more on flexible work for lawyers
Earlier this week I attended another meeting of Flex-Time Lawyers LLC, the subject of this prior post. In my Web meanderings I also happened upon this article on building work-life balance through “flexible work options.” The piece confirms information I’ve conveyed before. Although many lawyers like the idea of flexible work arrangements and an increasing number of firms are offering such opportunities, relatively few practitioners are exercising the option. Indeed, a 2003 survey by the National Association of Law Placement (NALP) showed that the “proportion of attorneys actually working part time [] was only 4.1 percent. That compares to 13 percent in 2002 in other professions, such as engineering and medicine, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.” According to the piece, among other reasons, lawyers shun flex time work for fear of: receiving less challenging assignments; being slowed on or even removed from the partnership track; or becoming victims of -schedule creep, "in which [they] end up working full-time hours for part-time pay.”
