To consider retraining as a solicitor with young children?

[Retrainingideas]

Currently have 2 DC under 5. I’m a SAHM for now, but would like to go back to work once the children are a little older.

However, due to DH’s job, chances are that I’m always going to need to be fairly flexible in terms of WFH/school drop offs and pick ups etc. I wouldn’t want to be reliant on formal childcare and don’t have much help in terms of family locally.

I like the idea of family law (sorting out divorces etc) and also employment law. Are these particularly competitive areas? Likely to be fairly flexible/inflexible?

Are law firms open to taking on those only starting their careers mid 30s?

i’d be looking to work out of London, so not at any big city firms.

I’d also ideally be earning £50k+ and not working 5 days per week. Is this possible in this career? If not, any other areas of law I could look at that would be more flexible?

I retrained in law in my 30s with young children and am glad I did so. It was worth the effort.

I did the GDL (law conversion) part time over 2 years then the LPC part time over 2 years, both whilst working. The studying isn’t too hard if you’re reasonably academic. DH picked up a lot of the slack with childcare but I missed spending time with them.

I was daunted by the idea of securing a TC with no prior legal experience but was fortunate that a local regional firm recognised my transferable skills and offered me a paralegal role. I started on about £20k, a huge cut from my former management role. I did all the grunt work but volunteered for every opportunity to learn. Being older and more confident made me standout from the younger paralegals.

After 2 years as a paralegal I got a TC on £25k. Qualified in 2017 and my firm kept me on as a NQ on £34k. I made Associate and then Salaried Partner fairly quickly because I was in a small team and the senior members of staff retired or left so I could move up. I utilised my prior experience in team management to support the Head of Department.

I’m now 9 years PQE and on £95,000 at a much larger national firm. I work FT in the office but with flexibility to WFH on occasion if necessary. Most days are 09.00 to 17.30. If I’m busy I’ll work late (20.00) or at the weekend. I do get to switch off on holidays.

My work is incredibly rewarding as I specialise in medical negligence. The subject matter is traumatic and there’s the pressure of court deadlines but nothing beats the feeling of winning a case and making a difference in the life of a disabled child. I have a great team around me.

What interests you about Family or Employment? Dispute Resolution isn’t likely to be any more flexible than other areas of law. If anything, having stressed clients who call you every time their ex / boss upsets them can be a huge burden when you simply don’t have the time to be their counsellor. You might imagine a wonderful world where you magically help warring parties find a happy compromise; the reality is that the clients will be pissed off no matter the outcome, especially when you bill them.

All law is competitive but maturity and confidence will play to your favour. But you’ve got to REALLY want it…

But the clients don't know whether you are using AI and the lawyers check what the AI has generated. Checking it over and amending bits takes a lot less time than drafting from scratch.

It's a bit like the shift from typing to word-processing or the change from using physical law books to lexis nexis. It increases productivty and means we need fewer people.

The SQE is a very different thing to the LPC though. LPC is no longer an option and gone are the days of open book exams.

Largely, I have the kind of job you want. I also have an accounting degree and have a specialisation where that is seen as a plus. But I am much older and I worked like a dog in my earlier years - regularly working late nights and often some of the weekend. Even today, on occasion, there are times when I do have to work longer hours though not the all nighters of my earlier years. You just can't do those kind of hours when you're older. My career was established before I was married and with children. Even at that stage, we managed because for a lot of it, my husband worked from home and was able to deal with sick children being at home, do a lot of the pick ups and so on. I second the comments of other people that law is one of the least family friendly professions.

Sorry. I think this is fantasy.

I don’t think there are realistically any jobs at £50k part time that leave you free of any childcare. Perhaps consultancy if you are experienced enough through many years in the right industry.

I think you need to plan for a much lower salary.

DH is a lawyer. There’s so few jobs out there that are family friendly that he’s been stuck at the same place for 15 years. I earn double what he does (I’m not a lawyer, I realised after law school I hated it, which was an expensive mistake to make).

If you want a flexible career, maybe look at technology/product development type roles - some might get replaced by AI but it’s still very much a busy and live industry right now.

