Staying Sane in Law
Staying Sane in Law with Annmarie Carvalho, the lawyers' therapist. Each episode, Annmarie meets a leader in the legal profession and the therapists who work with them, to talk about balancing high-pressure careers with the ups and downs of everyday life.
Staying Sane in Law
The Law Society President: Mark Evans on the Law Society's wellbeing agenda & his career in law
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In this special feature-length show, Annmarie Carvalho - The Lawyers' Therapist - meets Mark Evans, President of the Law Society of Wales and England, for a lively and personal chat about his journey from school in Wales to his current position in the UK's Legal landscape. Mark talks very openly about his life, his career and his personal journey into the work he's championing to improve the wellbeing and mental health of the legal profession. Plus, we learn about his secret role as Father Christmas, his love of running, and his own approach to juggling the demands of home, work, and the community. Don't miss it!
Hello, I'm Amory Corvallier, the lawyer's therapist and CEO of TCC, the Legal Therapy Coaching and Training Agency. Welcome to Stay Insane in Law, the show where every episode I'm in conversation with a key person in the legal profession talking about the gritty realities of life in the law. And today I am absolutely thrilled that we have Mark Evans, president of the Law Society of England and Wales, joining us. Mark, welcome to Stay Insane in Law.
SPEAKER_03Thanks very much for having me.
SPEAKER_00It's not often I get starstruck. I have to say, I am kind of starstruck. This is like to like a legal geek like me, this is like having Bruce Springsteen in the room. Okay, so I'm just gonna I'm gonna stop being weird and embarrassing now. But anyway.
SPEAKER_01I'm excited too. I'm excited to hi Mark. I've come out the booth already.
SPEAKER_03Can I just correct you? I'm president of the Law Society of Wales and England.
SPEAKER_00Wales and England, yeah, absolutely. Oh my goodness. No, I I love that. Um where whereabouts exactly are you from? Where were you born, Mark?
SPEAKER_03So I I'm from a little village in in North Wales, um in North East Wales, and I still live within three miles of where I grew up, uh as such. So yeah, my my family has like seven generations in in North Wales. Um, no background in law at all. Um, you know, my dad was a steelworker, and so yeah, never for one moment did I think that coming from a little village that one day I would become a Slister to start with, but then, you know, to go from that to become president of Law Society is just it's mind-boggling, to be honest. Um, but you know, it's happened.
SPEAKER_00So just to give our listeners a little bit of a background, um, so you are the president of the Law Society of Wales and England, as you said. Um, you're also the incoming CEO of Law Care, so you're gonna take on that position this coming autumn. So we'll talk a little bit about that as well. Uh, you're a property and private client lawyer by background, working in Wales and Cheshire, and you've also worked as a teacher. I don't know when you found the time to do this, due to doing various legal courses at the University of Law, which is a lot. Um, and you've already touched on something that's really, really important. Um, and we talked about this in a previous episode with James McFarlane, a lawyer in Scotland who comes from a very working class background. And inclusivity is something that's kind of key to your presidency, isn't it? And you've touched on already the fact that nobody in your family was a lawyer. It wasn't a thing. So, what what attracted you into the world of law? How did it all happen?
SPEAKER_03Okay, um, I mean, when I was growing up, um, I wanted to be in North Wales Police, um, you know, and this was back in the 1980s. And to be in North Wales Police at the time, there was a height restriction, the, you know, a minimum height, and it was something like six foot. And I was a late developer. And so by the time I got into six form, I still didn't meet the height restriction that was required. And so my history teacher, when I was studying my A levels, said, You're interested in law, aren't you, Mark? And I said, Well, yeah, because I'd love to be in the police force. And he said, Well, I can get you some work experience with a local firm of solicitors if you're interested. And he did. He got me one week's work experience in a general high street firm. And that opportunity changed my life, basically, because I went in, um, I experienced, you know, what the work of a conveyancer or a family lawyer or personal injury lawyer is. I went to court, I went to an inquest, I think. And I came away from there thinking, wow, what a job that is, helping people in your community at their times of need. And that was what the catalyst was. But it was that opportunity that I was given by my teacher. Um, and that's one of the things I'm really keen on. And that's one of the reasons I moved into lecturing is to encourage people from all backgrounds to enter law, um, you know, and be given the opportunity to consider law as a career.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. What was the name of your teacher? I won't I wanted to give them a shout out. Jeff Collins.
