Law as a profession is definitely one of the most lucrative career options available in the contemporary era with a never-falling market of new and different matters arising every single day. There are hundreds of perks and rewards associated with this profession which is why, young students are encouraged to take it up as a career. However, there are numerous challenges which lay in the career path of an attorney and it’s not entirely a bed of roses.
1.    Stress
One of the greatest challenges faced by a lawyer is having to deal with the constant amount of stress on a daily basis. Whether it is approaching deadlines, or pressure of bills or client demands or staggeringly long hours or daily changing laws- coupled with the rising business and market pressures, evolving technologies and soaring student debts; law as a career imposes a huge burden of stress on the head of a lawyer.
Such kind of a stressful life has created job dissatisfaction in the sector by metes and bounds. In a survey conducted in the American Bar Association, 44% of those surveyed has not recommended the career option to any young person.
2.    Staggeringly Long Hours
A humongous workload and scarcity of staff automatically results in more working hours for lawyers. On a Global scale, lawyers are also expected to be available to clients 24/7. Now-a-days the working hour for a lawyer is unduly high, having 50-plus hours of work in a week.
Adding to that, a hugely competitive industry has forced lawyers to work a lot into client development and activities relating to business management, in excess to normal working hours. Thus, most lawyers are unable to balance between work and personal lives.
3.    Sky-high law school debt
In today’s competitive education market, a law school costs more than the traditional courses in Universities and has outpaced inflation. Even in a mediocre law school, tuition fees soar at about INR 1.5 lakhs per annum. Thus, entering with a six-figure law school debt is quite common.
Most problematic of all, the fresh graduates are unable to earn enough and repay such debts in an extremely competitive job market. Thus, financial security as a result of a law degree is no longer ensured.
4.    Competitive Job Market
As a matter of fact, lawyers now a days face one of the most competitive job markets in the history where a record number of jobs have been cut down and salaries were drawn to a low. However, law schools aren’t cutting down on enrolment, in fact facing an increase in student intake.
An ample amount of lawyers, especially in India, are seen to have forced to settle for employment with far less remuneration or change their careers entirely. An increased demand with respect to the declining supply causes numerous professionals to rethink the value that their degree may yield.
5.    Spendthrift clients
In the contemporary era, clients are more conscious about how much to spend on legal proceedings. Experiencing decades of hiked bills of lawyers and firms, firms now demand more value for their money and thus, lawyers are forced to keep their billing rates reasonable.
The market is unwilling to pay exorbitant amount of money to expensive lawyers to perform jobs that can be performed by other professionals (such as paralegals) or by technological advancements.
6.    Changing Legal Paradigms
The law practices have changed in dramatic ways, taking away the monopoly from lawyers in the field. Legal document technicians, virtual law offices, self-help websites, mobile apps, learning apps, lawyers have to face an ample amount of competition from an array of non lawyer sources.
It is to be noted that such sources not necessarily ensure similar results as a trained and educated lawyer or can ensure justice, however, they do divert several potential clients away from ‘real’ lawyers.
7.    Technology
Technology has taken over and transformed the entire field of law and now-a-days, lawyers are required to be adept in a huge array of technological platforms, ranging from document review, management tools, spreadsheet, presentations, billing softwares etc.
Even in spite of that, the market leans towards technology to replace lawyers entirely and swallow their jobs.
8.    Legal Process Outsourcing
It is a contemporary economic reality that more and more legal work is being outsourced to workforces who work cheaply overseas or to other regional delivery centres onshore. Thus, a number of traditional lawyers are being eroded or displaces entirely.
This problem is faced mainly by developed countries wherein billing rates of lawyers are exorbitantly high and not so much in a developing country such as India, where outsourcing might result in a price-hike.
9.    Public Distrust
There is generally low public perception about lawyers and widespread distrust has continued even in recent times. Rising billing rates, mala fide lawsuits, news scoop of lawyers behaving badly, lower the image of lawyers to a great extent, in the public eye.
10. Non-likeable Clients
It is inevitable that lawyers cannot pick and choose which clients to work for, at least if they want to make a living despite all the aforementioned drawbacks. A very large demographical group of people require lawyers and they might as well be wealthy, sophisticated but arrogant. On the other hand, they might also be homeless and accused of heinous crimes they didn’t commit.
A lawyer may not like all his clients but they have to give their best representations to each of them and show their tolerance to people irrespective of their personal feelings.
There Are Advantages, albeit.
There are many advantages involved with law as a career and it certainly does offer gratifications. However, all these factors should be considered before opting for law as a career and profession.
