With the rise of contract-lawyer offerings in Asia, legal professionals across the region are finding that they have an additional career path beyond a conventional law firm or an in-house role. As these organisations offer lawyers varied working experiences and a sense of control over their working lives, it is no surprise that the life of a flexible lawyer is being seen as increasingly attractive. 

Following a stint at a law firm, Alex de Miranda came to the realisation that working for a traditional legal practice was not for him, and he started looking for alternatives. It was at that point that he found Axiom. De Miranda, who has now been with Axiom for close to 10 years, describes the moment he decided to join the NewLaw firm as “a happy accident.” “I was lucky that I came into Axiom right when they were starting in London, and I’ve been with them ever since,” he says.

Currently, de Miranda is working on a project in Hong Kong at a large multinational investment bank, but wherever he works, he is “basically embedded in the business.”

“So that’s the biggest difference from private practice. It’s a bit like being in-house, but on a slightly different path,” he explains.

Now, despite having had several clients offer him the opportunity to come in-house permanently, the ability to choose the types of assignments he wants to take on, or decide when he wants to take a break has meant de Miranda, who enjoys outdoor pursuits in his off-time, has never made the leap. “That flexibility is hard to beat,” he says.

There is an increasing number of like-minded professionals who agree. Tiffany Lee, a qualified solicitor and consultant with Peerpoint – a global platform operated by Allen & Overy previously worked in both private practice and in-house roles in Hong Kong. She was drawn to Peerpoint in search of a better work-life balance. Now, contracting for an ALSP has enabled her to pursue her personal interests -- such as studying the Japanese language.

“With a more flexible working structure, I have also had more time to travel and explore Japanese culture, which has provided me with a valuable opportunity that, most likely, would not have been possible within a permanent role,” she says.

Meanwhile, for Singapore-based Rachel Wright, who began her career as a lawyer with Lawyers On Demand in 2011 and now works internally within LOD’s HQ Team as Legal Director for Asia, the need to spend more time with her young family was a driving factor behind seeking a less traditional working environment.

Wright clicked with the LOD team, liked the business model (“which was very novel at the time”) and has not looked back since, she says.

 “I have realised since being at LOD that a real benefit of this model is that your flexible working arrangements can change each time you start a new secondment to suit your situation at that time,” Wright says. “For example, when my children were younger I wanted to work short days but now they are older and at school all day, I am able to work full days but want more flexibility to take time off during the school holidays. It can be harder to change flexible working arrangements when working in a permanent role.”

GRADUALLY CATCHING ON

Over time, the legal markets in Hong Kong and Singapore have gained a more nuanced understanding of the services NewLaw firms provide, as well as the advantages of working with them, but that was not always the case. While clients and businesses now grasp the concept of flexible lawyers, there was some confusion in the early days, recalls de Miranda.

“Especially before the model was well-known, Occasionally, someone would use the ‘t’ word: temp. Everyone within Axiom would hit the roof and say ‘no!’” he laughs.

“This is not low-level temp work. This is usually work arising a client’s very specific need, where they need someone who has the same calibre as a lawyer with a large firm. Basically, we are the kinds of lawyers the client would like to hire,” de Miranda says.

“The other thing that people don’t understand is how I can be a lawyer and take time off, and at the same time earn a salary,” he adds. “So many lawyers have no idea how this stuff works, or how somebody could be making a living and actually earn your usual lawyer’s salary. It’s pretty cool, and I’m pretty happy with it.”

Carolyn Aldous, Peerpoint’s managing director for APAC, agrees that NewLaw is now viewed as a mainstream career option for many lawyers. “From trainee up to the partner level and among both men and women alike, there is a similar shift in motivations, aspirations, and concerns around careers, with work-life balance being the resounding example of this.”

“Platforms like Peerpoint are all about offering people a different way to find a purpose in their professional lives,” she adds. “Consultants have the ability to take control over their career and make choices around the types of work they do, while continuing to expand their skillset by undertaking projects that may have otherwise been unavailable to them in a more traditional employment setting.”

Lesley Hobbs, who was previously with Lawyers On Demand, is now the CEO and co-founder of contract lawyer service Cognatio Law. From her perspective, a key reason lawyers gravitate towards NewLaw is to have more of a say in their professional lives.

“The ability to choose your working hours and clients, step away from permanent employee status and yet still earn a competitive salary are huge draws for an increasing number of lawyers particularly those working in major global financial centres such as Hong Kong, Singapore, London and New York,” Hobbs says.

