How to relax when you can't switch off
If you're like me, when it's time to go on holiday, you're absolutely guaranteed to face a huge influx of work in the weeks leading up to it. As a self-employed solicitor, I am of course grateful and happy to receive work. Just… not right now! I usually end up turning work away the week before because I know I won't get through it all. And then trying to finish on time whilst also finding time to pack for a family of four feels like Indiana Jones sliding through the gap before the giant rock rolls and closes the entrance shut. Every year we end up setting off to Dorset a good two to four hours later than we'd planned, because I can't finish work on time, no matter how hard I try.
You’re not the only one who hates marketing yourself
At our recent FLC masterclass on marketing yourself as a female lawyer, "blowing your own trumpet", with Rachel Brushfield, founder of EnergiseLegal, she asked us a simple question partway through: what do you most dislike about marketing yourself? A few people answered in the chat box, and said much the same thing, just in different words.
I thought I was the only one
"I quoted lower, but I could have quoted higher. Why did I never learn?" (said by a senior lawyer at a Female Lawyers' Club fees and billing session)
For years, saying my fees out loud made me want to apologise mid-sentence. I'd say the number and immediately look for ways to make it sound better, or justify it. I assumed this was a personal failing, something everyone else had grown out of.
It turns out it wasn't just me at all.
Nobody asked me why I was leaving
Nobody asked me why I was leaving.
Colleagues asked, plenty of them, out of real curiosity. But across six different law firms, over more than twenty years, after I’d announced I was leaving each firm, nobody ever sat me down properly - not once.
We already know women leave this profession in numbers that should worry every firm. Around a third of female solicitors leave between five and ten years after qualifying, and don't come back (Law Society, 2022). Women make up the majority of solicitors and a fraction of equity partners. None of that is news to anyone reading this.
The feedback you got wasn't about you. Here's the research that proves it.
A few weeks ago, I was running a leadership session for a law firm’s women’s network. Around 109 people joined, which was already impressive, but what really stood out was that around 20 of them were men.
At the start of the session, I put a question up on screen and asked everyone to answer it in the chat. The question was:
"Have you ever been penalised for being assertive, direct, ambitious, independent or confident - traits often praised in men but questioned in women?"