College of Law Performance and Wellness Study 2022

COLLEGE OF LAW PERFORMANCE AND WELLBEING STUDY

Prepared by

OBJECTIVE AND METHODOLOGY

Objective

The legal performance and wellbeing report is an annual study conducted by the College of Law in conjunction with Perceptive and is purposed around gaining insight into the issues, concerns and realities of what it means to work as a lawyer and associated professions in New Zealand.

The 2022 study continues to focus on understanding how key measures of workplace health and wellbeing have trended over the last 12 months. New sections have been added around flexible working, work life balance and choosing an employer.

Methodology

In November 2022, Perceptive conducted an online survey which was targeted at lawyers currently practicing in the profession. Fieldwork closed in March 2023.

Similar to previous years, responses were primarily captured through the internal promotion of individual firms, practices and other organisations.

To achieve an accurate representation of the practicing lawyers in the New Zealand profession, responses are weighted by gender breakdowns as per the NZ Law Society’s “Snapshot of the profession 2022” report (55% female; 45% male).

WHO WE SPOKE TO DEMOGRAPHICS

Gender and age proportions are relatively in line with previous years. In terms of region we see a lower proportion of Aucklanders compared to 2021 (but not significant) and an increase in smaller regions such as Tasman/Nelson/Marlborough.

WHO WE SPOKE TO FIRMOGRAPHICS

When it comes to the workplace we see a significantly higher proportion of smaller firms and lower proportion of larger firms (also reflected in number of employees). We also see a significantly higher proportion of lawyers from Government agencies.

Workplace

*Small law firm [Less than 5 partners]

Senior

Junior barrister (employed) Barrister and solicitor (selfemployed) Other (please specify)

*Medium law firm [5-24 partners]

Government agency / ministry / local government

*Large law firm [25 partners or more]

**Barrister

In-house counsel

**Sole practitioner

Accounting firm / financial organisation

#Private practice (selfemployed)

In house counsel

Other corporate organisation

Other (please specify)

01

EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE

EMPLOYEE ADVOCACY

On a scale of 0-10, how likely are you to recommend your place of employment to someone else in the same position as you?

• The industry eNPS score has recovered after the drop seen in 2021. This is driven by a decline in detractors and an increase in promoters – which is exactly what we want to see.

• Additionally, we also see an increase in willingness to stay at their place of employment, with 67% of lawyers saying they are likely/highly likely.

Detractors Passives Promoters

And how likely are you to continue to work at your place of employment for the next 2 years?

WHAT’S DRIVING ADVOCACY?

• There is stronger agreement across the board of statements compared to 2021, which is a very positive result.

• A new statement around remuneration was added in 2021 and positively we see significant improvement in this area this year. While grounds have been made in these lowest performing areas, the core issues are still centered around stress, remuneration as well as system and process support. The industry should continue to focus on these areas to help drive up engagement and advocacy further.

Q

To what extent do you agree with the following statements with regards to your place of employment?*

I am challenged by the work I do here

I know what I need to do to be successful in my role

I have opportunities to learn and grow at work

*My natural talents and knowledge are aligned to my current role

I trust my colleagues and the people on my team

I am motivated to help the company I work for achieve its goals

*I feel I am working in a purposeful/meaningful occupation

I have access to resources / information I need to do my job well

This is a good place for me to develop my career

I feel comfortable sharing my opinions at work

feel motivated by my role

I receive recognition when I do good work

I feel the company’s values are demonstrated on a regular basis

I feel I have a healthy work/life balance

The systems and processes at my job support me getting my work done effectively

I believe that I am remunerated fairly based on the work I do

The level of work-related stress I experience in my job is acceptable

*%’s reflect those who either agree or strongly

CHOOSING AN EMPLOYER

HOW EMPLOYERS PERFORM

Employers in the industry are already performing well in the top right quadrant among factors such as good work-life balance and culture. These are areas that have high claimed importance to employees and where these employees claim their current employer performs well in.

The focus for the industry should be in the top left quadrant, specifically, salary and career progression opportunities. These are areas that have high claimed importance to employees but somewhere their employer isn’t performing well in. While lawyers state their employer does well at offering great learning/professional development opportunities, they want to see a clearer pathway in terms of their career opportunities and potentially promotions.

High Priority (High Importance / Low Performance)

The salary offered

Maintenance (High Importance / High Performance)

Good work-life balance

Good company culture

Being offered mental health days/resilience training

Having pro-bono opportunities

Maintenance (Low Importance / Low Performance)

Career progression opportunities

Offered great learning/professional development opportunities

Work from home options

The number of hours worked per week

The company operating in a way that is environmentally sustainable

Being offered free/discounted health insurance

Having regular company events

The company’s reputation

Being part of a diverse workforce

My interest in industry/sector

Low Priority (Low Importance / High Performance)

Q.Imagine you are considering changing employers, which of the following factors would be the most important in choosing who to work for? (Please select up to 5 attributes)

Q.And thinking about your current employer, please state whether you think they do the following:

WORK LIFE BALANCE

WHAT ALLOWS YOU TO HAVE THE BALANCE?

