Lawyer Well-Being
& the Necessity for A Legal Industry Culture Change
Lawyer Well-Being
& the Necessity for A Legal Industry Culture ChangeWell-being is a priority for lawyers that can no longer be ignored. The National Task Force on Lawyer Well-Being acts on behalf of the lawyers who are functioning below their ability and for those suffering due to substance use or mental health disorders and the Task Force urges people to act.
It has been estimated that the average person will spend one third of their life at work. The American Bar Association (ABA) published a study of nearly 13,000 currently practicing lawyers that found between 21-36% qualify as problem drinkers and 28% are struggling with some level of depression, 19% struggle with anxiety and 23% struggle with stress. Notably, the study found that young lawyers in the first 10 years of practice and those working in private firms experience the highest rates of problem drinking and depression. Too many individuals face less productive, less satisfying and more troubled career paths. The result of the study signals an elevated risk in the legal community for mental health and while the study reflects the majority of lawyers do not have a mental health or substance use disorder, it does not mean the lawyers unaffected are thriving.
What is Well-Being?
Well-being is not solely defined by the absence of illness; it includes a positive state of wellness. Social science research emphasizes that well-being is not defined by an absence of disfunction or illness but is also not limited to feeling happy or filled with positive emotions. The concept of well-being is multi-dimensional and includes, for example, engagement in interesting activities, having close relationships and a sense of belonging, developing confidence through mastery, achieving goals, meaning and purpose, a sense of autonomy and control, self-acceptance, and personal growth.
Lawyer well-being can be further defined as a continuous process whereby lawyers seek to thrive in each of the following areas: emotional health, occupational pursuits, creative or intellectual endeavors, sense of spirituality or greater purpose in life, physical health and social connections with others. It is a continuous process towards thriving across all life dimensions. Lawyer well-being is part of the lawyer’s ethical duty of competence. It provides a lawyer the ability to make healthy, positive work/life choices and assure not only a quality of live within their families and communities but also to help them make responsible decisions for their clients.
Reasons to Take Action:
1. Lawyer well-being impacts the cognitive function and contributes to organizational success in law firms, corporations and government entities. When cognitive function is impaired, legal professionals are unable to do their best work. For law firms and corporations, lawyer health is form of human capital that provides a competitive advantage. The Gallup Corporation did years of research showing that worker well-being in the form of engagement is linked to a host of organizational success factors, including low turnover, high client satisfaction and higher productivity and profitability. The research also shows that 68% of employees are not engaged at work, which means organizations are not benefiting from their human capital. A 2016 survey by Law360 found that over 40% of lawyers reported they were likely to leave their current law firms within the next year. The high turnover rate for law firms is expensive; however, could be mitigated by improving employee well-being in an engaging way.
2. Lawyer well-being influences ethics and professionalism. The ABA Model Rules of Professional conduct have several rules that are relevant to lawyer wellness. Rule 1.1, “provide competent representation” Rule 1.3 requiring diligence in client representation, Rules 4.1 through 4.4 regulate working with people other than clients. Minimum competence is critical to protecting clients and allows lawyers to avoid discipline but will not enable them to live up the aspirational goal articulated in the ABA’s Model Rules of Professional Conduct’s Preamble, which calls lawyers to “strive to attain the highest level of skill to improve the law and legal profession and to exemplify the legal profession’s ideals of public service. A lack of well-being causes lawyers to struggle with even minimum competence. D. B. Marlowe, author of “Stress Management for Lawyers”, suggests that 40-70% of disciplinary proceedings and malpractice claims against lawyers involve substance use or depression, often both.
Major depression is associated with impaired executive functioning, including diminished memory, attention and problem-solving. Well-functioning executive capabilities are a necessity for making good decisions, evaluating risks, planning for the future, and coping with new situations. Further, some cognitive impairment persists in up to 60% of individuals with depression even after mood symptoms have diminished. For alcohol abuse, up to 80% experience mild severe cognitive impairment in executive functions, especially when problem solving, abstraction, planning, organizing, and working memory, core features of a competent lawyer.
3. Promoting well-being is the right thing to do. Untreated mental health issues and substance use disorders ruin lives and careers. They affect too many lawyers and it is clear the collective legal culture is toxic or sustaining is up to the individual. The interdependence creates a joint responsibility for solutions.
Recommendations
The Task Force for Lawyer Well-Being has published their recommendations for minimizing lawyer dysfunction, boosting well-being, and reinforcing the importance of well-being to competence and excellence in practicing law. The report is split into two main parts, Part 1 provides general recommendations for all stakeholders in the legal community and part 2 provides recommendations tailored to specific stakeholders, such as judges, regulators, legal employers, bar associations, etc. Some of the recommendations include:
- Leaders demonstrate personal commitment to well-being. Broadscale change requires a buy-in role modeling from top leadership.
- Facilitate, destigmatize, and encourage help seeking behaviors.
- Build relationships with Lawyer Well-Being experts,
- Foster collegiality and respectful engagement throughout the profession.
- Provide high-quality educational programs about lawyer distress and well-being.
- Guide and support the transition of older lawyers.
- De-emphasize alcohol at social events,
- Utilize monitoring to support recovery from substance use disorders.
- Take actions to meaningfully communicate that Lawyer Well-Being is a priority.
- And many more!
The Task Forces’ report and recommendations make a compelling case that the legal profession is due for some new ideals. Depression, anxiety, chronic stress, burnout and substance use disorders among lawyers exceed those of many other professions. To preserve the public’s trust and maintain the status of a self-regulating profession, the legal industry must come together with the commitment to care for the well-being of one another. Regardless of the position each individual holds in the legal industry, everyone can contribute towards making a difference in the culture change by considering their own well-being and that of one another. The legal profession has the capacity to face these challenges and create a better future for lawyers that is sustainable in pursuit of the highest professional standards, business practices and ethical ideals.
More information on how you can contribute can be found in the National Task Force on Lawyer Well-Being’s report, “The Path to Lawyer Well Being: Practical Recommendations for a Positive Change”, which can be found on the American Bar Association’s website or on Google.
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