A nationally recognized labor and employment attorney, Harriet Cooperman represents publicly and privately held businesses and nonprofits in court, at the negotiation table and before executive leadership teams. Her litigation spans employment discrimination, trade secrets, wage and hour claims, ERISA matters and traditional labor disputes before courts and agencies across the United States.

Cooperman also serves as an experienced neutral with more than two decades on Maryland public labor relations boards, currently sitting on the Public Employee Labor Board under Gov. Wes Moore and having previously chaired the State Higher Education Labor Relations Board under four governors. Her knowledge drew international attention when she testified as an expert witness on Maryland noncompete law before the High Court of Justice in London, with the judge citing her analysis as critical to his ruling.

What is the biggest challenge facing your industry today?

AI provides many benefits for lawyers, including fast and efficient legal research, expeditious and comprehensive document review and analysis, assistance in drafting legal documents and predictive analysis. These benefits, however, also pose significant challenges.

As lawyers become more dependent on AI for legal research, they may lose (or not develop) strong research skills. This is particularly dangerous for new lawyers. We’ve seen many examples of lawyers and even some judges relying on AI for case citations without actually reading the cases, only to find that the citations were hallucinations and not actual decisions.

Similarly, overreliance on AI for drafting agreements can result in including inaccurate or even unlawful provisions in contracts, as well as lawyers not developing strong drafting skills. Similarly, overreliance on AI to draft legal arguments, correspondence and other documents will also result in lawyers not developing strong legal writing skills, critical analysis and an absence of creativity.

Another challenge AI presents is that when AI is used to perform work that new lawyers typically perform, the availability of the entry-level positions may diminish. Law firms may opt to use AI because it is cheaper and more efficient than training new lawyers. In the long run, this will hurt the profession because it is essential that we train young lawyers and develop their skills.

What is the best advice you’ve ever received?

Your only limitations are those you impose on yourself. Reach for the heights and give it your all because anything less is simply not worth it.

How do you define success?

Success is achieving your goals that are consistent with your values and have a positive impact on others. Success is making a positive difference.

A career spent entirely at one firm is itself a statement. Stephen Cornelius joined Eccleston and Wolf as an associate and rose to managing principal over the course of a legal career devoted to litigation defense. Based in Maryland, he defends lawyers, healthcare professionals and directors and officers, and advises law firms on employment-related matters.

Cornelius earned his Juris Doctorate from the University of Baltimore School of Law and a Bachelor of Science from Methodist University. He serves as a practice oral argument judge for the University of Baltimore School of Law Taxation Moot Court Team and has judged the D.C. Cup Moot Court Competition.

What is the biggest challenge facing your industry today?

Grappling with the impact of developing technology on traditional attorney and staff roles in a law firm setting. The prevalence of artificial intelligence and rise of automation/digitization of legal-related tasks have presented both ethical and practical challenges for law firms on a micro- and macro-level.

What is the best advice you’ve ever received?

Winning is defined by the client. In a given legal matter, what constitutes a “win” is dictated by the client. For some, it may be avoiding a legal dispute altogether. For others, it may be taking a case to trial and litigating it to a conclusion. The best advice I received was to identify the client’s goals and definition of “winning” as early as possible.

How do you define success?

Achieving a desired outcome while conducting oneself with high moral and professional standards.

The managing shareholder of Baker Donelson’s Baltimore office and a member of the firm’s board of directors, Jennifer Curry advises and defends employers across industries on employment and compliance matters, from discipline and leave issues under the Americans with Disabilities Act and Family and Medical Leave Act to termination, contract violations and restrictive covenants.

As chair of the firm’s Labor & Employment Health practice, Curry brings particular depth to healthcare clients, including Section 1557 Affordable Care Act compliance, internal investigations and whistleblower litigation. She is an ATIXA-certified Title IX hearing chair, hearing adviser and investigator serving colleges, universities and independent schools.

Curry is recognized in Best Lawyers in America, Chambers USA and Maryland Super Lawyers.

What is the biggest challenge facing your industry today?

The legal profession is in the middle of a fundamental transformation, and the biggest challenge we face is not simply adapting to artificial intelligence – it is doing so thoughtfully, ethically and in a way that preserves what makes great lawyering irreplaceable. AI tools are already reshaping how we research, draft and analyze, and that pace will only accelerate. For clients, this creates enormous opportunity: faster turnaround, greater efficiency and more competitive pricing. But it also raises hard questions about judgment, confidentiality and accountability that our profession has barely begun to answer.

The lawyers and firms that will thrive are those who embrace AI as a force multiplier while doubling down on the distinctly human dimensions of this work – the trust built over years with a client, the judgment that comes from deep subject matter expertise and the ability to counsel someone through a genuinely difficult moment. In healthcare employment law, where I spend much of my practice, the stakes of getting that balance wrong are high. Residents, physicians and health systems don’t just need accurate answers; they need counsel who understands the human complexity behind every compliance question. That is something no algorithm will replicate.

