The War for Legal Talent
There has always been a fierce battle amongst legal firms and in-house legal teams to attract, hire, and retain the best lawyers in the market. The war for legal talent has been raging for decades, and if anything, right now it has intensified even further. Firms and companies are finding it extremely challenging to identify and then attract top quality legal talent.
What has become clear for those tasked with hiring lawyers is that the traditional methods are no longer working. In today’s competitive market, law firms and in-house legal teams have started to leverage technology to retain and attract top quality legal talent.
What is clear is that the war for legal talent requires a hiring strategy that is supported and enhanced by technology. In this article we’ll walk you through the key steps and what you need to do to stay ahead in the talent race using tech and a proactive recruitment strategy, to ensure you can win the race to attract top quality legal talent.
The Heart of the Law Firm
The fundamentals of a successful business remain unchanged: law firms need the best people, systems, and processes. As practice managers and HR professionals, it’s your responsibility to ensure your firm operates effectively and efficiently. Firms that excel in these areas attract the best clients, who, in turn, refer new clients due to their positive experiences.
At the core of every successful law firm are the lawyers providing services to clients. While technology enhances efficiency, the key differentiator between firms is the legal talent they hire. However, recruiting and retaining the right talent is increasingly challenging in today’s market. This is why firms are now using technology to take greater control of their recruitment processes, so they can effectively attract top quality legal talent.
The Current Legal Talent Landscape
The pandemic, the Great Resignation, and near-record inflation have created an unprecedented talent shortage. The war for legal talent has never been more intense, especially in the legal sector itself. Firms are paying significant sums to attract talent, but there simply isn’t enough quality talent available. The recent NZ ALPMA salary survey advised firms are offering 10-20% salary increases to attract and win talent when hiring reactively. Paying a 20% premium on each new hire will have a huge impact on a firm’s recruitment budget, and may also create pay parity issues when offering starting salaries that aren’t commensurate with the market.
According to the Beacon Legal Australian Private Practice 2024/2025 Salary and Market Report, the average starting salary in mid-tier law firms for a lawyer with 2 years PAE is now $105,000 across all major Australian states. These findings are mirrored on this side of the Tasman, as evidenced in our summary of the recent New Zealand Law Society and KPMG survey.
Relying on recruiters to fill vacancies costs Australian mid-tier law firms upwards of 20% of the new lawyer’s starting salary. It is therefore costing law firms $21,000 to hire a lawyer with 2 years PAE based on the average starting salary of $105,000. Whether you are above or below the average, one thing’s for sure, law firms are spending an astonishing amount of money when relying on recruitment agencies to win the war for legal talent.
Top performers are the most valued legal talent in any firm, and they are typically not actively seeking new opportunities. They aren’t on marketplace apps, announcing their availability on LinkedIn, or responding to job ads. They usually move only when the timing aligns with their personal and professional goals. To attract this top quality legal talent, firms must apply a proactive approach when hiring.
Proactive Recruitment Strategy
Leading law firms have realised that to win the war for legal talent, they must proactively build relationships with potential hires. It’s no longer sufficient to recruit only when there’s a vacancy. Firms are shifting to a proactive recruitment strategy enabled by technology, which helps them secure and attract top quality legal talent.
By adopting this approach, firms can identify and target the best lawyers well ahead of needing to hire. They can learn about a lawyer’s interest in future opportunities, gain deeper insights into their expertise, goals, and timeframe for a move, and ensure they are a good cultural fit. This strategy not only allows firms to be more selective but also enables them to hire talent immediately when the need arises.
Benefits of a Proactive Approach
A proactive recruitment strategy offers several benefits:
- Targeted Hiring: Firms can be more selective about the talent they hire.
- Cultural Fit: Identifying lawyers who align with the firm’s culture improves retention.
- Reduced Time to Hire: Knowing a candidate’s interest and timeframe for a move allows for quicker hiring decisions.
How to Attract Top quality legal talent – Six Step Process
The formula for taking control of your recruitment and winning the war for legal talent is shown and outlined below:
1. Develop an attractive employee value proposition
Understand why your lawyers are attracted to work at your firm and why they want to stay working at the firm. The best messaging to future lawyers is the messages that come from a firm’s existing lawyers.
2. Retain your best and most valued lawyers at all costs
Winning the war for legal talent starts at home. You must first and foremost fight for the hearts of your existing staff before you can win the hearts of potential talent. 90% of employer branding should be about current employees. Most firms focus their efforts on external talent at the risk of losing some of their best people. To attract great legal talent, it’s important to treat your existing people well because if you treat your people right, they will remain employed at your firm and will bring in more right people.
3. Leverage your warm connections
Your people know other great people. Encourage and incentivise your existing lawyers to connect you with lawyers they know and have worked with in the past. Imagine how much more compelling a recommendation about your firm is from a lawyer who is known and respected. It is always preferable to hire someone you know something about over someone you know nothing about.
4. Build and maintain a qualified talent pipeline
A pipeline can be built with minimal effort. For example, one of your lawyers might recommend someone to you they know or have worked with on the other side of a deal, or perhaps you meet a great lawyer at a legal conference or a law awards dinner. Maybe you approached a lawyer about a live vacancy, and they advised the timing isn’t right for a move now, but they would be open to staying in touch about future opportunities. Or perhaps you connected with Australian and New Zealand lawyers working overseas to learn their timeframes for a return home, or maybe you have reconnected with your alumni. All of these channels will help you build your legal talent pipeline.
5. Invest in the right people to proactively build relationships with your future talent
Firms that want to shift to a proactive recruitment strategy will need to invest in people with the right skillset to develop and nurture relationships with your future talent. To attract top quality legal talent, you need the right people to reach out and build positive conversations with them. Having someone proactively building relationships with your future talent will place your firm at the front of the queue for the best legal talent when there is a future hiring need.
6. Adopt and use the best recruitment technology
Hiring employees is hard but it is even harder when you don’t have the right tools. Equip your teams with the best recruitment technology and streamline your recruitment process. Creating efficiencies in the recruitment process using tech will reduce time-consuming activities such as manually updating a talent market map, which is never-ending given the fluidity of the talent movement in the legal sector. Give your team the tools that can directly show them the comprehensive talent pool in seconds. Yes, these tools do exist! Given recruitment is one of the biggest challenges and costs for all law firms globally, firms cannot afford not to invest in tech. You can find out more about our legal recruitment technology here.
How to win the war for legal talent using technology
In conclusion, there are huge time and cost savings to be made in your battle to attract top quality legal talent by moving the process in-house and leveraging technology.
Those law firms that leverage technology and adopt a proactive recruitment strategy are better positioned to win the war for talent. It’s something we are seeing in the market, and firms are using, as shown in the video below, where Olivia Holmes, Chief People Office at Macpherson Kelley shares her experience of working with Insource to win the war for legal talent.
By building relationships with potential hires and understanding their aspirations, firms can ensure they attract and retain the best legal talent in the market. Leveraging technology makes it easier to find and attract top quality legal talent, and crucially it enables you to understand who, within your firm, already knows them or can easily contact them from within their existing network.
