Cruel

This morning at 2 am a young woman wearily exited the Governor Phillip Tower and headed for my cab. The building is home to some of the top legal firms in town, offices which never seem to close.

Young graduates work 12-18 hour days just to get ahead, to make partnership, maybe in 10 years, for the privilige of increasing an already ridiculous workload. Young lawyers of 30 who look 40.

The young woman climbed in the back seat and ordered the upper North Shore. Yet throughout the entire journey never sat relaxed, but hunched over and staring vacantly into the night, as if wondering where her life had gone. I wondered, was this her...      

Comments

[Splat Guy]

Something about the insane hours of young professionals is just ridiculous. Eventually some good-natured entrepreneurs will realise that they can foster a much better work environment by encouraging sensible balance.

Of course, part of the problem is the young professionals themselves, who are so competitive that they will do anything to get ahead of their colleagues, like in that Opinionista article you linked to. What a very sad outlook on life.

[-]

Coming out from GPT it could have just as easily been a banker; another overworked profession full of overcompetitive people.

[PQ]

It used to be the foreign exchange dealers that lived on cocaine. pizza slices and whiskey, worked 20 hour days, then either went mad or became supermarket night fill workers.

If you treated horses like some of these "young professionals" are treated, the RSPCA would be around to lock you up.

There is much more to life than work and $$$$.

[Greg]

I spent 10 years in back office administration at one of the top 50 U.S. law firms, and I've seen what eight years of 'partner track' does to people, but also what the ambition to join such an enterprise does, and it starts early. There's a joke about the summer associate jobs law students vie for: a man recently deceased is offered the choice between heaven or hell. When he spends a bit of time in heaven, it seems pretty dull, especially compared to his sojourn in hell, where he's entertained constantly, wined and dined and sent to fabulous parties. Naturally he thinks hell is not so bad after all and makes his choice accordingly, only to be immediately thrust into the flaming pits of brimstone, etc. 'What gives' he asks? 'It wasn't like this last time.' 'That was the summer program' the devil answers.

Once you join one of these firms, you're expected to produce 2000 billable hours annually, or more, which doesn't sound hard over a 261-working-days calendar year. A 8-hour day means 2088 hours, after all. But most of a junior associate's time will be written off, often because they spend more time than a senior associate eventually will producing the same output, but also as a way of offering a reduction in a client's bill (although the partner's rates will more than make up the bulk, and it's really one of those mark-downs that only bring the price into line with the cost).

There's also the idea that working in the law is like becoming a doctor. Those years as an intern or resident and on-call put a similar burden on the young doctors, pushing them to learn more and faster and to become capable of handling the difficult work. After all, schooling only prepares you so much. Practice is often usually significantly different. But even doctors are questioning these methods lately, so surely lawyers, who often think they're doctors themselves, will do the same eventually.

[NM]

Doctors are different. The numbers going into medical school are strictly controlled. So the reason they have to work so many hours is because there often aren't enough of them.

Lawyers on the other hand are extremely common. They aren't competing in an undersupplied market but an oversupplied market. They have to be better than enough of their colleagues to actually keep their jobs. The young eating each other is the result.

So law firms can get away with mining their workforce cause there's always more of them to exploit. Medics on the other hand are having to change their ways... slowly.

[Fabian]

I worked at Macquarie Bank for a year. That was enough for me.

[slatts]

Who gives a shit abour fricking lawyers? They're part of the greatest protection racket and closed shop trade union in existence. I'm sick to death of workshops and policy papers on every facet of workplace behaviour simply because meddle management at the behest of company lawyers -- charging $100 an hour -- insist that not to do so could expose someone to litigation. I say level the law off at "Enter at own risk" and "buyer beware", ban settlements (if you want to take action, take full action), ban lawyers from becoming parliamentarians (all they do is make laws to benefit the brotherhood) and close the fucking law schools down for 10 years.
Rant over, that's better. I think.

[Patrick]

Wow Slatts, go man go!

[adrian]

Go hard Slatts ! I take it there will be no lawyers at Christmas dinner this year.