'You feel like rubbish': Why the toxic culture in law firms persists

In her first year as a rookie lawyer, Anna worked in a small firm where the managing director would frequently call employees individually into his office and "yell at the top of his voice".

Each time it happened, other employees outside his room would be left rattled, wondering who would be called up next.

Anna, who is now in her 40s and works in a different law firm, said: "Even if he didn't yell, he would raise his voice and say very mean things like, 'How come you don't even know this? Do you even check your work?'"

Like several other lawyers and former lawyers who spoke to CNA TODAY, Anna declined to have her real name published because she did not want to be seen speaking ill of law firms that she still has to work with or of past employers.

What she experienced seems fairly commonplace in law firms, with many other lawyers reporting having faced similar issues, though to varying degrees, including being shouted at, having items thrown at them and dealing with unreasonable demands on their time.

A recently published study commissioned by the Law Society of Singapore (LawSoc) to look into attrition rate of lawyers found that toxic work culture, bullying and workload pressures, as well as the judicial system, were among the factors contributing to lawyers leaving practice for other industries or in-house work.

The multi-year study surveyed 855 current and former legal practitioners and did in-depth interviews with 31 of them.

CNA TODAY spoke to more than a dozen lawyers across different stages of their careers, with about half of them having left private practice entirely or having left practice for prolonged periods to take a break.

A few of these lawyers provided more positive experiences about working in a law firm, but even they acknowledged that toxic behaviour in law firms was not uncommon and had heard of friends being on the receiving end.

As for Anna, things got so bad that she found herself crying every day. She eventually sought help from a psychiatrist and was given medication for anxiety and two weeks' medical leave.

Her medical certificate cut no ice with her boss and she was forced to continue working during that period.

Leaving that firm after about a year, she recalled speaking to an ex-colleague about how bad their workplace culture was and how they should not let their bosses treat them like that anymore.

"She just replied with this: 'This boss is very good already, because he never throws files and staplers at us. I heard in other firms, they throw files and staplers'."

Mr Linus Choo from recruitment firm Ethos BeathChapman reaffirmed the study's findings and what was shared by lawyers.

"Lawyers who exit private practice for in-house roles point to culture, not compensation, as the primary driver," he said.

Mr Choo, who is the managing director for legal and governance at the firm, added that these lawyers are also leaving private practice permanently, which then creates a talent gap at the mid-to-senior level that "no salary adjustment will close".

JUNIORS WORN DOWN BY INTIMIDATION, FEAR

Mr Theophilus Darius Thomas said he knows of many friends who graduated from law school "very full of life", only to turn into entirely different people as a result of their experiences at work.

"When I meet them nowadays, they look like a shell of themselves. I cannot recognise them," the 29-year-old said.

He himself had taken a break from full-time private practice after about two years and has since founded his own technology startup, which automates the administrative and grunt work done by junior lawyers.

Even though lawyers said that they entered the profession with their eyes wide open when it came to the demanding workload, many were taken aback by their seniors' behaviour.

For one former lawyer now in her late 20s, this came in the form of passive-aggressive treatment and comments that "made her feel stupid".

After a positive internship experience at a law firm under a supportive senior partner, she looked forward to returning to the firm full-time in 2021.

Instead, she found herself working under a new team and seniors who were hardly nurturing.

Although working from home was the new normal during the COVID-19 pandemic, trainees in the firm were mandated to be in the office, while their seniors worked from home.

With little guidance and no face-to-face time with her bosses, she inevitably made mistakes. The senior associates berated rather coached her, with comments such as “You don't know what you're doing” and "This is just common sense".

"It came to a point where every time I heard the Zoom message sound, I got scared. I was thinking, 'Did I do something wrong?'" she recalled.

Her confidence eroded and anxiety peaked, prompting her to leave the company after about six months for an in-house legal counsel role in a financial firm.

Lawyers also told CNA TODAY said that public dressing-downs were common.

A lawyer in her early 40s, who declined to be named, recalled a law firm partner screaming at a trainee over the phone so loudly that the entire office could hear.

"Another trainee was scolded and called 'stupid', among other unpleasant words. And again, with raised voices such that others could hear."

One other lawyer found out the hard way that it was not a two-way street when it came to feedback.

When she noticed a mistake by a senior in a document, she mentioned it in an internal email chain just among colleagues working on the case, only to be pulled aside later and scolded for her behaviour.

She was told her performance would be marked down as a result.

Words aside, lawyers also recalled how unreasonable demands were made on their time, including being asked to help run personal errands for bosses, such as helping them arrange furniture.

Mr Mohammed Shakirin Abdul Rashid, managing director of Adel Law, recalled how, as an intern, he had to wait hours for a senior colleague to return to the office from a family dinner, so that they could discuss a case.

There was no indication when the colleague would return and the interns were expected to just be available and ready.

"He didn't care that we (juniors) also have our respective families," Mr Shakirin said.

STAY CONTACTABLE IN THE TOILET – OR ELSE

Mr Ronald Yeo, 41, from Yeo Marini Law Corporation, recalled how sleeping bags were a common sight at work cubicles at one of Singapore's Big Four law firms during his internship days.

These four are namely Allen & Gledhill, Drew & Napier, Rajah & Tann, and WongPartnership.

With regard to the seemingly unending work hours at a law firm, what stood out more to Mr Yeo was his friend's experience.

"One friend told me that she takes her mobile phone to the toilet because her (firm) partner tells her, 'Look, if you don't reply within five minutes, you don't have to come to work the next day'."

The issue of sexual harassment also came up in the LawSoc report as an example of toxic work culture.

A practising lawyer told CNA TODAY how she started wearing oversized jackets to work at her old law firm after catching a senior partner leering at her.

