Getting Serious About Well-Being in the Legal Profession. Are You OK?

Episode Notes

Transcript

Announcer:

So if I was starting today as a New Solo, I would entrepreneurial Aspect, change the way they’re practicing leader, what it means to make it easy to work with your clients, New approach, new tools, new mindset, New Solo. And it’s making That leap, Making That leap leap.

Adriana Linares:

Welcome to another episode of New Solo on Legal Talk Network. I’m Adriana Linares. I am your host. We’ve got a little bit of a different episode today because this month on October 10th, it is World Mental Health Day and it just so happens that Alps, a friend of the podcast, Alps Insurance, had released a solo attorney Wellbeing Trends report and I thought it would be a great topic for October as we’re all getting ready to make the crazy pivot into the holidays. And also maybe think about how we’re going to start off the new year in a fresh start. I invited Chris Newbold from ALPS Insurance to come and talk to us about the report. Hi Chris.

Chris Newbold:

How’s It going?

Adriana Linares:

It’s going good. Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to help us with this obviously very important topic about mental health and reducing stress and trying to live better lives as attorneys. I’m not an attorney. I always like to remind everybody, but I do like to push how technology can reduce stress, not create it. So even though this might not be right on hand, there are certainly plenty of reasons to think about our mental health these days. So tell me a little bit about yourself first and then I’m going to ask you to tell us about the report. What do you do for Alps?

Chris Newbold:

So I am, Alps is Chief operating Officer. I have been with the company for 23 years, which is hard to imagine at this point, but I love the company. I love its focus. We focus specifically on providing malpractice insurance and other insurance solutions to solo practitioners and small firms. So it’s been a passion of mine to always be thinking about your audience, frankly, the solos, the smalls that oftentimes get overlooked in the legal profession. Although you and I know that they comprise almost 70% of the marketplace when it comes to private practice. And so it is been really interesting to then think about when you think about that community. Obviously a healthy lawyer is a good lawyer and better serves their clientele. And so we’ve always been thinking about in our guise of working within the legal sector, how do we continue to make lawyers better practitioners? And we’ve really taken a special leaning and inclination to want to advance the work around attorney wellbeing.

Adriana Linares:

Well, I think that’s incredibly important and I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it. As someone who loves and supports attorneys, I’m trying to, in your report, but you probably know it off the top of your head, the report when you surveyed, there was a percentage of rural attorneys that were part of this report that I wanted to make sure and mention.

Chris Newbold:

Yeah, I’m trying to, 31%, 31% were in of the demographics. So of the 300 or so respondents, almost a third of them were in rural areas. And that I think is a healthy, when you think about urban, suburban, rural, it almost ended up being one third, one third, one third.

Adriana Linares:

I do a lot of work with the Nebraska Bar State Bar Association on their practice management advisor, and most of the attorneys that I talk to are, they’ll tell me I’m the only attorney in our county, or I’m one of two attorneys for 50 miles, which sounds just crazy to think about. So the opportunity for them to serve their small community in a myriad of ways is great, of course. But then I also think, well, the stress must also be great because you’re the only game in town. I

Chris Newbold:

Mean, there’s an upside and there’s a downside, right? Yeah, right. I mean you get all the business, but then I think there are probably notions of loneliness and then access to just the courts and the judicial system when sometimes you have to travel long distances to be able to solve problems on behalf of your clients.

Adriana Linares:

And hopefully that’s all gotten better with remote technology and meetings and stuff. I found it very interesting that the satisfaction level of attorneys who are solar practitioners with 74%, there’s 74% of them are satisfied. I think that’s a great number. Why do you think that is?

Chris Newbold:

Yeah. Here’s the thing that I thought, well, actually,

Adriana Linares:

Sorry to interrupt you, Chris. You know why that is? Because your report actually tells us.

