Lawyers - thoughts please

[HuntyGirl]

I am a solicitor, I qualified late 2020. There have obviously been massive pay increases of recent and pay wars between firms. I am at a large regional firm and on £47k currently.
Firms such as Eversheds and DLA have just announced regional NQ salary will be going up to £62k and £65k respectively.

AIBU to have a discussion with my partner soon(ish) to say that when salaries increase in September, as a 2 year PQE by then I will expect c. £65k? That's taking into consideration that Eversheds and DLA are obviously international and have a higher turnover.

The current NQ salary at my firm is £46k. Please can I have some advice around how to broach this with my partner and what my salary expectations realistically should be. (I am regionally based so not taking the crazy London salaries into consideration!)

Thanks in advance

@babyjellyfish I'm 27 nearly 28 and DH is 29 nearly 30.

That's great advice, thank you. Will have a think

@dynamitegirl yes, most of my training was pre-covid. I have better seniors! The ones at my old firm were truly horrid people. They were rude, derogatory, condescending, would ignore me when I spoke etc. Used to shout at me (not yet me - others too) in front of a room full of people. Genuinely just a vile place to work.

Also, I have now learnt to manage my own workload much better. I struggled with this as a trainee as felt I couldn't say no so quite often had many urgent things and little time. Oftentimes worked late into the late night and early morning. Was just a dreadful experience.

I take your point about being able to do and enjoy my job. I am good at my job and love it. I suppose that is priceless

Say you want to speak to your line manager before salaries are settled. You need market evidence of salaries, plus the performance in all aspects to make it worth their while to break bands. Most regional firms are under salary pressure. My firm will break bands but only for the really exceptional e.g. smashing targets, fantastic attitude, building relationships all round etc.

I have had people speak to me about salaries over the years. The ones that make it easy for me to agree and enable me to present proper evidence to HR, finance and the managing partner are most successful.

I did get a trainee ask me for more than I am on with 20PQE, responsible for managing a large segment of the firm plus central management responsibilities. He was unlikely to ever stay with us and his expectations were unaffordable so although I passed on the information it was always going to be a no.

I’d not be getting too carried away with salaries.

If you want to TTC at only 4PQE that is very early in your career. Where can you work which will give you flexibility (if you want any) and where you won’t find blatant sex discrimination (when you’re out for the year you may find you get all your clients given away).

Hate to say it but junior lawyers are pretty replaceable. Leave to get a higher salary by all means but you need to think of the long games. Most lawyers who are serious about their careers wait longer to have babies. Sad but true.

[quote HuntyGirl]@Chessie678 agreed it would be difficult at a city firm. My colleague has a friend who is at a city firm and on her return to work after mat leave her partner asked her what her non negotiables were. She said 'I need to see my child at least once a day, whether that be in the morning to give them breakfast and drop them to nursery or pick them up in the evening and do bedtime, that's what I want.' I was shocked to say the least. That's not how I see myself as a parent so would never consider a city firm as I think that's ridiculous.

I agree that those things matter much more. I think this thread has helped me get some perspective back. I love my firm and was adamant that I didn't want to move but when I saw those salary hikes I couldn't believe it!

I imagine that is also true, going back to this job would be easy I feel as I love the work, have great support and a great team. Thank you for your helpful post[/quote]
That's the reality with most full time jobs though. I usually get to see my daughter at both ends of the day but the mornings are are just about running around the house looking for bits of uniform whilst nagging her to eat breakfast. Not exactly quality time!

I'm a partner at a big law firm. For salaries we are very much constrained by the bands and at the lower levels these are quite narrow. How it works at my firm is that each year the team is given a pot of money for pay rises and a pot of money for bonuses. We are told the pay bands and then have to distribute the pots. We have more leeway with bonuses - the salary bands mean there isn't a lot of wriggle room on pay. Your best bet would be to try to argue for a banding move across the board. Do you have an associate body to raise these kinds of things? Your firm won't be oblivious to the current pay wars. Eversheds and DLA only announced their increases in the past few days so give them a chance to discuss it.

@gogohm

Asking is fine but it can have repercussions later so it's a balancing act. Are you prepared to leave? Are there jobs actually available at the proposed salary?

I know people doing my job that are paid more but they are in a different location or have worse t&c's weigh that up too

I would be prepared to leave for the right job. Yes, jobs are available at those salaries.

Will update my CV this weekend and then start having a proper look and be open to the recruiters contacting me

If you have panic attacks doing London-style work and hours and you want to be off on maternity within a couple of years, you're not worth Eversheds-style salary, put bluntly.
You get the pay for the hours and the work and the commitment, not for the fast track to the mummy track.
Sounds like you have a good work-life balance and that is important to you, which for someone 18 months in is unusual, in both respects. Don't fuck it up

OP, before you have this chat I think you need to ensure you’re “comparing apples with apples”.

DLA and ‘sheds are both very good regional firms and, putting aside London, they tend to be considered to attract the best work and best talent, so charge (and pay) a premium for that.

Does your firm do similar commercial work? Would it be considered similar clients/value/complexity? How do your charge out rates and target hours compare? Do you recruit from the same universities?

In other words, the strength of argument depends on your firm.

In London, there are MC firms paying nearly 200k to nqs and there are high street firms paying near minimum wage. For the reasons above, they’re simply not comparable and there are good reasons for the differences in pay (even though some high street lawyers are undoubtedly underpaid).

I think leaving is the best option. It's unrealistic to think you can negotiate such a pay hike. The reason lawyers move a lot is they get paid better that way and its good experience. Is there a health issue which means you have to TTC so early? You'd be better waiting 3-4 years. It could make a real difference to your long term career prospects.

