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The legal profession is undergoing significant change, creating new challenges for boutique firms when it comes to hiring and retaining talent.
On a recent episode of The Lawyers Weekly Show, Mark Lazarus, director of Lazarus Legal, discussed how smaller firms can compete for skilled lawyers in an increasingly competitive market.
Lazarus explored the importance of culture, autonomy, meaningful work, and adaptability, while also examining how artificial intelligence is reshaping recruitment and the development of junior lawyers.
Along with this, Lazarus discussed the risks AI presents to the profession’s future talent pipeline and the need for firms to adapt.
Lazarus highlighted how difficult it can be for smaller firms to attract and retain the right talent, arguing that experience, adaptability, and cultural fit can be more valuable than traditional academic achievements.
“I’m not so concerned about grades or CVs as I am about life experience and the ability to adapt in what is a very changing world with AI and everything else that comes along,” Lazarus said.
“Finding the right people is challenging, and finding people [who] are motivated and want to be in a smaller or a boutique firm and really get hands-on.
“It’s finding that solid person or people [who] want to build and grow with your firm and have the same vision in mind that is quite challenging.”
Retention is another major concern, with Lazarus emphasising that lawyers are more likely to stay when they have meaningful work, opportunities to develop and a sense of ownership.
“I think people leave small law firms for maybe four reasons: there’s no visible path, there’s no training, a principal who keeps all the good work to themselves, and pays that falls behind after, say, the second or third year,” he said.
“Good people stay for one reason, and that is the work is better than they would get anywhere else at their level.”
“Money buys you six months, ownership of matters buys you a good two to three years.”
AI is creating another major shift for law firms, changing not only how legal work is performed but also what firms look for when hiring.
Much like other lawyers’ opinions, Lazarus argued that while AI can improve efficiency and reduce the need for some routine tasks, it cannot replace the human judgement, emotional intelligence, and experience that remain central to the law profession.
Simultaneously, firms face the difficult balancing act of embracing AI without undermining the development of junior lawyers who will ultimately become the profession’s next generation of senior practitioners.
“If you’re a small or medium firm and you’re not adopting AI in your practice, in any aspect of business, then you’re going to fall behind,” Lazarus said.
“What AI cannot do is replace emotion, but what it can do is speed up efficiency.
“Somebody like myself, [who] is 20 years experienced and has worn so many hats across the profession, can use AI and can see where to challenge it, where it’s wrong, where it can potentially hallucinate, whereas a junior might not have that experience and might rely on AI to their detriment.
“The biggest problem with AI ... is that if you stop hiring juniors because you can replace them with AI, then eventually there won’t be any seniors to hire because no juniors have come.
“AI is getting more and more powerful every single day, and if I [were] to write a book on using AI in the legal profession, I think by the time I finished it, I’d have to start it again because it would be obsolete.
“Any junior has some level of experience using AI because if they don’t, then they’re kind of coming into the firm as a dinosaur.”
