We are pleased to spotlight Nathan Jacobs this month! Nate is a Patent Agent in the Biotechnology Practice and works out of our Boston office.
How long have you been at Wolf Greenfield?
I started in August 2020, so about 4 years now.
How has being authentic helped you in your career?
Being authentic goes a long way in establishing personal connections, which noticeably ease the flow of day-to-day work and client relationships. As one example, a client’s in-house counsel and I will often mention what our cats are up to in the background of a Zoom call or what hijinks they got up to on their most recent trip to the vet, and at a firm event this summer we exchanged videos of each being fascinated by their automatic litter boxes. This client has always been great to work with, but the experience has certainly been improved by working with an in-house counsel with whom I look forward to speaking each week.
What motivates you to wake up and go to work?
My annual hours target! In all seriousness, a recent presentation noted that every law firm wants to work with clients doing interesting and impactful work, and I feel fortunate to be in exactly that position. It’s a privilege to be working with so many innovative companies that are at the forefront of new therapeutic modalities and food technology.
What has been your favorite project/assignment at Wolf Greenfield?
I can’t pick one specific project, but a few matters this year have involved a thorough consideration of one of those big questions in biology, “what is a species?” We’ve come a long way since Darwin and Wallace, but this is still a fascinatingly nontrivial question, especially as it applies to patents and different kinds of organisms. Before I started here, much of my scientific research was related to ecology and evolution of bacterial and viral pathogens, so it’s been exciting to work these concepts into our strategies for multiple clients.
Why is diversity and inclusion in the workplace important to you?
Everyone ultimately benefits from exposure to different ideas and people from different backgrounds. On a personal level, I grew up in a rural part of Pennsylvania that is 92% white. While I learned a lot about agriculture in school and am not likely to forget where our food comes from any time soon, it was not the most racially diverse area. As I got older, especially while living in Atlanta and New York, I began to better understand the implicit assumptions and biases that can arise in more homogenous environments, and the benefits of diversity in limiting those biases. More generally, everyone deserves to feel valued and included at work, and you can’t do your best work in an environment where you feel like you don’t belong. A culture of inclusion enables people to reach their full potential, and Wolf Greenfield’s effort to cultivate that culture is part of what makes it a great place to be.
I also had not thought much of being a first-generation college student when I started college, since that was common among my high school graduating class. In grad school and beyond, though, I began to appreciate how that acts as a dimension of diversity in the professional world. I’ve since benefitted from a lot of resources available to first-generation students, including the firm’s First Generation Affinity Group, so I’m always eager to pay that support forward, whether through initiatives like the firm’s partnership with Bottom Line or speaking with other students one-on-one.
What is something most people don’t know about you?
I collect tomtar (those little guys with hats down to their noses and long beards that Home Goods markets as “gnomes”). One windowsill of my apartment is essentially a row of pointy hats, with the rotation of seasonal ones waiting for their month to guard the entryway.