Spike in lawyers questioning their career choice
Majority of callers to wellbeing charity LawCare are trainee or junior
A wellbeing charity has seen an uptick in calls from legal professionals questioning their career choice.
Lawcare, a charity offering free and confidential support to legal professionals for over 25 years, has released its annual impact report.
According to data collected over the last year, nearly a quarter (22%) of people that reached out to the charity’s helpline wanted to discuss concerns about their career — an increase from just over 8% in 2021.
Career concerns ranged from training struggles to wanting to retire early, and with the fallout from the pandemic ongoing, many found themselves reflecting on whether they still considered law as a lifelong career.
Some 60% of those who contacted the charity were trainees or pupils or had been qualified for less than five years. Further, one-third were under 30, raising concerns about the pressures faced by young lawyers in the early years of their careers.
Other reasons for calling included stress (22%), anxiety (12%) and depression (8%).
The majority of callers were female (64%), but it’s worth noting that there was a 3% increase in the percentage of contacts from men (33%). Lawcare believes this may be a result of their work to encourage more men in law to seek support for their mental health.
Overall, LawCare’s support service was contacted 849 times in 2022 — an increase of 18 from 2021. It spent 250 hours providing support on the phone, with the average call lasting 26 minutes.
Elizabeth Rimmer, LawCare’s founder and chief executive, commented:
“The number of people who contacted us with career concerns now equals the number of people getting in touch about stress. This willingness to question their life in the law may be partly a response to the pandemic: legal professionals could be reflecting on what they want from life and work and be less willing to stay in careers or workplaces that don’t meet their needs and expectations and could be undermining their mental health.”
With talks of a recession, Rimmer believes the charity could receive even more calls. “We anticipate that in 2023 the number of people contacting us with career concerns may grow as the tough economic climate takes its toll,” she said.
Struggling with the stress of work? Contact LawCare via its helpline or live chat
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10 Comments
Kirkland NQ
If you own a Lambo at 24 you’ll never question your career choices.
Greta
The Lambo is powered by small d*** energy.
Newbie
Do you?
In House
Unsurprising the majority of individual’s questioning law are juniors and trainees – There is such tunnel vision at this stage of the legal career that most can’t see past the need to have a City TC, and have no realisation of different or future opportunities.
The City will work for some, but won’t for others – And it shouldn’t be seen as the be all and end all of legal careers.
If you want good quality work there are other opportunities, if you want well paid work there are other opportunities – You just need to go and look for it.
Anonymous
Yup. Ever since I was admitted in 2007…
Anonymous
Coming up to just one year NQ and looking at quitting soon. I don’t want to be tied to London any more, have happily ticked the law box and gained some useful skills, but I just can’t see myself staying in the profession or remotely wanting to make it to partner level. I’m saying this as somebody who is lucky to be able to work from home – e.g. I am able to take time to type this between tasks.
Money is great, but there’s lots of other things in life I’d rather make time for vs deadlines, last minute client requests and having to be available all the time. This is the trade off in a service based industry and I was well aware of it, but life is too short.
Not many on their deathbeds wish they’d spent more time at work or in the office. On a similar note, nobody dies if you make a mistake as all we do is create paperwork and then move it around, but at a junior level it is easy for things to snowball and feel like it is the equivalent, so I completely get the rise in calls to Lawcare from my contemporaries.
Relatable
Doing the LPC currently and already questioning it. I’ll stick out my TC but increasingly I’m wondering what I could pivot to after this. Does anyone know what non-legal career paths are open to those of us wanting a change after the TC?
US NQ
Do some research.
In House
It’s still legal, but I’ve been in-house for circa 10 years and could be happier.
I work on a variety of projects, work with a wide cross range of different people, have no billable hours – I also get a decent salary, decent perks and genuine independence and flexibility in my work.
If you get in at the right company, it makes for a great career.
A few suggestions
Recruitment. Legal tech sales. Company secretarial. A friend of mine became a management consultant (got the client management skills and how to write an email and that’s half the job). Another friend became a banker by getting to know the clients well and teaching himself the absolute basics of modelling on YouTube.
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