Chris Newbold:

Yeah. Well, I mean, here’s the thing that I’ve been in the wellbeing space for almost over a decade now. In fact, I actually wrote, I was a co-author of the report that launched the wellbeing movement. So I’ve been at the epicenter of thinking about these issues. And it was interesting that I think one of the real gaps that we had seen was there was emerging growth of research and data coming out about almost all sectors of the legal community. But for the solo community,

What we wanted to do is one, add depth to the research going on in the wellbeing space. And because of our clientele and our policy holder base querying and learning and understanding better about the wellbeing trends going on within that. Now, you probably know this quite well that when you think about wellbeing generally in terms of media stories out there, you’re going to hear a lot about heavy levels of stress and depression and anxiety and burnout and addiction and so forth. Of course, the statistics we generally rate as a profession higher in most of those areas than other peer industries. And so I think that the interesting thing about, I think our study is the fact that when three out of four solo attorneys ultimately are telling us that they are professionally satisfied as a solo, I do think that that actually contradicts the narrative in the wellbeing space that all lawyers are miserable for a variety of reasons, and I’m sure we’ll get this into this a little bit more, but obviously work-life balance I think is an important element of that.

You come out of the pandemic in which a lot of people kind of looked internally and looked at themselves reflected and said, what kind of life do I ultimately want to choose? How does that kind of sit? And so I was not totally surprised, but really I really enjoyed the affirmation that the solo community in essence was saying, if you ask me if I’m professionally satisfied, I’m going to tell you three out of four that I am. Because I think the more that you work your way up into other areas of the legal community, mid-size firms, large firms, I would pose to you that number is going to come down.

Adriana Linares:

Oh, I would agree with that.

Chris Newbold:

And I’m actually predicting in a lot of industries you see aggregation of businesses, small ones getting gobbled up by big ones. It would not surprise me, Adriana, that we don’t see in legal more people coming down into the smaller sector of the profession for some of the reasons that we’ll probably talk about today in terms of what they’re looking for, what they want out of a career as an attorney. I think one of the things that’s always struck me, and I speak a lot in front of state bar annual meetings and so forth, it always pained me when I would ask the question, if your son or daughter would come to you and ask whether they should go to law school, what would your advice be? Obviously the answer is it depends on the individual. But generally, if I was doing that query in front of a large group, 2, 3, 400 attorneys, probably only half of the hands in the room would go up, which to me tells me that there’s something systemically challenging within private practice within the legal profession that has people saying, I’m not sure I would wish my own own blood would go into this profession, even though they’ve seen and been raised as half lawyers already

Having seen us do it. And so I just think it’s very interesting that I think there are challenges in our profession, but it feels like those who are selecting this solo path are finding greater degrees of professional satisfaction. And that’s something to be kind of gleaned as to the why and what we can learn from that.

Adriana Linares:

Well, I can attest to that anecdotally because I started my career 27 years ago. I just did the math two days ago, and I’m mortified at that number in big law. So when I started working in legal, it was at two of Florida’s largest law firms and I saw misery sitting at a desk all the time. When I decided to launch my small consulting practice and focus on solos and smalls, it was like I had stepped out into the sunshine. I mean, definitely there are issues and they have their own challenges, but the level of happiness is very apparent to me between solo and small firm practitioners and working for the man or the woman as they like to say. I want to just dive into a couple of the key findings that the report had and that was this high satisfaction level and that 74% of solo practitioners are satisfied or very satisfied, which is what you just led to. Oddly, only 9% literally must have checked the box that said dissatisfied. But you had some interesting findings in the report as to why it might be that satisfaction level is so high. And I think you just alluded to them. What were they?

Chris Newbold:

Yeah, again, I think that what people ultimately yearn for is to be able to, in this day and age, have the flexibility that they need to be able to manage the life that is real for them. And I think you mentioned women, I think there has been a real epidemic of, obviously law schools are 50 50, in fact probably more women than men going to law school.

