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The legal profession is aging as the percentage of younger lawyers continues to shrink in a decades-long trend.
In 1980, 36 percent of the nation’s licensed lawyers were under age 35, compared to just 13 percent in this age group in 2005. The figures come from The Lawyer Statistical Report, which is based on data from Martindale-Hubbell and compiled by the American Bar Foundation. Meanwhile, the median lawyer age also increased from 39 in 1980 to 49 in 2005. Indiana University law professor William Henderson notes the statistics in a post at the Legal Whiteboard. “One would think the trend line would be moving in the exact opposite direction,” Henderson writes. The assumption would be that larger law-school graduating classes are replacing the much smaller number of law school graduates from 40 years before who are retiring or passing away. Henderson considers why the percentage of younger lawyers is shrinking. It’s possible that Martindale-Hubbell can’t track down all the younger lawyers, but Henderson suspects the difficulties don’t fully account for the drop-off in younger lawyers. It’s also possible the decline in younger lawyers is because women, who are going to law school in increasing numbers, are more likely to drop out of the profession to raise children. But Henderson says this is only a partial explanation, since the woman lawyers would likely be dropping out of the profession both before and after age 35. But the percentage of lawyers aged 35 to 64 is increasing. The most likely explanation, Henderson says, is that the rate of absorption of law grads into the licensed bar is steadily declining over time. “Arguably, the simplest explanation for these patterns is that it has gotten much harder over time to parlay a JD degree into paid employment as a licensed lawyer,” Henderson says. “So, faced with a saturated legal market, law school graduates have been pursuing careers outside of law.” Henderson also points to the After the JD study tracking law grads from the year 2000. In 2012, nearly a quarter of those grads were not practicing law. The drop-off occurred despite a better employment picture for those law grads. About 77 percent of the class of 2000 obtained full-time legal jobs nine months after graduation, according to the National Association for Law Placement. The situation was much worse in 2013, when only 57 percent of law grads that year had full-time bar-passage-required jobs, according to ABA data. Some have suggested that law schools need to do a better job of creating practice-ready lawyers to combat pushback from clients who don’t want to pay law firms for training new hires. But Henderson says that solution doesn’t account for “a new segment of the legal economy … that is financed by nonlawyers and heavily focused on data, process, and technology, which taps into skill sets not traditionally taught in law school.” Henderson says law schools need to figure out how to deal with the changes occurring in the legal marketplace, and the organized bar needs to address the demographic shift.
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Virtual Help: An Outsourcing Relationship With a Virtual Assistant Can Complete Your Team10/11/2014 E-mail This Article
Print This Article by Edward Poll April 2006 Lawyers function best as members of a team. No lawyer can do everything. A paralegal or administrative assistant whose qualifications and skills meet your needs will effectively extend the reach and quality of your practice. You can hire such a person to work full time, on your payroll. However, technology increasingly affords an efficient alternative: the VA, or virtual assistant. VA Relationship VAs are paralegals or other administrative specialists who work offsite and online, creating work product to your specifications and tailored to your practice. They represent an extension of the outsourcing that lawyers and law firms have done for years. Once that outsourcing was limited to mailing and records storage services. More recently it has come to include transcription of voice files for depositions, accounting support for billing, data entry, litigation support graphics, and legal research. Such outsourced services are transparent to the client – to such an extent that they now can be performed a continent away. The relationship with a virtual assistant is complex and rewarding. As an independent business owner, the VA is neither employee nor subordinate. VAs more closely resemble an accountant or any other business consultant with whom the lawyer has an ongoing, collaborative relationship. They become familiar with your practice and attuned to your business needs as much as any service provider engaged for a substantial length of time. VA Selection An excellent example of a virtual assistant practice is The Relief, a Tacoma, Washington-based firm that delivers remote administrative and legal assistant/paralegal support services to solo and small practice professionals. Danielle Keister, principal of The Relief, graciously shared with me her insights on what makes the VA relationship work from the service provider’s perspective. She recommends taking these factors into account when engaging a VA:
VA Versus Employee One of the most important considerations about the outsourced VA relationship is to ensure that it is in fact an engagement of an independent contractor. Do not make the mistake of thinking that every part-time or offsite paralegal or legal assistant qualifies. The IRS has very clear guidelines to determine whether a hired individual is an independent contractor or an employee for federal tax purposes. An employee is subject to the will and control of the employer not only as to what shall be done, but as to how it shall be done – an employee does not have independent control of the work process. By contrast, The Relief, as a true independent contractor, states on its Web site: “Our expertise is based on over 20 ears top-level administrative experience and training. Our legal support services for attorneys and investigators are based on paralegal and investigative training and experience.” If you engage a service provider who cannot provide the same assurance, they likely are not a true VA. VA Versus Temp Note also that a VA relationship is different from that with a temporary employment agency. Temps can be a viable solution to small firm or solo personnel needs, but if you need anything other than the most basic clerical assistance it would be wise to consider and select a temporary on a long-term basis, known as “temp to perm.” This option accommodates extended projects and protracted litigation, but should only be pursued with a temporary agency that specializes in temporary legal personnel. The VA Advantage Virtual assistants are an outsourcing strategy that can give lawyers the best of all solutions to the need for help. You get a professional team member, selected to your criteria, attuned to the business and professional needs of your practice. You are relieved of the cost (and potential liability) that in-house staff can represent. Best of all, you have an efficient solution to “The Business of Law”®, one that frees you to do the client representation and development work that you want to do. As Ms. Keister remarked to me, “ When I first started, I wondered if attorneys were so above the crowd that concerns like working at a profit, operating efficiently, finding ideal clients and dealing with problem ones were just too petty and far beneath them. Since then, I’ve seen that they have the same marketing and operating issues that any other business has.” Help from a knowledgeable virtual assistant can be a major step in resolving them. Back to Top |
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July 2019
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