her and I'm paraphrasing if I get it not quite right, but she said, if there's not a seat at the table, bring your own folding chair, but then there's a school of thought of, you know, start your own table. So I don't know how you feel about that.

Kate Geyer:

I think you need both. I think, I think you need to radically change how things work. A lot of systems were, I mean, law firms, right? Like all the way we do the business of law started back before women were lawyers. Like it really hasn't fundamentally changed much in expectations and billables and all the jokes the associates make about how overworked we are and stuff, right? Like that harkens back to, to systems that were built before when, when women stayed at home and men went to work. So I think you, you need to figure out a way to start your own table and to do it differently, but you need to make the, the current system work for you too. So I think you need to do both. I think there's definitely places in where it's needed to be radical change where you, you just need the new table, but I'd all also like it to be more, I'd like the actual industry to be more open I'd I'd like to have it be that there's, every table has a chair at it. And I, I think both are important and both are needed.

April Abele Isaacson:

Well, Kate, this has been such a wonderful interview with you. I, you know, I've had the privilege of being able to work with you, but just to your, your story has been just great. And I'm hoping that our listeners get as much out of it as I have. And I just wanna let you know how much I respect you and enjoy working with you. So thank you so much for your time.

Kate Geyer:

Yeah. Thank you. And looking forward to our, future conversations. Thank you for joining us today. Please subscribe to Sidebars on Buzzsprout, Apple Podcast, Amazon Music, or your preferred podcasting platform. And don't forget to rate or leave a review.

April Abele Isaacson:

If you enjoyed Sidebars, we invite you to check out Kilpatrick Townsend's Medicine and Molecules Blog at KilpatrickTownsend.com To read, watch, and listen to other related insight on patent law. We'll also put that information in our show notes. The opinion is expressed on this podcast are our own and are not necessarily those of Kilpatrick Townsend.