But the exodus of women leaving private practice when they hit portions of the career because the architecture of the way that things are created, it just doesn’t sit well with what they need, what they want, what’s fulfilling to them. And so that’s where I think that you do see people yearning for more flexibility. We call it life work balance, but I would pose to you that it’s a little bit more around the notion of I want have clients I want to be able to manage and I want to do it on my terms. And I think that that really does then play into when you have more, dare I say, kind of control, and you can navigate life better through a professional career path that has you a solo practitioner, it just opens up much more opportunities for you to ultimately feel good about what you’re doing, why you’re doing it, who you’re selecting for your clients, the type of workload that you want to take on and all those things.

The other thing that I think was really also interesting around it was that people in solo practice, and again, I think your listeners are going to attest to this, they’re more prone to take a couple weeks of vacation a year. They’re more prone to be more physically fit, they’re more prone to take care of the nutritional elements of rounding out the wellbeing, the whole self type thing. And so again, what I loved about it is I just think that the solo practitioner today is kind of again, pursuing and living the life that allows them more satisfaction, dare I say, more happiness in going down that route. Which again, I think that there’s a lot to learn amongst other sectors in legal from what’s going on within the solo community because again, I think that these numbers counteract the prevailing consensus that everybody’s miserable, addicted, stressed out, burned out, blah, blah, blah.

Adriana Linares:

Well, just I think two or three episodes ago I interviewed Cassandra Koenig of Aloha Law who told us how she runs her practice exactly how she wants, takes on the exact types of clients she wants, manages to turn it on and turn it off as she wants, while still delivering excellent client services to her client. So it was an inspiring conversation. Almost all my guests tell that same story, and I love that. So a couple things I want to pull out the report, which I thought were interesting, is that respondents rated their work-life balance at an average of 3.8 out of five, back to that’s just supporting what you were saying. That’s amazing. And then their satisfaction levels come from the things that you also mentioned, which are very obvious. And of course when I talk to solos and small firms, I hear this all the time, autonomy, flexibility, alignment with personal values, which are theirs and not some law firm with five offices and essential administration, which I used to work for a large firm where we had the central administration department, which no one ever wanted to hear from central administration. This sounded like the Borg in charge.

A couple more things I just want to pull out. Out of your key findings, 44% had experienced occasional burnout and yet only 32% often or always felt stressed. And I thought that was interesting too.

Chris Newbold:

And I do think that we can’t be kind of entirely Pollyanna-ish about the fact that solos do have their own sets of struggles. I would say that they’re commonplace within just lawyers in general, but there are going to be times where life is just overwhelming and that burnout realities are real. We know that we deal in a problem solving environment in which stress is naturally part of when you’re dealing with solving people’s problems and working with your clients that some of that stress is felt by you and you take that stress on. And so again, while I’ve just been a pretty big proponent within the wellbeing space of just thinking about, again, what brings people professional satisfaction, and we have great lawyer assistance programs throughout the country and they’re the safety net for people who are really struggling, but I think a lot of us have been really trying to think about how do you get two or three rungs further up the scale as to the why people then drift into dangerous positions in their personal life. I think that the more that you can kind of understand the whys, right, the work-life balance, the client selection, the flexibility that solo practitioners, they enjoy, it’s part of what they love it. And the notion that another finding was that there was a really high degree of likelihood that three years from now they were going to continue to be a solo practitioner. Right?

Adriana Linares:

Yeah,

Chris Newbold:

I was just

Adriana Linares:

Going to mention that one.

Chris Newbold:

It’s not like it’s like, and I can’t remember what the number is, but it’s a pretty high proportion of those who generally

Adriana Linares:

Say 76%,

Chris Newbold:

76%, right? It’s another three out of four. So again, so it’s not just that they’re saying that they’re satisfied today, but they’re saying this is my future.

Adriana Linares:

Right?

Chris Newbold:

And that’s, I think a big deal as well.