SPEAKER_02I think we can manage a little round of applause there for Jeff Collins.
SPEAKER_03And also the the guy who uh who took the placement was a guy called Michael Baker, who later went on to be a judge in North Wales. But if it wasn't for those two guys, I literally You know, I wouldn't be where I am today. Um yeah, you know, we didn't know any lawyers, you know. We didn't, I didn't grow up in the in the environment of knowing anyone. And so yeah, it it was transformational that just those few days to be able to see what a lawyer does, um yeah, gave me the impetus to think, well, that's something I could do. The bizarre thing is during my sixth form, I then had a height uh growth growth spurt. I then got over six foot, I was about six foot one, six foot two now. And I could I suppose have gone down the police career, which some of my friends did, but in in the end, I know I went down the legal route. And again, I was really fortunate having done my degree and and done my law society finals. Um I was really fortunate to get a training contract in 1993 in Wrexham. You know, I'm not the norm that many people in Wales leave Wales for their work, um, you know, and come to England or the big cities. Um, but throughout my career, it's the best thing that I did is living close to home. Um and being part of my roots, really, has always been important to me.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, absolutely. And also, you know, the areas of law that you chose to specialise in and, you know, sort of working in high street firms as well, it's it's very tangible as well, isn't it? You mentioned community and like staying close to your roots and actually practicing in areas that you can see how you're helping people. Because I think sometimes when I work with lawyers in therapy, sometimes it can be quite hard to retain a sense of meaning in what you're doing because actually in the day-to-day work, you lose the sense of the connection between why you got into the job, because often people get into the job to help people, yeah, and then they sort of lose that connection somewhere along the way, but you manage to sort of maintain that.
SPEAKER_03I think I've been really fortunate. The areas I I worked in often had repeat work, and so you act for clients who move house on a regular basis, for example, or buy or sell property or rent. And I was also in private client, you act for generations of families, you know, and so you meet your clients on numerous occasions. Now, in other areas of law, you may only meet that divorced client once, you know, and that's it. That's your only engagement with the client. But for me, over like three decades, you build up connections with families in your area. Um, and you know, you you really get to know them and they get to know you, and it becomes very personal. Um, I always made sure though that I had a, you know, I I worked, I live separately from where I worked. So when I was in the supermarket, I didn't continually sort of bump into your clients as such, even though you do get some embarrassing moments when a client gives you a hug in front of your family uh as such, and you have to explain, you know, how do you know her? And you say, I don't know her, unless she explains the connection. Um, you know, that that has caused a few embarrassments in the in the past, but um, it's been good fun. And, you know, you it's a human element of the job. And I know we may touch upon, you know, the technology and AI and how that, you know, is impacting people staying sane in the law at the moment. But at the end of the day, most of the work that I did was very interactive with, you know, um the general public. And uh it was great.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I mean, you mentioned it there with the idea of, you know, some woman coming up to you and hugging you in the supermarket. Um, but is it hard to, or was it hard to kind of maintain boundaries? We talk about boundaries a lot these days in law, and you know, how do you kind of stay sane? How do you have any sort of boundary? But it's quite difficult, isn't it, when the role of a solicitor, traditionally it's a bit like a GP, isn't it? A kind of village GP. You don't just talk to them about that one particular area of law, you talk to them about, you know, your ingrowing toenail or your, you know, your kids getting divorced, or you know, completely things that are not related to the matter at hand. Did you have you quite enjoyed that, embrace that?