“In short, it gives the consultants more control over their careers. They can work when and how they want.”

As NewLaw firms continue to become more mainstream, lawyers contemplating making the switch should be aware that the work requires skills in certain areas: “The quality of work and clients will be high, but lawyers in particular need to be comfortable with working as a consultant and not being given management or decision-making responsibilities,” says Hobbs. “Flexibility is also key because the consultant could be seconded to between one to three companies in a calendar year and will need to adapt very quickly to each client’s working cultures. They may also have to cope with leaner resources in terms of the client’s personnel, legal knowhow, immediate access to templates, etc.”

NO COMPROMISE

So, does this better work-life balance and increased family time mean career compromise? Not so, say those who consult for NewLaw firms. Lee considers professional growth a key advantage of her new working arrangement. Because Peerpoint works with “high-calibre, international clients,” she says she always has access to challenging, top-tier work. “It also presents opportunities for me to work outside of litigation and investigations,” she says.

“My career is different in the sense that I have a relatively flexible work schedule and have better control over the split between my professional career and personal life. I am also able to make use of my experience to develop on new roles.”

Wright adds that for those looking to be a partner in a traditional law firm, “working for an ALSP may not help them achieve that goal.” However, for those who endeavour to work across a range of different industries and gain exposure to new areas of law which may not be open to them if they were looking for a permanent role, the arrangement works well.

“This can then open the door for them further down the line if they do decide to look for a permanent role as they may then have the required industry experience. We have had a number of lawyers work for LOD who have transformed themselves into different types of lawyers, for example, litigators into TMT lawyers, and finance lawyers into general commercial lawyers, and this career option may not have been open to them if they had continued working in a traditional firm.”

De Miranda, whose career trajectory may be different from that of a lawyer with a traditional firm, suggests the stereotypical career path is not what it once was.

“I don’t have the typical path of associate to senior associate to partner for instance. To be fair, I think very few people, even in law firms, have that anymore. When I started the partnership track was seven years, now it is close to ten. So, everyone’s career path changed over the past few years.”

Nevertheless, he says his work has grown more sophisticated as time has gone on. Working for NewLaw firm has “changed the timing of things, but not the progression itself necessarily”.

For those who work for contract-lawyer firms and enjoy it, taking the less well-worn route and travelling a more eclectic path to seniority is worth it.

Working at a traditional firm, de Miranda always saw room in his work for flexibility but remained hampered by traditional firm thinking, the change has been nothing short of revolutionary.

“Just to give you an example: I started as an M&A lawyer, so there was really no reason I couldn’t pick up a transaction, see it through, and then tell my partners, ‘hey, can I take a little break here and go do this other thing.’” 

“It couldn’t be done because the model was always: ‘No, we need the spare capacity because if another transaction rolls in, you’re going to have to be here,” says de Miranda. “Whereas Axiom looks at it differently. Deals are always coming in, and we have a bench of people that we are able to activate. I think part of the DNA that’s a little bit different is that we’re willing to look at the employer or resources in a more intelligent way.”

And in the meantime, de Miranda is also able to take time off work, explore his passions and avoid the dreaded burnout that many lawyers working in traditional firms face.

De Miranda predicts that NewLaw will become more popular in the future, although “it might take a little while”.

“I think as we, the ‘eccentrics’ become increasingly prevalent and start talking to people, it will become more common and then began to expand the realm of possibilities you can do as a lawyer. I do see a movement in that direction, he says. “In some parts of the industry it is going to be almost impossible to change; in others, I think it’s just a matter of getting fully comfortable with taking the risks and giving more flexibility to our attorneys so that they can stay with us longer and this is what made me stay.”

But while there may be a cultural shift towards flexible working and NewLaw firms, geographically, progress is slow. The Hong Kong and Singapore legal communities may be comfortable with the concept of ALSPs, but expansion beyond these markets is yet to be fully tested, notes Hobbs of Cognatio.

“The question then becomes when and whether this flexible working model can genuinely take hold in other Asian jurisdictions such as Japan and China, which have tighter labour law regimes than Hong Kong and Singapore,” she says. “There are certainly opportunities on the client side, but the reality is that none of the established NewLaw firms has opened offices in either jurisdiction despite having operated in both Hong Kong and Singapore since 2011.”

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