Adriana Linares:

Let’s take a quick break, listen to some messages from some sponsors and we’ll be right back. All right, I’m back with Chris Newbold from Alps Insurance. We are talking about their solo attorney wellbeing trends report. I think I should mention this if nothing else to sort of support your comment about let’s not be too Pollyanna, but also to give hope to younger attorneys out there. The majority of your respondents were experienced attorneys, so 70% of them had been practicing law for 20 plus years. That’s the Pollyanna part or coming to meet you there, which is, oh, well this report isn’t all that positive, but that might be because these attorneys have been practicing longer. And I think what that does is give younger attorneys who are on that solo path who might be a little stressed out right now and might be feeling kind of lonely because you’re just getting started.

You’re smoothing out the wrinkles, you’re figuring out how to run all the elements of her practice smoothly. So just give yourself a few more years solo practitioners before you throw in the towel because this could be your future, not just your future literally as Chris just said, which they plan to stick to it, but it might just be that it’s going to get a little easier for you. You’re going to feel more confident, more comfortable, the technology is only getting better and come a few more years into your practice. Your satisfaction with all of these types of queries could be just as high. So don’t give up.

Chris Newbold:

I think you raise a really interesting point as to again, what the newly graduating attorney is looking for, right? Many of them are now, again, going getting that law degree, not necessarily to maybe take the traditional path anymore.

They may be looking for a JD plus pathway into business. They may be thinking about other things. I liked your point that I think there’s a couple of things I think going on in the workforce that has established firms scratching their head and wondering what do we need to do? Because I think more and more applicants, particularly how the qualified applicants are coming in and saying, tell me what my life is going to look like if I come to your firm. And so that was a question that usually would not have come from the applicant. It would be an expectation of you’re lucky to even be at this interview.

And so the notion that qualified applicants are actively inquiring about what is my work-life balance going to look like if I accept a position with your firm is interesting. And by the same token, I think that a lot of established firms are struggling with investing a lot in some of those attorneys, giving them the skills, and then those attorneys then deciding that they want to move on and continue their own professional journey, perhaps not with the degree of loyalty that 20 years ago was more commonplace in the legal profession. And then you add on top of that what they’re looking for for their life objectives, what they’re looking for in terms of family commitments and other things and what you said, I think the barriers to entry to become a solo practitioner are now almost as low as they’ve ever been relative, relative to people being able to just kind jump in. The technology’s better pretty soon with an AI subscription, you could have a paralegal right by your side who’s an AI paralegal and just so there used to be a lot of what I would call just natural entrepreneurial risk that now is more mitigated.

Adriana Linares:

Totally

Chris Newbold:

Agree. And so more people are willing to take a bet on themselves. And if you believe our report and the findings from at least our policy holders, these folks are finding professional satisfaction and that likely will give more momentum to, again, people coming into the small firm space.

Adriana Linares:

I totally agree. I wanted to follow up with something you said in the last segment, Chris, which is how easy it is to start your solo practice today. And I will tell you, there is no better time than right now to launch a solo practice. It costs almost nothing to get started. And as I tell attorneys all the time, want to hem and haw about a hundred dollars monthly subscription to something, I’ll say, if you had called me 15 years ago, the conversation would have been, you’re going to need $15,000 to get a small business server and network it. So do you have $15,000 to start your solo practice? The answer was almost always no. Today for like $500, I mean, it’s just crazy what you can get for not a lot of money to be able to launch. So point well taken. I see it every day. If you think it’s expensive to start a solo practice today, let me put you in my time machine and take you back to the mid nineties. Let me ask you a couple other questions. Just based on the report, workload and inconsistent cashflow were identified as the top stressors. What created the most amount of stress? What advice do you give solos when struggling with these particular challenges?

Chris Newbold:

Yeah, a couple things. I mean, on the workload front, I think it has to do with just being thoughtful about what you aspire to do. Some people will be at portions of their career where it is all about I need the financial resources for my business, for my family and so forth. And as you know, there are also different portions of life where you as a solo might get to manage that up or down. And so I would just say on the workload front, what your limitations are. We generally find more malpractice claims when the workloads get overbearing, and that’s when you’re more prone to a mistake. And so I would just say planning, evaluating, and then putting consistent markers in your calendar as to where am I at today? Do I feel like that’s an appropriate workload? Do I want more? Can I handle more or do I need to go backwards a little bit because it’s more than I can handle?

