Lawyers are some of the most highly stressed professionals in the world. The mental health challenges faced by lawyers are unique and often compounded by other stressors such as long hours, client demands, perfectionist tendencies. It is crucial for lawyers to take care of their mental health to be effective both professionally and personally. In this article, we will discuss five key things you can do in your workplace to manage your own mental health.

The work-related stress faced by lawyers tends to involve working in a high-pressure environment and managing demanding billable hours. Such intense corporate culture and relentless working conditions can lead to problems such as burnout, anxiety, and depression.

Our time as advisors to and recruiters for the legal industry have given us a unique insight into how legal professionals that thrive look after their own mental health. They tend to be self-aware and not have any expectation that someone else will look after it for them. These are our top 5 insights:

1.     Bring your Authentic Self to Work

In our recent Friends in Law podcast interview with Ann-Maree David, she shared the idea that in earlier generations, lawyers were trained to bring their fictional protective armour to work. They were advised to keep themselves separate and professionally distant from their clients as a self-protection mechanism. Having a professional identity and not necessarily bringing the ins and outs of your home life to the office was the way things had always been.

According to Ann-Maree, this is now changing as millennials become managing partners and technology and flat management structures are also having an impact. It is a much richer experience to bring your whole authentic self to the workplace. This includes your outside-of-work interests, your true personality, and the diversity of your family environment or lifestyle to work. People connect more to authenticity, and you are more likely to develop honest and mutually beneficial relationships with colleagues, bosses, and clients if you are not busy pretending to be something you are not. It is exhausting and stressful to put on a front and it never works in the longer term.

2.     Choose a Growth Mindset Over Perfectionism

It could be said that many lawyers tend to have some perfectionist tendencies. The profession, as a rule tends to attract a type of person that has excellent attention to detail who were high achievers at school. The pressure that they put on themselves in their legal careers to always be perfect can have an enormous impact on their mental health. Human beings are fallible and will always make mistakes during their lifetime and career. Lawyers are not robots. The important takeaway from any mistake is a clear understanding of what it taught you. Learning from mistakes and adopting a growth mindset as opposed to attempting to achieve perfection is a much less stressful approach.

3.     Practice Self-Care Often

There are many ways to practice self-care, and this might be different for every individual based on what makes them happy or clears their mind. One type of self-care is to get some positive endorphins via exercise. Our founder Alex Correa pictured above, has set herself the goal of walking Coastrek in July raising money for Beyond Blue. Training for the 30km walk will certainly raise those endorphins and raise money for a very relevant and worthy cause. You can donate to Alex's team here.

For other individuals, self-care might involve connecting with family and friends. It could even be meditating mindfully. It could be practicing gratitude via a gratitude journal. It could be volunteering and connecting with your community, or it could be as shallow as a touch of retail therapy. Self-care is highly individual, subjective, and relates to looking after yourself, investing in your mental health, making time for yourself, and doing things outside the office that you enjoy.

4.     Set Boundaries and Realistic Expectations

One thing you learn over a long career is how to say no. It is currently a challenging time for the legal profession, and many lawyers are working very long hours. The current talent shortage is not helping to alleviate this. For the clients and lawyers we speak to, it feels like everyone is working too much and are completely exhausted. The shortages aren’t just in law it doesn't matter if you are looking for a Barista or a Barrister, everyone is at full-capacity and for those knee-deep in work it can sometimes feel like there is no end in sight.

As we approach the end of the end of financial year, it is a good time to regroup and have an honest conversation with yourself. Is there anything you can do to rid yourself of excess stress? Is there anything you can stop doing?

Many lawyers set career goals at the beginning of the year, and for some the pandemic and its associated chaos has meant those goals may have stalled. It is ok to be kind to yourself and accept that your path may have been blocked by extenuating circumstances. Career goals are useful, but they are not etched in stone and the path to achieve them can sometimes be winding. Missing a milestone can make you feel disheartened but as they say the sun will still rise tomorrow.

Regroup! Reassess those goals and reset them based on what you know now. Do they need to be tweaked? Do your deadlines need to be extended?

5.     Vote with your Feet

Many lawyers stayed in roles that were perhaps too demanding in difficult circumstances during the pandemic, in the hope that having and keeping a role was better than the fear of the unknown. The current unprecedented levels of extraordinary demand for legal talent have tipped all the power into the hands of jobseekers. In our experience, it is not likely to change over the coming months. If self-care, setting boundaries, and being authentic are not working for you.... give yourself some time and space to reassess what it is that you want in your career.

We are always here for a confidential career discussion!

Looking after your mental health is a vital requirement of having a career in law. Over time you will develop skills, strategies, and a toolkit to manage your own stress levels. You will learn who you can lean on and the relationships that are important, whether they are in your workplace, or are a supportive partner, friend, or mentor. Sometimes it can be as simple as sharing the problem to reduce the feeling of overwhelm.

And of course, always ask for professional help if you need it. If you or someone you know needs support, please call Lifeline on 13 11 14 or Beyond Blue 1300 224 636. You can also access law care via the Queensland legal society here.

These are unprecedented times, and we need to look after ourselves and each other. No one is immune from mental health issues, even lawyers. We hope these tips will help you to consider and manage your own mental health in your workplace.

If you have any questions or would like to discuss your career with one of our team, please get in touch. We are always here to help!