"He had no qualms openly making comments on a female colleague's physical appearance, saying things like, 'Don't you think she's hot?' to other colleagues and interns," she said.

That lawyer would also put his hands around interns and rub their shoulders, despite them looking visibly uncomfortable.

She added that no one dared to speak up against this partner's behaviour, because he would frequently bring up how well-connected he was in the legal fraternity.

TOXIC BEHAVIOUR BEYOND THE FIRM

Lawyers also described having to contend with the stresses and toxic behaviour from stakeholders outside their firms.

In a service profession where clients' interests reign supreme, especially when clients pay hundreds or thousands of dollars an hour, their expectations soar.

One associate director at a law firm in his mid-40s, who declined to be named, said that there are clients who present problems that simply cannot be remedied by the law.

"Our clients expect magic and sometimes, a 'no' is the most difficult thing to say to them, because their logic is, 'I'm paying you, why can't you do that?'"

To make things worse, it is a "common occurrence" to have clients who would refuse to make full payment for the lawyers' services and threaten to report them to LawSoc simply because they did not achieve the outcome that they had desired.

Such unreasonable demands add to their workload unnecessarily.

Mr Wong Yi, a 42-year-old in-house counsel, who had worked in private practice for about two years, said: "The client is the one telling the lawyer on a Friday, 'I want advice on these matters on Monday'.

"Then, the (firm) partner will want to please the client and will ask the junior to work over the weekend."

Separately, lawyers at times encounter uncooperative lawyers who make unnecessary demands or are harsh in their correspondence, in a misguided bid to impress their clients.

Another form of stressor stated in the LawSoc report came from the courts – in the form of rigid timelines and demeaning ways in which judicial officers interacted with them.

Lawyers who spoke to CNA TODAY said that there are indeed some court officers who had a reputation for being "grumpy", "unnecessarily cutting with their words" and sometimes, picking on what they felt were non-issues.

One case highlighted in the report was that of a pregnant lawyer who had written to the courts to reschedule the hearing dates, or else she would be "delivering right in the middle of the trial". Her request was rejected.

Mr Wong said that he was familiar with this incident because he knew the opposing counsel, who told him that he had made known to the judge that he had no problem with a change of dates.

Former lawyer turned recruiter Shulin Lee noted that all jobs are stressful, but the adversarial nature of the legal profession adds a unique form of pressure.

"For example, if you're a doctor performing a surgery, it is stressful but there is no opposing doctor trying to make sure you screw up," the founder of Aslant Legal said.

"But for lawyers, you have an opposing counsel who is trying to make sure you don't succeed for your client, so you are constantly on edge; you are constantly in fight-or-flight mode.

"You have stress from the client, stress from the judge, stress from your team, stress from making sure there are billable hours, stress from opposing counsel. It's a lot."

WHY PROBLEMS PERSIST

The LawSoc report highlighted workplace culture “as the most powerful driver of lawyer retention”.

Yet, the legal industry is seemingly resistant to change.

The same report pointed out that there have been "decades of documented problems" and "structural and cultural conditions that may have remained unchanged for decades".

Lawyers and recruiters gave a few reasons for this inertia.

On the individual level, lawyers pass on the toxic behaviour to their juniors in part because that was what they had experienced when starting out and it is "the only reality that they know".

Ms Lee from Aslant Legal said that lawyers are supposed to be advocates for their clients, so they might be reluctant to admit to being bullied, because this might be misread as a sign of weakness.

"So I'm just going to tahan (Malay for bear with it), and this is like a mark of a resilient person," she added.

Every time I heard the Zoom message sound, I got scared. I was thinking, 'Did I do something wrong?'

More importantly, structural factors further entrench toxic behaviour.

One of which is the payment model – where law firms charge by the hour for the amount of work done.

Lawyers are each given individual "billable" targets to achieve, so seniors had been reported to "retain lucrative matters to themselves" while delegating the rest to the juniors, the LawSoc report found.

The industry thus "cannot build a healthy culture" with this unhealthy metric unless it is re-examined, Mr Choo the recruiter said.

Mr Wong the in-house counsel noted that because partners bring in clients for the business, the firm may be reluctant to take action against a "very high biller" for wrongdoing, since it could affect the company's bottom line.

This discourages victims from calling out or reporting bad behaviour.

In the meantime, LawSoc and the courts have taken measures in response to the publication of the report.

LawSoc has convened a task force to examine the study’s findings and implications, and make recommendations, while a Judiciary-Law Soc committee was set up to address feedback within the courts' purview.

Practising lawyers believe that every law firm can already do their part to make the vocation a little better without having to wait for big changes from the top.

At Setia Law, its team grew from nine to 13 with only one exit in the last three years. Its associate director Bethel Chan credited the retention rate to a supportive work environment that starts from the higher management.

Having described herself as "fortunate" so far in her career since being called to the bar in 2019, Ms Chan firmly believes that it is possible to lead a legal team without toxicity.

"Dealing with a mistake in an intemperate or harsh manner, if anything, will foster ill feelings and prevent productivity rather than be conducive to it," she said.

Mr Shakirin said that legal secretaries and junior lawyers under his lead at a previous firm followed him when he started Adel Law three years ago, and have stuck by him since, proving that it is still possible to retain talent in the legal industry.

He tries his best to give reasonable timelines, encourages employees to go home early when they can and keeps his feedback constructive rather than caustic.

To foster better camaraderie, the company organises short weekend trips together every few months.

This approach is rooted in his own experience. "I've gone through it (bad work environment), I don't like it, so I don't want to carry on that bad culture myself."

Source: CNA/ma/sf