It's exceptionally competitive to get a training contract, I know several people who have been trying for years, meanwhile they're earning paralegal salary (~£25k -£28k for full time work and long hours at that). I think it would be even harder to find a training contract where you're allowed flexibility around your work hours, many firms expect their trainees to work long hours.
It will take a few years post qualifying to earn £50k at most firms outside of London, have a look at solicitor jobs on Indeed to get an idea. There are full time residential property solicitor roles near me for £35k(!).

Dh and I often say we were 50 years too late to our careers in law. It used to be far more lucrative and easy going than it is now. There are far easier and less stressful ways to earn 50k.

I qualified at the same time as you. It was still nice back then - drinks trolley on a Friday at 4pm, champagne at completions, glass of wine at lunch. The hours were always long though and working from home was rare.

Now there is far less camaraderie and joking about IMO

I would look into training as a Mackenzie friend in your shoes

@Retrainingideaswe are ino Scotland. My daughter qualified as a solicitor last September aged 32. Age definitely a help. She was an actor before! She's in employment law I. £47k as an NQ solicitor
She frequently works until 9 at night or later. She doesn't have a family yet but says she will need to go part time then. She thinks her working hours will reduce with experience as she's doing a lot of tribunal work which needs a lot of preparation and she's quite slow at that just now due to lack of experience.

It's hard work.

I doubt you’re going to get the flexibility you want when you’re starting out. They are going to want someone there 9-5 minimum. Maybe an established solicitor could have some flexibility to pop out and do school run or WFH a few days but i’d be very surprised if you’d walk into a training contract and be allowed to WFH and work school hours and then log on again in the evening. I think you even need to manage your expectation around paid childcare, or pick another career that might allow school hours / term time.

Exactly what Zanatdy says, sorry OP you are dreaming. You definitely can work part time or flexibly in smaller regional firms but only if/when you’ve proven yourself as capable and indispensable to your firm. That’s at least 8 years away (assuming f/t study for two years, you get a job (which is so competitive!), 2 years training, 4 years working full time going above and beyond to ‘prove yourself’. Very few lawyers are particularly capable until about 4 years PQE, that’s when you become 80% self sufficient and bloody useful, imo, esp in family / employment which require a lot of judgment, nuance, emotional strategy.

i think you can go further faster in transactional departments where junior level work is very precedent based and more formulaic.

im speaking from a private practice perspective - try civil service, trade unions, nhs (do they offer training schemes?)

Have a look at local authority opportunities. Some have programmes supporting professionals retraining in order to mitigate problems retaining staff who leave for the private sector. Pay probably won’t get to where you want for many years, but there will be more flexibility

I agree with lots of the others OP. I have the things you’re looking for, but I’ve only had them the last year or two since having kids and at almost a decade qualified. And I’m looking at having to step up my work a fair bit if I want to get promoted to partner.

Its a big risk as a retraining option as:

1. there’s a big financial commitment at the start, both for university and the SQE, and in terms of earning less or nothing while you’re studying;
2. there are barriers to entry beyond your control in the shape of getting training contracts
3. you will have the benefit of life experience behind you, but you are coming with the request for part time work as well which is going to make your offer as a trainee less run of the mill and straightforward
4. as a junior or trainee your work is supervised all the time and you’re effectively a support person on the cases and work of more senior lawyers. That means you have to fit in with them. They’ll expect you to be present and available when they are.

I don’t want to say it’s impossible but if I were in your shoes, I would look at something else because the huge up front financial cost plus the uncertainty of getting a job plus the fact the job you want in terms of pay and flexibility is quite hard to find in the field would just all amount to too much risk for me.

I don’t think that you’ll be able to do your training contract part time around school hours.
i also don’t think this is particularly realistic for a qualified lawyer in any field. Maybe as a consultant but you can only be a consultant once you‘ve got a few years PQE under your belt. At that point a salary of £50k is realistic. Before then, I think it depends on the firm and the higher the salary the more expectations. Yes big London firms pay their trainees ridiculous salaries - none of those trainees walk out for the school run or even bedtime.

I also think you’re underestimating the difficulty of the SQE. You’ll have a lot less time to study if you’re caring for children. I’ve seen students with children struggle. It’s hard, even for really bright students.

if you’re not prepared to use any childcare I cannot see this working. Not just the workload but the client entertainment would be difficult. It’s harder to work yourself up the ladder if you cannot gain your own clients.

