Why burnt-out lawyers are bad for business
Monday 01 February 2010 by Rachel Rothwell
Tough times call for tough measures, and there is no doubt that firms have had to bite the bullet last year, letting go of large numbers of staff in the hardest hit areas such as property and corporate. The fall-off in work made redundancy programmes inevitable.
But all along, consultants have warned firms to learn the lessons of the last recession, and hold something in reserve for when the market picks up. Don’t make the cuts too deep, they said, so that you have enough staff to bring in the fees when the economy improves.
And as the government informed us last week, the recession is now officially over – so corporate departments at least can expect their fee income to turn northwards for a change.
That’s good news for firms, and it is good news for the lawyers who managed to hang on to their jobs in areas like corporate, which are finally on the up. But for some of those lawyers, it is a mixed blessing.
Many firms – particularly, I have been told, regional practices – have been too heavy handed when it came to wielding the redundancy axe. They cut their departments right down to the bone, and now they are reluctant to recruit in case workloads dry up again in a double-dip recession.
The result: as the work comes in, there simply aren’t enough lawyers there to do it. That means longer hours for the ‘lucky’ ones who survived the redundancy rounds, and in some cases they are being unfairly stretched to the absolute limit.
No one wants to be the first to leave the office, and no one wants to be last in in the morning. Jackets are left hanging on the chair to give the appearance of being there at all times.
One corporate lawyer described to me a ‘climate of fear’ in some firms. With so many friends and colleagues already having been given the chop, no one is about to stick their neck out and complain. No one wants to lose their job in an environment where no firm is hiring.
And even if they do raise a murmur of protest, the attitude from partnership is that they are ‘lucky to have a job’.
Is this really the way to run a successful business? Yes, you can save on your overheads if you get one lawyer to do a double workload, rather than getting two in to work reasonable hours.
But do firms really want their fee-earning work performed by lawyers who are burnt out, fed up and miserable? Is someone drafting an intricate contact agreement at 2am going to be doing it with a sharp mind? Or will they be making careless, rushed mistakes that will cost the firm a heck of a lot more in the long run.
Yes, firms are nervous about hiring new staff in case work drops off again. That’s understandable. But look at it another way - with so many talented corporate and property lawyers out of work at the moment, now is actually a pretty good time to hire.
You don’t have to offer a top salary to get top lawyers right now. Indeed, there are probably plenty of very high-quality solicitors who would be willing to take on a six-month contract.
Even if firms are brave enough to offer permanent contracts, if the worst comes to the worst and recession does hit again in the coming year, the new recruits will not have been there long enough to build up much in the way of statutory redundancy entitlement. But at least they will have had a job in the meantime.
It seems to me that hiring the staff you need to make the most from the upturn, without stretching your existing lawyers to the point where they are about to snap, is the only sensible way forward.
Comments
Hi Rachel. You make a
Hi Rachel.
You make a compelling argument. I agree with you on a number of fronts and have heard similar rumblings.
It's certainly going to be challenging for partners in getting the balance right going forward; once again some tough decisions and no doubt wranglings in the board rooms will occur frequently over the coming months.
In my experience service levels aka customer relationship management, client care and marketing, sales and business development activity also dip considerably when lawyers are stretched. Ironically, these are the very things that will help the individual and firm grow and hopefully pop out the top of the 'W' recession that we are constantly warned / reminded about. The phrase 'one has to speculate to accumulate' comes to mind.
Bold decisions and actions and perhaps 'sticking a neck out or two' might be what is required by both individuals and partners in order to move forward progressively to achieve a satisfactory outcome for all parties concerned.
Bottom line, personally I do not believe there should ever be a trade off where quality is concerned as inevitably the client may suffer and it may in fact cost the individual and the firm (time, money, reputation)at some point down the line.
It will be interesting to observe how the industry and the profession juggle this hot potatoe in 2010, particularly in relation to keeping top talent refreshed and motivated.
Chrissie Lightfoot
"TheEntrepreneurLawyer"
POTATO.
POTATO.
Hiring staff
Yes there are definitely very good people on the market in the conveyancing area as I can personally attest to. But the biggest problem I am finding as I now search for work concerns Agencies. In the good times they did not need to have any real skill to place staff, when Firms were crying out for Conveyancers they could probably have placed a monkey in some positions.
Now one is finding that when sending in a CV for an advertised role, I am lucky to receive an acknowledgement of my application. A telephone call to discuss? Forget it. And if I try to ring to discuss the receipt of the CV if I am lucky someone will talk to me without being rude and sounding stressed because they have received loads of applications andclearly cannot cope. But speak to the consultant handling the role? No chance. I am not even being considered for roles I could fill in my sleep. I know how good my CV is, I know it is way more impressive than 99% of the CV's Agencies are going to receive for a role. Yet clearly they do not have the expertise to sift through those applications to find the best people to put forward, as my experience proves. So for Firms who want to tap into those quality people still out tere, potentially they could have difficulties finding them.
As to how to solve that problem I do not know. Firms who advertise without using an Agency are going to be deluged by applications and they probably do not want to waste time going through them themselves. Firms using an Agency run a huge risk of not getting the best person in to fill the role. That has already happened to plenty of Firms who have not even had the opportunity to see my CV as a result of the poor Agencies they have used. There are still a lot of positions out there being filled by people palpably not the best for the job.
Hiring Staff - HELP
I can't agree more with the observations from Anonymous on the 1/2/10. I am becoming extremely frustrated and growing angrier by the day with the whole situation. Firms seem to have ceased recruiting staff directly, and as a result all sorts and forms of Agencies have popped up on the internet, presumably unregulated.
My own situation is growing gloomier and gloomier by the day to the point whereby, as time continues to pass, I am unemployable as a Property Solicitor, and also too qualified to do anything else out there, except maybe retail!!. I took a career break at the beginning of 2006 for personal reasons with a view to returning towards the latter part of 2007. Without my crystal ball, I never saw the recession coming, nor did I have any idea that it would practically cripple the whole country for so long. When I tried to return, there were no jobs and there have hardly been any either until the end of 2009, so in total, I have not worked in a legal office for 4 years.
Despite the fact that I had been qualified as a Property Solicitor for 10 years before my break, and that I had invested in 2 Conveyancing update courses and conferences from my own resources, and a Practising Certificate, Agents seem to think I am not capable of going into an office and be able to cope, and I suspect they are passing this advice on to the firms as I see many adverts stating that the candidate 'must be able to hit the ground running'. What does that mean? I am applying for a job that I could do with my eyes closed with all the qualities that a 10 year qualified Property Solicitor could bring (not someone who winces when they see a slightly complicated Lease). I do more than just registered freehold. I think this is some kind of discrimination. How can anyone state categorically that I would not be capable of undertaking this type of work.
I also find it immensely irritating to be told that being out of the legal office for 4 years makes me difficult to employ, when I only actually took 18 months out, I cannot be blamed for this recession and the inability of a number of people to get a grip and sort it out. I am based in the midlands and if anyone could help, I would be obliged
Totally agreed!
Rachel, I absolutely agree with your arguments! My husband's a corporate lawyer with a mid size firm and although he's spared the chop last year when the firm underwent major restructuring, he's working literally 18 hours a day! Thanks for this very insightful article, I've already sent to to my husband! Cheers, Patty
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