For lawyers, the key to the work life balance equation is having enough time to spend with family and having the flexibility to take time off work.

While there was no significant differences between demographics, younger lawyers were more focused on having enough time for sleep and relaxing (both 34% respectively). Lawyers aged 35-54 years had a greater focus on family (64%) and those over 55 with a greater focus on being able to take time off (63%).

Thinking about the following, for you personally, which are the most important in allowing you to have a healthy work life balance? (Please select up to 3 attributes)

Having enough time to spend with family

Having flexibility to take time off work

Having enough time for exercise

Having enough time for sleep

Having enough time for relaxing

Having enough time for hobbies (excl exercise)

Being provided with fulfilling work tasks

Having friends at my workplace

Having a variety of work tasks

Having enough breaks during work hours

Having social events with my colleagues

THE IDEAL STRUCTURE

The most ideal flexible working structure is if lawyers can choose which days they work in the office and at home. While 62% stated this is their preferred, 48% said this was their reality (a gap of 14pp).

• This option was particularly popular among 35-54 year old lawyers (72%), those working in Government agencies (83%) and Senior associates/solicitors (71%).

Thinking about how you like to work, what would be your ideal structure?

Which of the following best represents the policy your place of work has regarding working style/structure?

Mix of work from home and in the office where I can choose what days I want to do each

Work from the office full-time

Have mandated days that I am in the office every week but can otherwise work from home

Work from home full- time

STRESS AND BURNOUT

05

HOW ARE LEVELS OF STRESS AND BURNOUT CHANGING?

While not significant, this year we have seen a decrease around the recency of stress and burnout. Positively, less lawyers claim to have felt burnt out within the past week (down 8pp).

Feeling burnt out is still more prevalent among females but this has declined YoY (from 53% to 46%).

Those feeling the impact of burnout are more likely to be working in smaller firms (62%) compared to larger (44%).

Have you ever felt like you have been burnt out at work?

Those

CAN WORKPLACES DO MORE TO HELP RELIEVE STRESS / BURNOUT?

Since 2018, we have seen similar levels of “yes” towards employers doing more to try combat stress. While nonsignificant, this is even up 4pp since 2021. This should continue to be a key area of focus.

• Again, similar to previous years, younger lawyers and females are most commonly asking for their workplaces to adapt (70% and 69% respectively).

• It is also more common among staff solicitors/solicitor (80%) and those earning up to $80k (78%).

Do you think your workplace could do more to reduce stress?

There

WHAT CAN WORKPLACES DO?

Overall, across the board, lawyers on average are recommending 4 areas of improvement compared to 5 the previous year.

Offering mental heath days is again the key initiative, however this has significantly declined since 2021 indicating that good grounds have already been made in this space.

Being given the “right to disconnect” has fallen right down the ranks, indicating improvement has been made.

Improvement also looks to have been made in terms of having more fixed fees as opposed to billable work – significantly down compared to 2021.

Which of the following do you think your place of work could do to improve work related stress? (select all that apply)

Have better support systems

Increase the level of training for senior staff around how to be effective managers

Have better policies around incentivisation for overtime work

Hold senior staff more accountable for the way they treat their staff

Have more training for all staff (i e resilience training)

Have more fixed fee/retainer work and less billable work

Key themes:

•

BILLABLE TARGETS

Q

Within your role do you have billable targets that you are expected to achieve on a weekly or monthly basis?

Just under six in ten lawyers say they are expected to achieve individual billable targets. No significant changes compared to 2021.

• Following the same trend as last year, medium-large sized firms are significantly more likely to have individual targets (86%).

Majority of Government lawyers don’t have billable targets (97%).

No, we don’t have billable targets

SUPPORTING PHYSICAL AND MENTAL WELLBEING

In a normal week, which of the following do you do in an active attempt to support your physical and mental wellbeing? (Select all that apply)

The key ways in which lawyers support their physical and mental wellbeing is by socialising with friends/family, exercise and reading/listening to podcasts/listening the music.

• All of these skewed significantly higher among younger lawyers (socialising; 90%, exercise; 83%, podcasts/music; 75%).

Those working as a Government lawyer are significantly more likely to participate in a hobby outside of exercise (65%).

Read

Participate

None of the above

PHYSICAL HEALTH AND MENTAL PERFORMANCE

Majority of lawyers draw comparison between their physical health/mental performance in and out of work.

Q

Overall, do you currently draw any correlation between your physical health and your mental performance in and out of work?

THANK YOU

Prepared by