Assist Loves our Law Students and our Lawyer Family!
This week, I had the pleasure of moderating a panel of distinguished lawyers at the University of Calgary law school who spoke candidly about overcoming mental health and addiction challenges while having a career that they each love. The panelists were amazing, and the students asked insightful questions. So, today, I want to share a few of our learnings from this panel with our blog readers who may have a law student in their lives—and perhaps some of these comments will be relevant to lawyers, too.
- Big Law is not the only desirable career option.
There is nothing wrong with working at large law firms, called Big Law, but it isn’t the only path to success in law. Some lawyers enjoy Big Law practice while others prefer other practice settings. Law students, however, are primarily exposed to Big Law firm names from their first visit to either of Alberta’s law schools where rooms are named after large firm donors, followed by welcome receptions hosted by Big Law firms. By osmosis, or something even more pervasive, students pick up the message that Big Law is the only place to be.
When I was a law student, classrooms and law school areas were numbered—the big classroom at the University of Alberta law school was just called room 231/237 (and don’t ask me why I remember it all these years later.) Firm names were not featured anywhere, and law firms did not host receptions or interact with students until hiring started for articling students after Christmas in second year. Things have changed a lot.
I worked in Big Law for about seven years, and I worked with some great lawyers and made long-term friends. I developed an excellent grounding in some of the areas of law I practiced, and that grounding served me well when I moved to corporate counsel life. I had some good experiences and I had some bad experiences, and all articling students and junior lawyers are going to have a mix of experiences. One practice setting is not superior—it all depends on who you are and what you like.
Articling students get different experiences depending on where they work. Articling students in small and mid-size firms may get more court time and conduct of small claims court or criminal matters, while articling students in large firms may work as the junior member of teams on major files and only see the inside of a courtroom when they are carrying exhibit binders (if those still exist.)
I’m talking about different law firm practices because this is the time of year that first year students at both law schools, along with law students from outside the province, are interviewing for summer student positions at law firms. It is primarily Big Law and mid-size firms who are hiring One L summer students, and many law students hope to land one of these coveted spots even if they aren’t sure they want to practice in a Big Law firm. The reality is that many Big Law and mid-size firms hire their articling students from their One L student pool, so getting selected for a One L position looks like the golden ticket—it doesn’t mean that you are guaranteed success at a major law firm, but it means that you are in the running.
I don’t know what percentage of Alberta One Ls land these positions, but I suspect that it is in the 25 to 30% range, which means that there are many students whose dreams of an easily obtained articling position in a prestige firm are dashed. Even students who aren’t sure that they want to work in Big Law are disappointed, as we want it to be our choice not to work in Big Law, and not someone else’s.
You can have a great career in Big Law, and you can have a great career without working in Big Law. If you are keen on Big Law and are not hired as a One L summer student, it hurts. But dust yourself off and remember that the formal articling recruitment will happen after second year, and focus on becoming the best candidate for the position you truly want.
So, if you are a first year student who is disappointed with the One L recruitment results, do not despair—you still have great options available. Please consider what you are looking for in your law career and approach the next recruitment cycle with confidence about who you are and how you want to practice law. Explore the CBA Mentorship program which matches law students with practicing lawyers so that student can learn more about different practice areas.
When you are hurting because you didn’t get chosen for what seems like the best opportunity for a made-in-the-shade career, it is cold comfort to be told to explore a broader range of options. But many students land Big Law jobs and realize it isn’t for them and they either leave or they try to reconstruct themselves so that they become what the firm wants, and this often results in unhappiness (to put it mildly) down the road. You can ask Assist to match you with a peer support volunteer with an alternative law practice and chat about how they got to where they are. You may find that you have both more, and better, options.
I would love to hold an alternative career fair for law students or practicing lawyers—you would be amazed by the types of careers lawyers develop apart from conventional law practice. And if you are interested in helping me organize this type of event at either or both law schools (if they will have us), please email me!
If your disappointment about the recruit result doesn’t fade in a few weeks and you notice changes to your mood and energy, please consider booking an appointment with an Assist counsellor. In first year law, rates of depression increase almost fourfold, so please be aware that low mood for a continuing period of time can be a symptom of depression. And, generally speaking, the earlier you begin treatment, the more quickly issues are resolved.
- Mental Health Awareness is Improving.
Law firms are increasingly aware of both mental health and neurodiversity challenges. I hear incredible stories about how firms are trying to accommodate and act inclusively. But there are also firms who may not have had much experience with these issues, and while on one hand we might think that smaller firms would be less bureaucratic and more flexible, this is not always true.
Our panel members this week talked about the fact that law is a business. As an articling student or associate, your job is to produce enough billing units to support the firm budget. The firm budget will include partner draws at a competitive level—if firms do not provide competitive compensation, partners can and do leave. So, please understand your role in the commercial aspects of law practice.