What is the best advice you’ve ever received?

The best advice I ever received came from the Hon. Pamela J. White, the first female partner at Ober Kaler (now Baker Donelson), former president of the Maryland State Bar Association and a member of the bench of the Circuit Court for Baltimore City, for whom I served as a law clerk. Her advice was deceptively simple: Invest in relationships before you need them. Early in my career, I was focused, as most young lawyers are, on developing technical excellence, billing hours and proving myself through the quality of my work product. Seeing how I was operating as a new attorney, she reminded me that in this profession, your relationships are your practice. The people you show up for, stay curious about and genuinely invest in will define the trajectory of your career far more than any single brief or deal.

How do you define success?

I define success by the footprint I leave in the community alongside the work I do in the law. Professional achievement matters to me – I want to be excellent at what I do, to grow Baker Donelson’s Baltimore office into something this city can be genuinely proud of and to serve my clients at the highest level. But I’ve never believed that professional accomplishment, standing alone, is the full measure of a life well spent.

Baltimore has given me so much, and I feel a deep obligation to give back with intention. Whether that’s through my board service at the Greater Baltimore Committee and Cristo Rey Jesuit High School or through our firm’s investment in initiatives like the Light of Baltimore Incubator, I want the work I do beyond the billable hour to matter. Success, to me, looks like being known not just as a skilled lawyer but as someone who helped build this city – who invested in its young people, its institutions and its future. When those two things are aligned, that’s when I feel like I’m doing it right.

With nearly five decades of practice in school and employment law, Rochelle Eisenberg is a member of Pessin Katz Law P.A. A co-author of the Maryland School Law Deskbook, she has represented school boards, superintendents and colleges across Maryland and provided more than 500 seminars on education and employment law.

Eisenberg earned a Bachelor of Science in education from the University of Maryland and a Juris Doctorate from the Washington College of Law of American University, where she served on the law review. A past president of the Maryland Council of School Attorneys, she was the first recipient of the Carl W. Smith Excellence in Education Award from the Maryland Association of Boards of Education and the first female partner at Blum, Yumkas, Mailman, Gutman & Denick P.A.

What is the biggest challenge facing your industry today?

Lack of civility.

What is the best advice you’ve ever received?

Think before you speak.

How do you define success?

Sleeping at night with a clear conscience.

With more than 30 years of litigation and counseling experience, Marc Engel focuses his practice at Lerch, Early & Brewer on helping for-profit and nonprofit employers across the Washington, D.C., area minimize employment claims, establish sound workplace policies and resolve disputes. He advises business owners, executives and human resources professionals on wage and hour laws, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Family and Medical Leave Act, and anti-discrimination and harassment regulations.

Engel founded the Employment Alliance Group, a no-cost forum for HR professionals and business advisors. He earned his J.D. from Columbia Law School and has been recognized in Chambers USA for Labor & Employment since 2020.

What is the biggest challenge facing your industry today?

The biggest challenge facing the “employment industry” is fully understanding and “buying into” the notion that despite all of the changes in the employment laws and head-spinning changes in the economy, the key to success in terms of improving hiring decisions, retention, employee performance, employee satisfaction and ultimately the bottom line lies in the basics. Specifically, successful employers understand the importance of proactive planning of all hiring decisions: the regular review and updating of job descriptions and employment documents, an ongoing assessment of current and future personnel needs, a deep understanding of why employees join organizations (and why they leave them), and, perhaps most importantly, realizing that empathy is actually a superpower that can coexist with sound and effective employment rules and policies — and at the same time serve as a powerful differentiator from competitors.

What is the best advice you’ve ever received?

The best advice I have ever received is to not get mentally trapped by circumstances that I cannot control and to always keep in mind two important presuppositions: First, all things are here to teach me and to help me — it’s all working for my good — and second, the problem is not the problem. The problem is the way you are thinking about it.

How do you define success?

I try to define success the way that my mother, who taught second graders for 32 years, and who recently passed away at the age of 91, defined success. She measured success differently than most people that I have met. In her view, success was measured by what someone gave back, the lives they touched and whether they made the world a better place than they found it. These were her metrics. Her ways of measuring what really mattered in life.

With more than 15 years of experience, Sima Fried focuses her practice at DLA Piper LLP on employment law and commercial litigation, partnering with businesses of all sizes, from family-owned operations to Fortune 100 companies, across industries including hospitality, media and construction. Prior to joining DLA Piper, Fried practiced at a mid-sized Baltimore law firm advising employers on federal, state and local employment law.

She earned her Juris Doctorate from New York University School of Law and a Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, from Duke University. Fried has served as president of the Pro Bono Resource Center of Maryland’s board of directors.