SPEAKER_03When I first got my um first job, I moved back to live with my parents, you know, having obviously lived away at university. And obviously, with my parents not having any least legal background, the the trying to explain to them the rules of confidentiality was was was difficult. You know, my mum would wait patiently for me to return home from work, have my dinner on the table, and then would sit and eat, you know, she'd already had her food, but she'd sit with me while I was eating, and she would be saying, Well, you know, has Doreen been to see you today? Doreen being my mum's best friend, you know, and she said, Well, I think Doreen's gonna be making a will. Has she been? And I'd say to my mum, Mum, Mum, if Doreen wants to tell you, you speak to her every day, she can tell you, but I'm not gonna tell you anything because it's confidential. And so she would get sort of quite a bit irate, really, that, well, why haven't you you know why won't you talk to me? So then I got into a real habit which I carried out throughout my career, when my mum would say, How's your day be? And I would either use one or two words, busy or very busy, and then I'd say, How's your day be? And then she'd just tell me about who she's met on the dog walk, in the kitchen, and then I'd eat my tea in peace because she would then talk all the way through about how her day has been. But I followed that through then when I had my, you know, got married and have a family and and that, you know. I just say, How's your day been busy? And I switch off and I then ask them, tell me about your day. And I and I get the joy of listening to them because you do have to disassociate the work that you do and your home life, you know, that's vitally important that you have that switch and that you can do it. And it does worry me now for people who are working solely maybe from home, that they don't disconnect from work, they don't commute, they don't have their, you know, their time to leave that front door and come back. Um, or they don't change their clothes or their outfit and they stay in the same thing. And these are some of the things that, you know, I've been looking at this year as president to see what we could be doing differently to help people in the law.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think that's an important point. And I've often talked to clients about it, about, you know, little things like, like you say, change your clothes, go and have a cold shower, run water on your wrists, like change the way your body feels. Because as you allude to, a lot of lawyers that I work with are doing, you know, high octane work or criminal work or historic child abuse cases or whatever it might be. They're viewing personal injury lawyers viewing material on their computers, reading statements in their homes. And it's a very different, you know, back in back in the day, you might watch this material on a video in your law firm, and then you could take that old, old school VHS tape out and lock it in a cabinet and then go and chat to a colleague about something completely different. But now it's a different thing, isn't it? When physically you're in the same location all of the time, or lots of people are. Um, you know what you said about sort of not obviously not breaking confidentiality and not talking to family about the ins and outs of your work. I think one of the other issues that a lot of lawyers talk to me about is the sense of isolation. Like law can be quite an isolating profession. I think that's probably one of the contributing factors in the sense of you know you can't talk to your friends and family about the ins and outs of what you do. Um, so it makes colleagues even more important, doesn't it? And and kind of networks within your firm or chambers.
SPEAKER_03For me, when I joined the law firm, I my firm were very active in a local law society. Um, and so from a very early stage in my career, I went to a lot of local law society social events. Often it's the annual dinner as such, and you meet other lawyers, you meet other people from other firms, and you build up a network. So that for me was creating a new community for me of people who understood the work I was doing. And so from about 1993 um up until about 2010, I was, you know, I would go to local law society events, and then in 2010, I joined my local law society in Cheshire and North Wales, and that opened up a new avenue for me because it opened up um, you know, meeting other firms in my area, talking and you know, feeling quite safe. Because sometimes it's difficult to talk to people in your own firm as well, because you know, there may be other pressures that you're feeling or something. So that basically opened a new avenue for me. And I was fortunate in 2014 then to become president of Cheshire and North Wales Law Society. And again, that was a pivotal moment for me in my career because it then sort of I used that as a springboard to move into sort of it on a national level. But there was an incident in 2014 that, or two incidents really for me, that changed again my direction of travel. Um, so