Transcript:

Hello, this is Andrew Murdoch from Dovetail Legal Solutions. With a August 2024 in-house legal job market update. There are three main takeaways.

The first takeaway is that although the job market has been softening over the past 12 months and there are now 15% fewer job ads than what there were 12 months ago. This has to be taken into a broader context, and that it’s coming off a very large high post-COVID, the job ad rate and indeed the unemployment rate are still better than what they were pre-COVID. Additionally, we’ve historically seen the months between September and December as the busiest time of the year for us. We typically almost place twice as many people in that period as what we do during the beginning of the year.

The second takeaway is that there are almost twice the number of in-house lawyers with more than 6 years experience looking to leave their job now than what there were 12 months ago. That rate has risen from around 15% to 30% in the last 12 months. Some of that can be put down to people looking to move jobs for a higher salary, to compensate for increased, living cost expenses.

The third takeaway is that while there’s been an increase in lawyers with more than 6 years experience looking to change jobs, there has been a decrease in active candidates. Active candidates are those candidates that look on job sites like LinkedIn and Seek and are applying for jobs and really actively pushing out there through the market. Passive candidates are ones that would like to change jobs, but are really waiting to be contacted about those roles. They’re the passive candidates. I liken this to, a donut. Would I like a donut? Yes. Am I prepared to leave the office, go down to find a café, buy a donut, and come back to the office and eat it? Perhaps not. But if that doughnut was put to me, on a plate in front of me, would I eat that? Gladly.

If you have any queries or would like to know more about the job market or about resourcing a lawyer for your team, please give us a call at Dovetail Legal Solutions. Thank you.

Transcript:

Hi. This is Andrew Murdoch from Dovetail Legal Solutions with a May 2024 In-house Legal Job Market Update. I have three main takeaways.

The first takeaway is that the job market, after a subdued start, seems to have picked up and found a nice rhythm, with jobs continuously coming through. Just bear in mind, however, that typically, July is the quietest month in the recruitment year, and that it is much quieter than January or December.

The second takeaway is that the market seems to be performing equally across Australia.

Last year, we crunched some numbers to find out how many in-house lawyers were in each state, and we found there are fifty-two per cent of in-house lawyers in Sydney, twenty-six per cent of in-house lawyers in Melbourne, twelve per cent in Brisbane, and six per cent in Perth. And the number of jobs since the beginning of the year or the jobs advertised mirror those percentages almost identically so that for every one job there is in Perth, there are two in Brisbane, four in Melbourne, and eight in Sydney.

The third takeaway is that the interim market is outperforming the permanent market. I suspect that’s because businesses are looking for greater flexibility to scale up or scale down depending on which way the economy goes. If you have any further queries regarding any of this or comments, please feel free to give me a call at Dovetail Legal Solutions.