Healthy Boundaries: 5 tips to help lawyers (and other humans)

Posted on February 17, 2021 by Madeleine Shaw, One of Thousands of Executive Coaches on Noomii.

Setting boundaries – healthy boundaries – is essential for lawyers to maintain a healthy balance in their lives. Yet succeeding in law practice – particularly in the private law firm context – can make this very challenging. In the legal context, what does a healthy boundary even look like?

How can setting and maintaining boundaries even be possible?

First up: biology. You’re human; running at 110% is not sustainable.

It’s no secret that physical and mental health issues arise when someone is exhausted and under constant pressure and scrutiny.

An unquestioning acceptance of each piece of work as urgent and maximally important can itself lead to the lawyer doing what they fear most – failing to deliver on time, and jeopardising the professional relationship they have with their clients.

This can then create more fear, leading to rushing more and working harder, leading to more exhaustion and propensity for error. It can be a downward spiral.

When I was in-house, we briefed out to various law firms. If I needed something in two weeks’ time, I would tell the lawyers that – and I really didn’t mind when it was delivered, so long as it was within the next two weeks. There was absolutely no benefit to the lawyer staying in the office late that night to complete the piece of work. Yet this was often what was done, no doubt at personal cost.

Conversely, if I said I needed something by 9.30 am Wednesday so I could review it before a 10.00 am meeting at which I would need it, I needed it. If it arrived – polished to perfection – at 10.30, it was useless to me.

This happened surprisingly often – perhaps because the lawyers concerned couldn’t get to it in time because they were flat out completing other work which actually could have waited, or were simply too exhausted, and either way were operating in a stressed-out, fight-or-flight state where different options (like, say, letting me know their situation) didn’t occur to them.

In the legal profession, too often we are trained to put the client relationship above all else.

They say jump, we ask how high. They want it tomorrow, we deliver it tonight. Good practice management is taken to be about figuring out how to do it all, faster – rather than asking how much really needs to be done, and by when. But how many clients actually notice or care?

These days, many of my lawyer clients grapple with testing boundaries and deadlines with their clients. It feels very dangerous – as though simply asking when something is truly needed is itself a failure of client service. In fact, when they try it, they usually report back that it has been something of a liberation.

I know – having been a client – that most clients (I’m aware there are exceptions) just want their requirements met. Good enough really is good enough. Can I go to the meeting and provide the advice needed? Can I get the contract signed in time to start producing the widgets? Can I resolve the dispute and come out with the relationship still functioning? Whatever the client’s goals are, having you stay up until 3 am on the day you happen to receive the instructions so you can polish your work in ways most clients won’t even notice is usually not what is needed.

There are times – particularly in deal-based work or litigation, that there are genuinely short, hard deadlines with huge amounts of work that needs doing in order to meet them. I have certainly been on the tough end of this equation in my time practicing in “biglaw”. Even in this context, having clarity around your professional boundaries, and what services you will and won’t provide, and by when, will help you get the work done with a higher chance of maintaining your energy and ability at the high levels you expect of yourself. I didn’t know this at the time. I burnt out. The lawyers who manage it are the ones who thrive – and they do exist!

So how to set healthy boundaries? I don’t pretend to have the magic wand that will fix these challenges. They originate in deep, multifaceted ways and play out in complex systems that are greater than any one individual. Having offered that caveat (you can take the coach out of law, but you can’t take the lawyer out of the coach), here they are:

Five tips for setting and maintaining healthy boundaries as a lawyer – or really, as anyone!

1. Train yourself to think of boundaries as enablers, not limitations

Needing downtime, interactions with friends and family, and a good night’s sleep doesn’t make you a bad lawyer. It makes you a better one. Investing in your recovery leaves you refreshed and switched on, ready to deliver. Thinking of your boundaries as enablers of your performance can bolster your courage in setting them, as well as giving you clarity in how to respond when boundary violations do occur. You are not trading off your “good professional” status for health by having appropriate boundaries, you are enhancing both.

2. Establish boundaries up front

Be clear about when you are available, when you are offline, and (if required) protocols for contacting you in case of genuine urgent need during downtime.

If there is an urgent injunction lodged, or a building is on fire, have someone call you and let you know. Don’t check your email every ten minutes, every weekend, just in case. Constant email checking dramatically undermines your recovery from work. Clearly communicating and agreeing protocols up front can make a dramatic difference to both your wellbeing and the quality of your work as the matter progresses.

Relatedly, be clear about what is your remit and what is not. I find this one is particularly relevant for in-house counsel, who can tend to try to take the entire good governance of their organisation onto their own slender shoulders. You can provide advice. You can assert yourself strongly. But you are not the organisation and if they need more than you, as a single human being, can deliver they need to take accountability for that and respond accordingly.

3. Always test deadlines

Sometimes they are legitimate – fine. Oftentimes, you will be able to meet the client’s needs without working until 3 am. If you receive a piece of work at 4 pm, don’t just assume that you need to cancel your dinner plans. Dig deep and find the courage to ask the client (or the partner, senior associate, etc) if it would be OK for you to deliver it by the following morning/afternoon/Monday. Even as a very new lawyer, saying “I can do this tonight if you need it, but would it be ok for me to have it to you by COB tomorrow?” should be perfectly acceptable. Quite often the answer is yes. Win. (If it isn’t perfectly acceptable in your work environment, consider whether it’s where you want to be.)

4. Slide off your work emails and switch off your work phone when you are offline

The addictive nature of our phones is another topic entirely – but suffice it to say, addictive they are. When you are not working, don’t work. That means sliding off your work email when you are not working. This is a tough one for many lawyers – they are worried about missing something critical. They will wake in the night, check their email, end up responding to something and severely shortchange themselves in the process.

When you are actually asleep, you are not checking your email.

When you are in a critical meeting, you don’t scroll your email (I hope).

Whatever comes in during those times is handled when you wake up, or get out of the meeting.

Take the same approach. Be what I call “notionally asleep” – think about your offline time as being akin to really being asleep – you don’t need to be scanning every few minutes and you can deal with anything there once you check it on your own terms when you “wake up”.

One adjustment to this tip that several of my clients have found helpful is to pre-set “triage” times – say 2 or 3 times a day on the weekend, or perhaps once after dinner. You log in, check your emails for anything that genuinely can’t wait until you’re back at work, and leave the rest. The triage process can relieve the anxiety that many lawyers feel about switching off at say 6 pm on a Friday and not seeing something urgent until 9.00 am on Monday.

5. Team up

Opening up a conversation with your colleagues, peers or tapping into external support through places such as your EAP, bar association or professional body or – yes – a qualified coach can make all the difference. A common piece of feedback I hear from clients is surprise and relief that they are not the only ones grappling with these issues. Sharing strategies, establishing protocols and just feeling heard and understood can make a real difference. Help is available, and it helps. Don’t go it alone.