Work/Life Boundaries for In-House Lawyers
7 practical tips for part-time in-house lawyers to establish healthy work/life boundaries.
05th Oct 2022
Andrew Murdoch
Managing Director
Work/Life Boundaries
7 practical tips for part-time in-house lawyers to establish healthy work/life boundaries.
Effectively managing work-life boundaries can not only reduce work-life conflicts but can also enhance mental and physical health. In an increasingly boundaryless world, with work and nonwork roles overlapping it’s important to find ways to create healthy and sustainable boundaries. This is particularly so for Part-Time lawyers.
Lawyers are embracing part-time working; last year 16% of lawyers worked part time, a figure I expect to increase.
Anecdotally, there are three times as many 4 day-a-week inhouse legal roles than 3 days a week and less. I suspect many organisations try to fit a 5-day job into 4 days.
Which is why boundaries are important for part-time workers!
Some Practical Tips
- Set expectations in the interview and include boundaries in your employment contract. It’s much easier to set boundaries earlier but harder to create them retrospectively
- Schedule workdays. Set hours per week may be harder to manage i.e. 30 hours per week
- E-mail signature, list the days you do, and don’t work
- Set your out-of-office on the days you don’t work
- Block out your diary on days you don’t work so meetings can’t be entered
- Separate work phone with a voicemail advising which days you do work
- And this is the most important one …. be firm. Don’t rely on the company to set or maintain the boundaries, it’s up to you
I would love to hear any further tips you have!
in/andrewmurdochdovetail
Feel free to get in touch to hear about full-time/part-time roles and career advice!
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