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Firms to up the ante on staff retention strategies
A new survey has found the majority of law firms are placing added emphasis on employee attraction and retention strategies, with salaries increasing for most roles across Australia’s legal industry.
Emma Musgrave
According to the ‘2019 ALPMA Australian Legal Industry Salary & HR Issues Survey’, 53 per cent of law firms expect to grow in staff numbers this year, in comparison with 42 per cent in 2018.
“In relation to salaries, it is particularly good news for those working in West Australia law firms with 25-74 staff seeing the highest salaries,” said Emma Elliott, General Manager, ALPMA.
“This might be an attraction and retention strategy that WA firms are having to use given their location.
“... Given the shortage of top talent in the legal industry, focusing efforts on retaining current staff always makes commercial sense,” said Ms Elliott, “I’d also urge law firms to have quite a robust training (or retraining) program in place to equip their lawyers with the skillset they need in the future.”
In addition to increasing salaries, the survey found 32 per cent of law firms in Australia have paid parental leave entitlements “over and above government schemes to the primary care giver”, with the most common time period provided between 11 to 14 weeks. Forty-eight per cent provide paid parental leave in excess of 11 weeks, it said, adding that 21 per cent of respondent law firms also provide additional parental leave to non-primary care givers, with most of these providing one or two weeks.
“Given the proportion of females within the legal industry I’m surprised by the lack of paid parental leave policies in place at Australian law firms, that go over and above government entitlements,” Ms Elliott said.
“This is a clear attraction and recruitment strategy that is being overlooked by 68 per cent of firms. This could easily set firms apart and give them a competitive edge in the war on talent.”
Emma Musgrave
Emma Musgrave (née Ryan) is the managing editor, professional services at Momentum Media.
Emma has worked for Momentum Media since 2015, including five years spent as the editor of the company's legal brand - Lawyers Weekly. Throughout her time at Momentum, she has been responsible for breaking some of the biggest stories in corporate Australia. In addition, she has produced exclusive multimedia and event content related to the company's respective brands and audiences.
Prior to joining Momentum Media, Emma worked in breakfast radio, delivering news to the Central West region of NSW, before taking on a radio journalist role at Southern Cross Austereo, based in Townsville, North Queensland.
She holds a Bachelor of Communications (Journalism) degree from Charles Sturt University.
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