Both mature-age law students and undergraduates face unique challenges on their path to becoming lawyers, with flexible working arrangements, gaining working experience and wanting to work for firms with inclusive policies and a supportive culture being key themes among law graduates, according to the College of Law.

According to the most recent Graduate Outcomes Survey (GOS) conducted by the government, 84.5 per cent of the College of Law’s 2023 graduates are in full-time legal employment – something the college noted was a positive result overall despite the various hurdles practical legal training (PLT) students face at a graduate level.

In conversation with Lawyers Weekly, College of Law customer insights senior manager Beth McVicker-Murphy and national career strategists Ruth Beran and Susan Pincus discussed the current state of the employment market for legal graduates and what they want from employers.

A number of universal themes and challenges have arisen over the last year for both undergraduates and, later, lawyers.

“There are job market pressures with higher competition for entry-level roles. The selection criteria and process for gaining an entry-level role appear to be getting more and more selective. This includes roles in top-tier law firms, government and in-house,” Pincus said.

“Securing their first role in law, getting their foot in the door, can be difficult, especially for graduates if they have financial commitments and can’t do unpaid work experience. On top of this, cost of living is having an impact.”

More legal graduates also now want to work for firms that not only exhibit inclusive policies and a respectful culture but are also prepared to invest in a lawyer’s career.

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“Undergrads can be very discerning about what is important to them in their employment and will demand this from their employer,” Beran said.

“They are a lot more discerning in terms of company culture, social responsibility, hours, flexibility like working from home, opportunities for career development, mentoring and work/life balance. Adequate training and supervision are also highly prized, so they don’t feel they are thrown into the deep end.”

Recently, McVicker-Murphy conducted a national listening summit, talking with university law students across Australia looking at post-pandemic learning experiences and career expectations, which echoed similar sentiments.

“Many of the students expressed feelings of isolation and disconnect, which was amplified by increased online learning and reduced time and interaction on-campus. This impacted their learning, social confidence and networking opportunities. The irony is students want on-campus experiences but opt for online learning and limited attendance,” McVicker-Murphy said.

“Students expressed concerns about maintaining a healthy work/life balance, indicating that the nature of work in law can be demanding. Balancing work commitments with personal life is considered crucial for overall wellbeing and sustained career success.”

According to the trio, legal employers need a retention strategy to keep graduates, as many other industries will hire those with a legal degree.

There is also a growing trend in graduates looking for alternatives to the traditional law firm career path, according to Pincus.

“Many graduates are rejecting the traditional law firm practices, like keeping billable hours and long working hours,” she said.

“The College of Law is preparing new lawyers for the future world of work, including training in new technology and business skills. With AI, new lawyers will be able to use technology to reduce the amount of mundane work that they do and is opening up many new law career pathways.

“Even if you don’t go onto practice law, there are a number of translatable core skills and capabilities that equip law graduates for other career paths, and these capabilities are valued by many industries.”

Despite various challenges, the profession (and its graduates) should be optimistic about the current employment market.

“In short, yes. The rates of full-time employment for recent graduates are a strong indication that we should be very optimistic about the opportunities for law students,” McVicker-Murphy said.

“According to the last three years of data from the Graduate Outcomes Survey (GOS) conducted by the Department of Higher Education, 90.5 per cent of the College of Law’s graduates found full-time legal employment.”