I'm not a lawyer but at a mid tier professional services firm dealing with lawyers all the time.

My juniors knew they could get more at a pwc or KPMG. They also know it would be long hours, not always interesting work and treated like crap, lots of stress. Everyone they know who made that move out of our team reports back unhappy so fortunately they have stayed at the lower salary.

I actually think that at z junior levelits worth getting a bug firm on your cv so you can prove your calibre. But you can't do that if you're going to TTC

Bear in mind that these pay rises are going to have to be funded somehow. Client rates can only be pushed so far and partners are not going to want to pay for them out of the equity pot and see their drawings go down. So that means more hours.

Personally I would wait before TTC. The more senior you are, the more flexibility you have and the more you can delegate and WFH and the like. You're still very young.

The women at my old firm with children who made it work were either senior or well established in their career or came back full time and didn't see their children. A lot of mums and mums to be were made redundant in the last recession.

I left law as it was just not compatible with family life. The money was not worth the stress (and £ wasn't all that good either, large regional).

Sorry, I have a real downer on law from my own experience. But it can work. I probably wasn't determined enough.

What practice area are you in, OP?

@babyjellyfish

What practice area are you in, OP?

I'm a litigator

post on rollonfriday for advice fromlawyers

I'm a litigator

How compatible do you think that is with working part time?

When I was a trainee in litigation my supervisor (who was a senior associate at the time) worked part time and left at 2:30pm several times per week to collect her children from school.

She did leave during the afternoon without fail, but she would always be working in the evenings. It seemed to me that she was working a full time job for part time pay.

If you're in a practice area where you have to respond to things at short notice including court deadlines, either you need a really slick team where several people are equally up to speed and any of them can pick up matters in someone else's absence, or you will end up working on your days off.

As a junior lawyer, I think this will be impossible to manage.

You're still pretty young and so in your shoes I would do some real soul searching about what kind of job you would like you be in when you have children, in terms of specialism, work life balance, pay etc. You won't get paid a six figure salary for a 9-5 job in the regions. So you need to think about what your priorities are, and what working conditions would be the best fit. Then I would try to get that job before you TTC.

At 27 you still have time on your side.

I used to work at Eversheds in one of their regional offices in a litigation team. I think if you’ve got a reasonable work/life balance at your current firm, your salary is reasonable for your targets and the work and team is good then I’d be very wary at jumping ship to go somewhere like Eversheds / DLA. The salaries are higher but so are the expectations - especially at 2-5 years PQE as that’s the time the partners are basically deciding whether you’re on the progression track or not. If TTC is something that is on your timeline in the next few years then I’d avoid the likes of Eversheds like the plague as the hours are looonnnggg. I went back full time after I had DD and I pretty much didn’t see her at all during the week which no salary makes up for IMO.

What kind of work do you do? Is it commercial like DLA and Eversheds? I’m at an international firm in Manchester but do insurance backed works so our charge out rates are significantly lower than those charged by commercial teams. Salaries are therefore always going to be lower.

To compare, our London NQ rate has recently been increased to £80k. That’s a lot more than I am on at 10pqe in the regions which is a bit irritating.

I would suggest that you wait and see what your salary review comes out at and then decide what to do from there. I think there will be a mini pay war in the regions now but nothing on the scale of London. Probably more of a benchmarking exercise.

@MikeWozniaksMohawk

What kind of work do you do? Is it commercial like DLA and Eversheds? I’m at an international firm in Manchester but do insurance backed works so our charge out rates are significantly lower than those charged by commercial teams. Salaries are therefore always going to be lower.

To compare, our London NQ rate has recently been increased to £80k. That’s a lot more than I am on at 10pqe in the regions which is a bit irritating.

I would suggest that you wait and see what your salary review comes out at and then decide what to do from there. I think there will be a mini pay war in the regions now but nothing on the scale of London. Probably more of a benchmarking exercise.

Not sure how to PM - do you mind PMing me please? Would love to discuss this further as your post is really helpful

Thanks for all your responses! They have all been really helpful and there is a lot of food for thought. Will consider how to proceed but definitely recognise I am very lucky to be somewhere I love, feel valued and can develop well. Thanks again for all the comments that have been useful and well intentioned

Just wanted to chime in, not so much on pay but on TTC plans. I’m a recently promoted partner in a regional firm (not an Eversheds or DLA but doing high quality commercial work) and I had my DC at 29 when I was 4.5 PQE and still at associate level. On my return from mat leave I was promoted to senior associate quite quickly and then partner. I do work full time but having DC relatively early in my career did not affect my prospects and there’s no reason it should yours either.

@PenguindreamsofDraco

If you have panic attacks doing London-style work and hours and you want to be off on maternity within a couple of years, you're not worth Eversheds-style salary, put bluntly. You get the pay for the hours and the work and the commitment, not for the fast track to the mummy track. Sounds like you have a good work-life balance and that is important to you, which for someone 18 months in is unusual, in both respects. Don't fuck it up

Well this is depressing.

Some public sector legal jobs will pay around the level you want and allow you to take the piss work around your children to the detriment of other people on the team. Just throwing that into the ring.

@MabelsApron are you suggesting that parents should either work in exactly the same way as non-parents or not at all?

@MabelsApron

Some public sector legal jobs will pay around the level you want and allow you to take the piss work around your children to the detriment of other people on the team. Just throwing that into the ring.

I don't know what public sector legal jobs you're referring to but the OP's current salary is what a GLS lawyer can expect to earn from 3PQE onwards, and be stuck on that salary for about 7 years until they're eligible for promotion, when they can expect a pay rise to the dizzying heights of around £60k.