Lawyers please will you talk to me about being a PSL?

[DamsonWhine]

After a difficult year at work where I was encouraged to apply for a promotion and didn’t get it in part due to lack of support from my boss, who continues to disappoint me with his lack of support despite promises to the contrary, an opportunity to apply for a PSL role has come up. It’s in my area of expertise, working roughly the same PT as I do currently but working from home.

I have a LOT of reservations about working from home. I’d be required to be in the office that the job is notionally based in at least 1-2 times a month but I really like working around people that I can bounce ideas off, share experiences with, all that jazz. Plus what about my lovely work wardrobe that will be sad and unloved?

Anyway, I would be very interested to hear your experiences of working as a PSL. Is it a one way street? Can you ever go back to client work? Do you find it frustrating, unfulfilling or is it a brilliant opportunity to make a difference and get under the skin of things that you never have time to focus on as a fee earner?

I would turn it down on the work from home too
But presumably could you ask to work in the office 1-2 days a week if you wanted to?

Thanks Red I’d certainly want to explore the arrangements in more detail.

Sorry I can’t help more - I chose the public sector for the best work life balance but with interesting work formula. The draw back is the pay though.
In-house is a good option too - personally I always thought the psl work looked really dull but if you enjoy researching and writing and working on your own it’s probably a good opportunity.

Do you think they ear marked you for the psl role and that’s why you didn’t get the promotion? Don’t be sidelined if what you actually want is advancement - just move elsewhere where pt working is valued and won’t hold you back. You don’t have to self select into these roles.

It’s not with my current firm Red. I’ve had all sorts of reassurances about promotion next year at my current firm (and Im making excellent headway with all the BS “development areas” they wanted to see ticked off) but there’s a part of me that thinks I might benefit from a clean slate elsewhere.

I’m not actually gunning for partnership, or at least not at present. My firm has an extremely limited, linear structure for progression and the promotion I applied for is the only way to progress but also to get the objective recognition I want for all the stuff I am already doing at that level (and the salary and additional opportunities to match).

And you may be right about PSL work being dull. I would certainly miss the cut and thrust of my current (transactional) role.

PSL is dull compared to corporate work but it doesn't take over your life.

I stayed in fee earning work myself but worked with lots of PSLs and people thinking of taking that route. A few thoughts:

• You should think about whether what you like about the job is the academic side or the transactional cut and thrust. Happy PSLs tend to be academically strong and actively enjoy that side of things

• Being forced to work from home sounds miserable. The PSLs I worked with enjoyed the "surgery" element, where clueless junior lawyers would come and ask them for help. They also enjoyed being involved in e.g. client training initiatives, so that they could continue to be part of client relationship building

-If you do it well, I think it can be a very satisfying job, carrying a lot of recognition internally

• law firms are generally pretty unimaginative at thinking up career structures for PSLs and the pay tends to plateau pretty quickly

• I think that , whilst not impossible, it is difficult to go back to fee earning. This is not because it is actually difficult to pick it up again or to get the confidence back; but because those taking the decisions have rarely taken any time out themselves and are sceptical about time out. If the pay structure is based on PQE then they worry about a disjunction between PQE and actual transactional experience

-There are some great PSL jobs and some awful, quasi paralegal ones. Be careful to choose the right one

Thanks very much, all food for thought. I’m not an ivory tower lawyer. I get a lot of respect at present, at least in my immediate team, for my broad range of experience and ability to get to grips with some of the stuff that no one else in my firm can.

I think I need to see this as a confidence boost and an exploration of life outside my firm (I’ve been there since I trained) first and foremost.

Quick update: recruiter liked the CV I had put together (which was a relief since it was 6 years plus since I had last done one ) and is happy to put it forward as is.

So I guess I see where it takes me

Good luck OP

I got an interview . I was warned not to expect anything for a couple of weeks!

Wow congratulations hope it goes well