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What might 2023 look like for in-house recruitment?
The director of G2 Legal spoke about what 2023 might look like for in-house legal recruitment.
Jess Feyder
The Corporate Counsel Show recently hosted Daniel Stirling, G2 Legal Australian director, where he discussed the past two years of recruitment for in-house lawyers and talked about what 2023 might hold.
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2021 and 2022 saw a busy market for in-house lawyers. There was strong demand across different levels: senior roles, mid-level and junior roles all saw strong recruitment, he maintained.
The past two years saw a shortage of talent alongside strong demand, “the volume of in-house roles in the market was much higher than [in] previous years,” explained Mr Stirling.
“At times, there was a really high volume of positions available across different levels and different sectors, above and beyond what I would have anticipated,” he commented, noting that the candidate shortage was stronger than what he would’ve guessed.
“The sheer volume of different positions on offer made it a competitive market,” he continued, this resulted in salary changes, and in-house lawyers were commonly offered higher pay.
The overall legal market saw a similar trend, with shortages of talent and salary hikes; this was reflected for in-house lawyers and “resulted in larger increases than normal”.
How might this trend show up in 2023, with a possible recession on the horizon?
A recession or financial downturn could result in less demand, and perhaps the talent shortage will be eased slightly, Mr Stirling noted.
Things might ease off slightly in the international market, which might result in more talent being available for domestic roles, he added.
“If there’s a deeper and longer recession, that might impact things negatively because there’d be less opportunities.
“However, what I’ve normally seen is that the in-house market tends to be quite resilient — it’s not common to see in-house teams reduced because, generally, everyone stays busy,” he maintained.
It may shift the type of work people are doing to some degree, but in-house lawyers usually deal with diverse work, he said.
During a recession, it may be particularly important for in-house teams to work at showing their value in the business, which can be difficult because it is sometimes seen as a cost rather than a revenue-generating aspect of the business.
Having a legal department is a big saving in its own right, and it’s important for the business to know that, he added.
