Hold onto the innovation, says Law Council of Australia president Jacoba Brasch

The myth of nine-to-five lawyering has been exposed, argues Law Council of Australia president Jacoba Brasch.

Lawyers should be offered flexibility, says Law Council of Australia president Jacoba Brasch. Picture: Britt Spring Photography

Jacoba Brasch speaks for many in the legal sector when she urges firms to retain the best lessons of the Covid lockdowns. “We don’t actually have to go back to the old way of lawyering,” the Law Council of Australia president says.

“It’s been a really tough two years, but great opportunities can come out of it and I really hope, given that we now have the ability to work remotely, that no one has to choose between, for example, a career and being a carer.”

Dr Brasch, a QC who worked overseas in the early part of her ­career, particularly feels for young lawyers who were also fulfilling that rite of professional passage when international travel was ­suspended.

“We’ve got to work on getting those Australians who are struggling back to Australia, if that’s what they want to do,” she said.

For those returning, those already in the legal workforce and those about to join it, the important thing was that firms recognised their desire for a more balanced existence than has been traditional.

“They should be offered flexibility,” she says of young lawyers.

“Employers need to listen to their employees’ reasonable requests. For example, why shouldn’t they play their soccer game or attend a swimming meet even if it’s at two o’clock in the afternoon?

“There are a lot of young or new lawyers who are heavily engaged in a range of non-“legal” ­activities. But it’s also important for new lawyers to understand the way the law works, which is hard to do by Zoom.

“There needs to be a face-to-face component to get feedback, to sit down and understand how the firm works, to understand the good culture of lawyering.

“We need to look at ways that we can allow people to be the best lawyer, but also be their best self. The idea that we work nine to five has been exposed for the myth that it is.”

This attitude should extend to normalising the use of cutting-edge technologies both within firms and with clients, along with other innovations.

“Lawyers are not early adopters. Our research tells us that it usually takes us four to five years to take on new approaches. But in March last year we all had to change the way that we practice and of course, it’s been volatile, it’s been tough.

“I would prefer that we – ­employer and employee alike – embrace new ways that we can ­deliver our services. The bottom line is that if we do that, that’s a real bonus and a potential bonus for access to justice.”

And while Dr Brasch acknowledges the competition among firms for good lawyers, and is hopeful that talk of a “great resignation” does not become a self-fulfilling prophecy, she points to the area where, in her opinion, the need for more legal practitioners is most acute.

“It is a terrible problem in rural, regional and remote areas and has been for a long time,” she said.

“There is 30 per cent of the Australian population living ­rurally, remotely or regionally, but only 10 per cent of our lawyers are there and that is declining. So there’s another hidden shortage we have to keep in mind.”