at the dinner of my In Chester race course in 2014, I invited the president of the Law Society to come as a guest speaker. And you said you were starstruck before, you know, so was I, you know, I was starstruck. I I expected this president to turn up from, you know, um, sort of a big city firm, you know, um, Oxford, Cambridge graduate, you know, maybe uh not state educated, but you know, privately educated and all of this. And I had an image of the president and in walked Nick Fluck, who was a uh a property practitioner in 2014 from a two-partner firm in Lincolnshire in a general high street firm, you know, no different to the work that I was doing. And I sat with him for a few hours and I just realized that my word, we've got so much in common. And he sort of during the that evening said, Well, you know, you're involved locally, so why don't you get involved nationally? And sort of planted a seed in my head. And I went, actually, you know, really, you know, listening to you and hearing from you gives me an opportunity. The very next day, I'm in the supermarket with my mum. Um, well, she's already in there shopping, and I walk in, and at the end of the grocery aisle, she's there talking to a group of women. And you know, when you're in a supermarket and you can't turn the trolley because you've been clocked, somebody's seen you, you know, and it's that embarrassing moment where, you know, you you know you've got to go and say hello to somebody. So I walk down and you know, it's about 8:30 in the morning on a Saturday morning, and my mum beaming says to these group of women, This is my son Mark, he's the president of the law society. And I just looked at my mum in sort of horror, as if to say, Mum, you've got that wrong. But I in a split second, I thought, these women are never going to know what the law society is or anything. I'm just gonna let it roll, you know, and just let it go. So the women walk away, and my mum then is with me, and I said to my mum, I'm not the president of the law society, I'm the president of Cheshire and North Wales Law Society. And she looked me straight in the eye and she said, But one day you will be. And then, and then a few months later, um, I held her hand when we switched off her life support in the hospital. And before she passed away, in my head, I thought, you know what? She had the belief in me. And one day, one day I'm gonna give it a go. And 12 years later, here I am.
SPEAKER_00This is gonna sound really cheesy, but that was so emotional listening to you say, tell us that story about your mum. I think that's incredible. And it sort of adds to that sense of urgency, you know, in the in terms of like, well, I just want to get on with doing the things that I want to do and like making a difference. I think when you have that sort of belief, particularly from a parent, and particularly, as you say, in the in the year that she died, it's um it's it's very strange because I I didn't know that you were considering going into the police initially. And this morning my mum handed me my late dad's police helmet, which you can sing in the background behind me, and she's just clearing out, even she's not well herself, and she's clearing out and she just gave it to me, and with this kind of long service medal thing, and I was like, oh. So it's weird how the universe does that, isn't it?
SPEAKER_03When you were saying about the police earlier on, and I I think your parents have a bigger impact on you than what you will ever really appreciate. Um, and certainly to me, you know, my mum was always a constant source of encouragement, um, and always a constant source of you can do it, you know, attitude. My dad, as a steel worker, was very sort of a man's man, you know, said very little. Um, and in fact, I found out more about my dad when he had dementia um than I did sort of growing up. Um and my dad basically, and my my involvement with mental health really stems from with my dad, because my dad was orphaned at the age of two. He was in a local authority care home during the Second World War until he was 12, and then he was adopted as such. And a lot of his issues from a mental health when he later on in life came from that childhood memories as such, you know, and so he he then shared those memories with me and shared, you know, and it opened up a side to my dad that I never knew, you know, existed. Um, and then I saw the strength that he had and the character that he had. And, you know, he would never, he never saw me in my position here now at the Law Society and anything else, but it's really made me sort of focus on, you know, everyone has a story, everyone has something that maybe they don't disclose or whatever. And for my dad, it was always a taboo subject. You know, it was always mental health, you know, and a strong steel worker and with the the guys that he worked with. It was not something that you would open up or share. But actually, when he opened up and shared it with me, it was really powerful. It really impacted upon me and has led me to do focus on things like mental health and well-being in, you know, in my area now.
