In accordance with the multistep plan outlined by the federal government, states and territories across the country are beginning to incrementally ease restrictions imposed to flatten the national curve. But while Australia is – hopefully – past the worst of COVID-19, it remains incumbent upon lawyers to continually ensure the security and longevity of their employment status.

As Carly Stebbing puts it: “The fight continues”.

Job security for a post-pandemic world

According to Ms Stebbing – who is the founder and principal of Sydney-based employment law firm Resolution123 – the easing of restrictions shouldn’t mean that legal employees become complacent about their positions and financial security.

“We know that unemployment is set to continue to rise as job advertisements continue to fall. Lawyers aren’t immune to the general economic climate,” she posited.

“[Our firm is] getting an increasing number of lawyer clients seeking advice on their rights at work, asking whether they can decline a pay cut, whether they can decline a direction to take annual leave, challenging dismissals where it appears the employer has created sham performance concerns to avoid paying redundancy and where the lawyer has been made redundant without prior notice, consultation or the opportunity for redeployment.”

As a result, Ms Stebbing noted, lawyers “will be under more pressure than ever to reach their billable hours or face performance management, bonuses won’t be forthcoming and pay rises will almost certainly freeze, as we saw during the GFC”.

VIEW ALL

Law on Lydiard principal Paul Cott agreed that lawyers are not necessarily out of the woods yet – assuming they have managed to stave off redundancy or cuts thus far – but added that the “whole landscape” must be considered through a different lens at this point in time.

“At this stage it is arguably even more imperative that ‘the fight’ continue in earnest as there is now arguably even more uncertainty in how things are going to pan out in a post-pandemic world,” said Mr Cott, whose firm is based in Melbourne.

“We are obviously, as has been said so often in the past few months, living in unprecedented times!”

Checklist for individual entitlements and fiscal safety

Almost two months ago, Ms Stebbing and Mr Cott outlined five key items that legal employees would have to keep an eye on during the pandemic, so as to be “armed with a fuller picture of all relevant considerations” pertaining to potential impacts on their roles.

Those five items were: superannuation, leave entitlements, salary continuance, other entitlements and general financial situation.

“Information is king,” Ms Stebbing mused at the time.

As to the suite of an employee’s entitlements, Mr Cott said, it is “arguably even more crucial to communicate openly and transparently” with one’s employer so as to ensure the security of such payments.

“This obviously dovetails into an employee’s general financial situation both in an immediate sense but also in a long-term sense. I am obviously no medical expert but word has it there is always a possibility of a second-wave infection, which may well be worse than the first one and it would then be all the more crucial that an employee is well set up if that was to occur,” he said.

Looking back on the listing of those items, Ms Stebbing said that lawyers must continue to be on top of their super and whether or not it is being paid by one’s employer.

“There is an ability to access your super early if you need it for economic hardship, while not a personal choice it might be necessary for lawyers facing protracted periods of unemployment. If you are employed understand your current employment entitlements and what they are on termination,” she advised.

“How much notice do you get under your contract or the National Employment Standards? Are you entitled to redundancy? (boutique firms with less than 15 employees are exempt). Employers are having some success having the requirement to pay redundancy waived or reduced before the Fair Work Commission for financial hardship, so you may not be able to count on that.

“If you don’t know the answers to these questions, get advice. There is no shame in that, we aren’t all employment lawyers. The best lawyers know what they do know and outsource what they don’t.”

Lessons to be learned

Ensuring one is getting their dues is of course paramount, but – perhaps more importantly – legal employees need to keep being indispensable to an employer.

“You must be a value-add. It’s not good enough to be a good biller,” Ms Stebbing argued.

“You need to have valuable client connections, be prepared to have skin in the game, roll up your sleeves, do business development, do marketing activities. Get across the ever-evolving legislative landscape quickly. Be clear about your performance objectives and raise concerns about your ability to meet them quickly, don’t wait for them to be raised with you.

“Be flexible, consider temporary pay cuts, reductions in hours and taking accrued leave to avoid redundancy. Enquire about your employer’s eligibility for JobKeeper and be aware, if the employer is eligible it can also issue JobKeeper directions you must reasonably comply with. Skill up, look to the future of law (the Law Society’s FLIP Report is a good place to start).

“Don’t keep doing the same thing, this is not business as usual and it might not ever return to ‘normal’, be prepared for what the future looks like in your practice area and embrace it. Those lawyers will be safe.”

Similarly, for Mr Cott, the lessons to be learned about securing one’s employment and financial security also lie in being cognisant of what the “new normal” might look like.

“The lessons lawyers can or should learn from this situation are that arguably in this changed environment, new ways of doing things may emerge which may be for the betterment of many aspects of our lives. Employee lawyers should embrace this and see the positives in it whilst always considering (not at the expense of care for others obviously) how we may benefit from the new normal,” he reflected.

“Open, honest, transparent communication is key, not only in the employer/employee sphere but far more generally throughout.”

To share how COVID-19 has impacted you and your business, please complete this anonymous, two-minute survey here. For more information, please contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.