The working hours of lawyers and the struggle for work/life balance is a complex – and hotly debated – area. So, what this post won’t be is a discussion around work/life balance at law firms and the difficulties with the hours lawyers work – maybe another time!
What this post will be, however, is a set of practical strategies I use to help get me away from my desk and enjoying those non-work based parts of life. I hope this helps!
xo
1 Block out your own diary
If I have concrete plans – an exercise class I’ll be charged for if I don’t attend (the cheeky sods), a client event, an important social event, etc. – I make sure I add them to my work diary and have the diary icon show as “out of office”.
By putting my non-work commitments in the diary, I find I’m less likely to get unplanned calls/diary invites at those times from people across the firm.
It’s also great for transparency, as your secretary & team can see where you are if you’re not showing as online. I find this helps loosen the vice-like grip of my fingers on my work phone, frantically refreshing emails to see if anyone has asked where I am!
2 Communicate
One thing I’ve noticed is that the only time people get even slightly annoyed about you having evening plans, is when they don’t know about them!
Nobody begrudges you having a life (obvs) but if plans are sprung on them, or they simply don’t know where you are, that can be a bit more problematic.
So, don’t announce an hour before you need to leave that you’ve got dinner plans, or just disappear. It’s only fair that your peers know what your day/week is looking like, so they can plan accordingly.
Which brings me to…
3 Get in there early
If there’s something you particularly want to attend, make sure you flag it as early as possible.
Example: It’s Monday, and you’ve got theatre tickets for Thursday night. It’s looking like a particularly busy week, and you’re already starting to get nervous about whether you’ll be able to attend that event in 3 days’ time…
Saying something like “I just want to flag that I’ve got tickets for something on Thursday night which, if at all possible, I’d really like to go to” to your supervisor does the trick, I find. Make sure you remind them closer to the time too.
This way you’ve been clear in what you need and they can try to plan around it, getting cover for you if needed. It might still end up being an all-hands-on-deck situation (see point 5!), but at least you’ll have tried.
4 Actually make plans!
In my early days as a trainee, when I was still adjusting to the lack of control we as lawyers can sometimes have over our work hours, I had SO much anxiety around weeknight plans.
Will I be able to make it? Will I look workshy if I go? If I *can’t* make it, will my friends hate me for cancelling? If I stay at work late over seeing my loved ones, am I turning into a w*anker?! Aggghhh!
My solution? Avoid the issue altogether and simply don’t make plans in the evenings.
Big mistake – huge (*insert Pretty Woman meme*). It was a VERY speedy shortcut to a sad, burnout little Soph whose 2019 life was simply a loop between the office and Tooting Broadway station.
Don’t be tempted to do the same!
Spoiler alert: there’s nearly always more work to be done. So if you don’t get dinners/cocktails/yoga/gym – whatever you enjoy – in the diary, you probably won’t somehow end up doing them. You’ll simply stay at your desk later!
You need to consciously try to carve out pockets of time for the things that make you happy in your non-work life.
5 Accept that you win some, you lose some
Sometimes, despite your best efforts, there might be something particularly crucial or urgent which your client needs to be done and it results in a late night, or maybe weekend work.
For me, there’s some peace of mind purely in accepting that fact!
This acknowledgement doesn’t mean you won’t sometimes feel a bit crap about making these (hopefully occasional) sacrifices, though.
Everyone will have their own coping strategies for dealing with it. Personally, I realised that what I was most worried about was actually that my friends and my boyfriend at the time would think badly of me for not seeing them or – worse (in my mind) – leaving them high and dry last minute.
So, I sat my boyfriend down, and sent a slightly dramatic Whatsapp to the girls, to let them know that if I ever say no to/cancel plans, it’s because I *really* have to and I most definitely would rather be with them (no doubt drinking wine or stuffing my face) than churning out CPs or something equally sad. Instant relief!
I try to see the positives, too. I know it sounds odd but there really is a camaraderie to those late nights with your colleagues. And there’s no better feeling than a heartfelt thank you from your client for what you managed to achieve for them 🙂
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I would love to know your own thoughts so I can add more coping strategies to this post – drop me an email or say hi on Insta!