Maybe look at areas of law that do not require court attendance. I think that may be more realistic. Doesn’t sound like that’s what’s speaking to you though?

Plenty of people have commented already about the fact that being a solicitor isn’t a flexible career, particularly in the early years. Clients are paying for a professional service, courts have deadlines, barristers need to have conferences with solicitors & clients & all those things are hard enough to manage when you work full days. Nobody (even your own mum or dad) is going to give you a job that allows you to pick the kids up every day & do a bit in the evening - plus kids get older & bedtimes get later, they do clubs and join sports teams & you get worn out working in the evenings after a busy day as well.

Plus where do you think family lawyers find their clients? Lunches, dinners, networking events, charity events. They come on top of the working day.

Also what’s your plan if one of the dc’s is ill? Or falls off the climbing bars at school? A client could be in the middle of proceedings for custody of their dc’s you can’t just get up & walk out.

I’ve worked with people coming to law as a second career. It’s always come as a huge shock. When you’ve always worked in the legal profession you get immune to a certain degree about what an odd culture it is. I’m sorry this sounds very harsh but I cannot see it working for you at all. (Been in this profession 30 yrs this yr). X

Given that you are not going to train as a solicitor under these parameters, the best bet for legal-ish work at fixed hours around kids would be something like CAB or similar charities. Advice session or phone based. Even then I'd expect to probably have to use at least some childcare. There's quite a few on the CAB jobs page now. You sound like you'd be more interested in the 'people' side of law, which this is.

The downside is that you wouldn't be earning anything like 50k even pro rata'd, but it would still be a fair whack more than you're on now. They also tend to like experience if possible, but if you potentially have the spare time to retrain then I presume volunteering would be a possibility?

Hopefully the op has realised what a tough profession this is. I had a frustrating evening last week with a friend who says that her dc is going to become a solicitor because she’d been told that you don’t have to be that bright since it’s all just about being sociable and they need to make six figures by mid twenties. Ridiculous for her to have been told that you just turn on the charm and get a place.

As a mother you’ll have kids in school which means that instead of applying for 200 training contracts up and down the country you’re applying to the handful of local firms. And competing with literally hundreds (possibly thousands) of straight A star applicants for every place.

It’s a long time since I did my training contract. But I’d say generally firms would happy take on mature candidates and those with experience in other areas. That said the training contract is an intense and competitive time - upon qualification there are often not enough jobs to go around (or not in the seats the trainees want to be in) so you are in direct competition with your other trainees for a NQ job.

Any area of law can be unpredictable with time pressures, either court dates or client needs etc.

I would say the workload will always be heavy but once you’re well established you can get more flexibility of when or where you work - every lawyer has a billable hours target they have to hit. That said the people I know who have gone part time, including me, often end up working extra hours on their day off etc. Clients, like in any area, can be demanding. Going in house is more enjoyable and a better work/life balance.

like others have said you are also expected to bring in work to the firm. So in some areas that means lots of networking and client entertainment - in the evening, or long lunches where you have to make your billable hours up another time. Employment and family law might be very different though.

I think you have to really want to do it. You never get to take your foot off the pedal fully

Just an idea Op. but you might want to look into the idea of an in house training contract https://www.lawcareers.net/Explore/Features/02042024-In-house-training-contracts-and-careers
where you train within the legal department of a company. My feel is that may be more flexible as you would likely not have a billable hours target and your ‘client’ would be the company.

You’d still work hard, but it would be more flexible.

I don’t know much about small high street firms. Why not call around some of them and ask how their training contract applications are structured etc. But large city law firms can be brutal and I’m not sure how easy a training contract would be with children - it might be very different now but you’re at everyone else’s whim 😂 clients, partners, urgent court applications etc

The OP simply doesn't have a lifestyle that is compatible with training as a solicitor. She has kids in school so she cant relocate. She doesn't live in London. As such there are likely to be a handful of local training contracts she can apply for each year. And she'll be competing against literally thousands of applicants for each role. In house is still extremely competitive and there are even fewer jobs available.

She doesn't mention whether she has the circa 25-30k it will cost her to go to law school and qualify as a non law graduate. I suspect she doesn't.

She then wants a job that is flexible. That's just a completely unrealistic expectation for a training contract.