And that’s creating some of the burnout, the stress that I was not looking for. So again, a lot of it is you managing you. And I think that the more that you think about that on the inconsistent cashflow, that’s obviously going to be important to somebody, particularly at the launch phase, right? Yes. Because you do need to get the clients, get the cashflow coming in. And again, just being kind of thoughtful about now, I think you got to be a little bit careful that sometimes you sacrifice client selection in the interest of cashflow, which can be a little bit of a double-edged sword as you know well, and then again, planning on that front because there are pathways to be able to manage yourself and your finances a little bit better so that when cashflow is good, you’re squirreling some of that away. And when it’s not so good, you have some safety valves to kind of pull you through some of those more challenging times or go into that emergency account that you had built up with some surplus to be able to manage the valleys, so to speak in that. But again, that’s really not that much different than your personal life

In terms of how you think about budgeting your expense load, your revenue collection, and then really thinking about oftentimes, as you also know, sometimes we are so passionate about the representation of our clients that we don’t deal with the administrative realities of collections and other things that are needed to make sure that these don’t become stressors. And so I think it’s, it’s advantageous for you to be thinking about law practice management software, the clios, the other entities out there that can help you more effectively manage the solo practice so that you can mitigate some of these stressors that come from particularly cashflow, time management, administrative tasks, all of this kind of bundle of things that with some nice tools and the technology again is trending in our direction, you’re going to be able to handle that more efficiently, more effectively. And then you introduce some AI components, you may be able to say, Hey, can you prepare me bills for all of my clients so that I can review them and things happen more quickly than ever before

Adriana Linares:

We move on to our next segment and take a quick little break. I’m just going to say this, which was another point that came out of the study, which is many respondents, they expressed a need for better client management tools. People, they are out there and they are not expensive, and they will reduce stress and help you manage your cashflow, your workload, and your matter dates, deadlines, details, parties and documents. So if you have a need for client management tool, let me tell you, they are out there. They are good and they are affordable. We’ll be right back. Okay. I’m back with Chris Newbold and Chris from ALPS Insurance. You have mentioned AI a couple of times, and I want you as a representative of a large malpractice insurance provider to tell us how is an organization like yours, a company like yours, looking at AI for its clients? Sounds to me like you’re saying this is a tool that can help you. While much of the profession is going, holy shit, this is really scary. There’s no way I can do this. It’s going to take our jobs, it’s going to make me create malpractice errors. So that’s not what I’m hearing from you.

Chris Newbold:

I’m a cautious optimist. I mean, I think the next 15 years will fundamentally transform how lives are lived, how legal practice is structured. Again, it’s all about trust yet verify, right? And again, I think these tools, while I’m really actually pleased that there have been a lot of examples that have been very public, examples of things gone awry in artificial intelligence because that has heightened everybody’s sensitivities around how you use it, why you use it, the most effective way to use it. And I do think that there will be better and better guardrails as we continue to progress. It’s as clunky, as expensive, and as hallucinating as it’s ever going to be right now. And As we go forward, I think it will continue to be that copilot, right? Literally, and it’s not a Microsoft plug, but just that copilot right next to you that can help you. Particularly there’s a part of me that actually believes that it will enable lawyers to focus on what they love to do most, which wrapping it back to wellbeing, if you really love the art of lawyering, the ability to take some of all of this administrative stuff off of your plate and amen, get back to the lawyering that you love to do, that could be very exciting. And so again, there are pitfalls. There are things to manage. There are examples that obviously have been public of hallucinations and so forth. It’s like any other tool, whether it’s spellchecker, the work of your paralegal, you got to continue to understand what you’re using it for, why you’re using it. Ultimately, at the end of the day, it’s your work product. So you need to be thoughtful about the diligence that you employ in utilizing it. But I don’t think, and I do think that one of the things that’s very interesting in the solo space right now is we are seeing a lot of more veteran attorneys ultimately deciding to opt into retirement. And I actually think that part of that is being driven by anxiety around technology.