Most firms do not expect to make money from students in their early months of articles, but with training, they expect to be able to bill a reasonable portion of juniors’ time as the year progresses. While larger firms may be able to provide more extensive accommodations to diverse students before reaching the point of undue hardship (the human rights test), students must still be able to produce quality work in reasonable timeframes. I am particularly concerned about students with disabilities that cause them to need more time to complete tasks—please be aware of this reality. The professional and business communities cannot always allow more time. If your principal has a chambers application and, at 8 am, asks you to do a case law update before 9:30, there simply is not more time.
On Tuesday of this week, Assist hosted a webinar for law firm administrators titled “Neurodiversity and Law,” featuring Dr. Brian Forbes, the head of Assist’s counselling program. If you are interested in having Dr. Forbes deliver a presentation to your firm, please contact us. While presentations featuring Assist staff and volunteers are free, there is a fee for Dr. Forbes’ presentations.
If you are, or know, a student who is neurologically atypical or who experiences mental health challenges, please reach out to Assist to connect with either an experienced counsellor or a lawyer peer support volunteer who has had to develop or negotiate accommodations in their practice.
- It’s hard to talk about mental health with your employer.
Human resource experts will generally advise that you do not disclose a disability and required accommodations until after you are hired, and this is generally good advice. But in law we know that the answer is almost always “it depends,” and this is no exception. Some accommodations are easier to achieve than others, so if the accommodation you require is extensive, you may want to make a carefully designed disclosure at the time the position is offered and ask them to confirm if they can provide accommodation. This is because we hear horror stories from students who do not disclose their need for accommodation and when the firm cannot provide it (and there may be valid reasons why they cannot), the student is terminated. Being terminated from an articling position can have more adverse consequences including stigma than not getting hired in the first place.
You may want to talk to the Practice Advisors at the Law Society of Alberta if you are a student who needs accommodations in the workplace. The Practice Advisors are lawyers who provide confidential advice to lawyers and students, and they cannot disclose information to other departments of the Law Society except for likelihood of misappropriation or risk of physical harm to a person—see Rule 33.1 of the Rules of the Law Society
And if you are part of a law firm navigating disability and accommodations, remember that the Practice Advisors are there for you, too!
- Internationally Trained Lawyers Need Our Support.
Most law students worry about finding articling positions, but securing placements is even more challenging for internationally, or foreign, trained lawyers. Pursuing studies at a Canadian law school can improve employment prospects but the job-finding battle is still uphill.
Assist provides support to ITLs at our Red Mug Coffee Circles and through our peer support and professional counselling programs. CBA-Alberta provides mentorship through its mentorship program, and the Law Society offers Mentor Connect and Mentor Express. I also participate in the Foreign Trained Lawyers Think Tank organized by Dr. Kellinde Wrightson from the University of Calgary and work with the articling placement initiatives of the Calgary Regional Immigrant Economic Council which secured articling salary subsidies from the provincial government. While CRIEC is based in Calgary, articling subsidies are available regardless of where the student and firm are located.
I was impressed to learn that the Imperial Oil law department has been providing ITLs with articling students in conjunction with DLA Piper, creating what is known as a composite articles arrangement. It is initiatives like this, coming together to support ITLs, that will move the dial for ITLs.
Individual students can put together composite articles, arranging to have different principals and employers for a period of twelve months rather than just one, and organizations can come together to offer composite articles like Imperial Oil and DLA Piper have done. Composite articles can round out a student’s experience, better equipping them to practice law. You can learn more by visiting the Law Society’s webpage on composite articles.
Can your organization offer composite articles for ITLs? If you are a law firm, you might even connect with a desirable client to provide composite articles.
- Be True to Yourself
We didn’t have time to cover all of the questions in my moderator’s quiver, and the one that I regret not having time for was “What advice would your 2025 self provide to law school you?” But we chatted about this question in our planning phone call, and I am pretty sure that panelists would have said “to thine own self be true.” Our panelists talked about the fact that we are all different and want different things—this is how we are a great society—and we are happiest when we find the situation that works for us as individuals.
It sounds simple, but this piece of advice is deeper than it sounds.
- First, you have to know yourself.
- Secondly, you have to identify your personal wants and needs. Knowing your unique strengths, what you actually enjoy, and what you are interested in and care about deeply is important. I know how hard law can be if you are not enjoying the type of work you are doing, and your career becomes just a job, and a demanding one at that.
- And thirdly, you have to give yourself permission to forge your own path rather than following the path others are on. As corny as it sounds, I advocate revisiting your pre-law self and remembering why you went to law school. Don’t lose the internal motivation that brought you to the profession. Did you know that you are more resilient and happier when your values are in alignment with your employer’s? Law will toss curveballs at you, so resiliency is a survival skill.
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Are you interested in a panel discussion about mental health in our profession? We would love to offer this type of opportunity to anyone who is interested (and that includes the U of A law school!) We have many volunteers who can share what they learned both in the trenches as practicing lawyer and from learned writers. Just ask—we are here!
Loraine
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