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‘Young lawyers are leaders of today as much as they are leaders of tomorrow’
One solicitor and CEO of a charity discusses the role young lawyers play as agents of change, the renewed sense of worth felt by young lawyers, and gives advice for career beginnings.
Jess Feyder
Recently on the Protégé Podcast, host Jerome Doraisamy spoke with Taylah Spirovski, solicitor at HWL Ebsworth and chief executive of Voices of Influence Australia.
The purpose of the organisation is to assist in the promotion and protection of human rights with an emphasis on empowering and educating young people as agents of change.
The organisation “reconceptualises young people as solutions to existing problems, and then creates spaces and opportunities to enable young people’s advocacy, participation, and leadership in public discussion and decision making concerning human rights at a higher level,” Ms Spirovski outlined.
“In my opinion,” she said, “young lawyers, much like any lawyers, are advocates and agents of change, and they’re leaders of today as much as they’re leaders of tomorrow”.
Ms Spirovski also noted that it is a lawyer’s duty to do community advocacy.
Ms Spirovski also discussed the renewed sense of worth embodied by young lawyers.
“In terms of the changing landscape and the impending doom of the economy and everything else, I think that young lawyers have a little bit more bargaining power,” Ms Spirovski outlined.
Ms Spirovski highlighted that the difficulty many young lawyers face at the beginning of their career is not tolerated in the same way it used to be.
“There is a mass resignation in a lot of firms, and I think a lot of young people are entering their careers and the profession with a very good idea of what a healthy work/life balance looks like with a very good idea of their worth,” she noted.
“There is this renewed sense of worth as a young lawyer, and often I dare say, they’re cottoning onto the fact that especially the big firms don’t want to lose you.
“If your train’s late, and you’re arriving at quarter past nine, no one’s going to say anything — as long as you’re trying to do your best work.”
“There’s so much lateral movement, especially in the first three years of practice, often you’ll find that even despite being relatively happy at firms, people do move on at the two-to-three-year mark,” she highlighted.
“This generation prefers to move and want change and to grow in different environments — I think if the environment that you’re in is no longer serving you, well, it’s time to move on.”
Ms Spirovski commented that while movement and change are helpful, it is also important to try to change one’s own workplace if there is an issue.
“I would definitely encourage you to bring that conversation forward.
“I feel as though what I’ve seen amongst some of my colleagues and peers is that they assume that a conversation about their needs and a change in working style or workload or supervision, that conversation is never going to go their way,” she said.
“They present a resignation letter instead because they think it’s an uphill battle.
“But you’ll find that a lot of senior lawyers are actually open to having conversations about what you need to thrive in your environment,” Ms Spirovski said. “I would encourage you to bring that conversation forward.”
“Whenever I feel like I want something more out of work, I bring that to someone, and something is usually done about it,” she illuminated.
“You need to have a little bit of courage to bring that forward, and you’d be very surprised at how it might work out for you.”
Ms Spirovski gave advice to young lawyers about the mindset and attitudes to adopt in any vein of law.
“I would encourage people to see the human aspect of everything that they do,” she said.
“It does not matter which area of law you are in. You are always dealing with people. This is a people-based profession — a profession built on relationships and interactions with other people.
“Whether you’re doing tax law, commercial law, or you’re at a community legal centre doing victim’s compensation, you should still be empathetic and trauma-informed and kind.
“I implore everyone to see their jobs through that lens because it really doesn’t matter what you do; you’re always interacting with people, and the way that you show up in these spaces is going to leave a lasting mark on these people whether or not you intend it to.”