Adriana Linares:

Oh, 100%. And I’m seeing the same thing with paralegals, office managers and legal assistants that have been around a long time and sort of just coasting to retirement. It might be too much for them. And that’s okay because those are the exact types of tasks by support staff that AI and much of today’s tools can help replace making it easier for solos and smalls to create an effective work environment. Chris, I don’t want to let you go without talking about an important part of the report, which you just brought us back to with mental health and physical health. I found it interesting that your report showed that 22% of respondents sought mental health support, and that doesn’t seem like a high number, but for me, any number over one when it comes to mental health issues is high. So how do you think the stigma around mental health in the legal profession can be reduced? What do you tell us to encourage any of our listeners that are having any sort of mental health issues? It can just be stress, right? Let’s just start with probably the most common type of issues that we deal with. How do we reduce these things? And remember, I like to say with the help of technology, but you might have other resources and ideas. I’m sure you do

Chris Newbold:

Actually. Yeah. Again, I think that the reality that people are more likely to leverage mental health resources is a positive. That ability to be able to know, self-identify that I’m struggling with something. Again, I think the stigma, particularly in firms has been, I got to be really careful how much I socialize this because I think it will affect how people see me. Again, in the solo context, I think that people are generally solos are more apt to one, understand themselves, understand what they want, and then seek the resources that they need to be able to navigate those situations. So I’m excited about, and I think that there are both. I’ll also say that I think that there are societal things happening in generational elements to this that allow people to be more of, I know we talk a lot about our authentic self, but be more willing to come forth and say, I am having a struggle and it’s okay for me to socialize that. And you look at society and you look at some of the athletes

Adriana Linares:

And

Chris Newbold:

Some of the public Simone Biles and that ability, there used to be a time where that people really struggled with being able to articulate that they’re struggling with something. I think that’s more commonly acceptable, and I think that that’s healthy. And so you got more people in society allowing people the freedom to come forth and socialize that. And then generationally, I think you got people who frankly are not hardwired to work 80 hours a week every week to be able to advance their career. Now again, that’s not to say that a job doesn’t need to be done, you don’t need to be a hard worker, all of those things. But I do think that that perceptions and societal shifts are naturally occurring, and that gives people, I think, more latitude to come forward and say, this is the challenge I’m struggling with. And then be able to seek solution oriented pathways to be able to ultimately help them overcome those challenges.

Adriana Linares:

Well said. Last question for you. If you can give one piece of advice to solos based on the report, and of course your years and years of experience and knowledge in this profession and supporting it, what would it be?

Chris Newbold:

I would go back to live the life that you want to live. I think that when you made that decision to become a solo, I have to believe that that was centered around notions of prioritization of what you wanted most out of life. That professional success was part of that. But as we know, happiness is most often derived from the relationships that we have with other people. Whether it’s your family, your friends, yourself, and your selection of a solo pathway I think has allowed you to be able to live the life that you ultimately want to live. And for that, a big applause to you. And it affirms our findings that when three out of four are saying, I’m in a profession, which most people are generally not finding professional satisfaction, and you have found professional satisfaction, that’s good on you for taking that risk, knowing what you want and pursuing that to the best of your ability.

Adriana Linares:

That’s excellent advice. Well, I can’t thank you enough for your time today, Chris. Tell everyone where they can get their own copy of the report.

Chris Newbold:

Yeah, go ahead and just head over to our [email protected]. Lots of resources, not just on the wellbeing front, but also on the risk management front.

Adriana Linares:

I love that. Well, thank you so much, Chris. I super appreciate it. And thanks everyone for listening. We’ll see you next time on New Solo. I’ve been

Announcer:

Running from nine to five and Body My Tongue for all this time won’t let anyone Clock Me show. I was thinking this was the way to go and you put up your puppet show. I say.

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