SPEAKER_00My parents would never, you know, would never go, would never have dreamed of going to something like counselling. It was all very, you know, sort of stoic, stiff up a lit, dad, you know, working class northern policeman, all that, all of that kind of sort of mentality. But I think it if you see that in your parents and you have that kind of experience, then living in this generation now as we do, where people are much more open about things, which is wonderful, but it also gives you an insight. I think if you've had parents of that sort of type, for want of a better word, of how difficulties with mental health can present themselves, present themselves in lots of different ways. And for one person, therapy might be an option. For another person, it's not, it's going to the pub and chatting with their mates or not chatting about it, playing video games, you know, with a friend, whatever it might be. I think um, I think that's one of the things that touched on earlier about the the legal profession. It can feel quite isolating. And when people are struggling with their mental health, and I have to say it is a very gendered thing to say, but I find particularly with men, um, they it's hard to talk about things. They might not their difficulties might not present in the way that people might expect. You know, people think someone with who's struggling with their mental health will be crying and will come to them in tears, but often that's not the way.
SPEAKER_03And that's for me where I sort of started my journey in running. Um, so you know, um, and because I was that man that bottled it all up and didn't share my feelings and, you know, of what I was going through, dealing with, you know, the great grief, with um, you know, the loss of my mum, the loss of my dad in front of me who had dementia. We'd had, you know, recurrent miscarriages in the family as well. So baby loss and all the things. But none of these topics I was talking about. And but going to visit my dad in the nursing home, I, over a period of six years, I could feel my own health deteriorating physically and mentally. I was putting on weights, I was becoming lethargic, I, you know, just just really feeling under the weather. And my dad had, I was approaching my 50th, and my dad had a stroke when he was 53 whilst he was at the steelworks. And I thought, I'm gonna be him in a few years. Um, you know, I could see the way I was going that, you know, unless I did something that sort of changed my lifestyle, that, you know, then there's there's a destiny here. And so in 2019, I I went to the gym. I uh I met this personal trainer who's an ex Army young lad. And said, you know, what do you want to do? And I said, I don't really want to be here because I'm I'm only here because my wife's a member of the gym and I'm not as the gyms are not for me, but I'd love to run a marathon. And I said it quite jokingly. I just thought I said, yo, I'd love to run a marathon. And he said, you'll do it next year. And he looked at me, you know, and he said, and I went, Really? He said, you get on that treadmill now and see how far you can run. Well, I couldn't even do 10 minutes. It nearly killed me on this treadmill. I hadn't run for like 30 odd years going back to school. And I thought, my God, you know. And he said, look, you know, what motivates you to run? And I said, well, my dad's suffering with dementia. I'd like to do something to support that. And so he said, Well, why don't you sign up to in Chester, they do a Chester Triple, which is a 10K race in March, a half marathon in May, and either the metric marathon or full marathon in October. So he said, sign up for charity and do it next year. And I will give you a training plan. So I signed up for Alzheimer's Society to do the three. And I started my training. And basically, my dad died in that January, just about six weeks in to my training. But then I thought, you know what? I'm going to carry on. Got to March, did the 10K, and then lockdown happened the week after with COVID. And then I thought I'm just going to carry on. I'm just going to carry on training on my own in isolation. And in October, I did the London virtual marathon. I lost nearly three stone that year. Not really by changing my diet to a certain extent, but just by being physically more active. And I actually found therapy through running. It cleared my head, it got me out into the open. I was able to process things. Frustrations, I was able to process. And all of that training happened sort of on my own. But then I got involved with like a local park run as a volunteer and I met lots of other people. And then, as you mentioned before, I started to talk to men who talk when they're running or talk when they're doing something active, but don't talk otherwise. And so that led me to think about a running group for the legal community and especially focusing on trying to get men into this group, even though I've not publicly said it's for men, it's for everyone. But I really wanted to attract men into the group because when you're not looking at somebody and you're running either in front or to the side of them and you're not giving eye contact, as I'm sure you're wearing a car, people talk more openly. And we talked about anything. You know, in that half an hour or an hour, we would go out on a run. And, you know, it's all conversational pace. I'm not fast, I'm not a quick runner, I know I'm not a speed person and looking at my watch. It's there for conversation. And yeah, I just realized that there's a gap here, you know, for lawyers, you know, that no longer, you know, growing up when it always used to be social events in the pub or that, most younger lawyers now want to do something that is not involving, say alcohol or other things. And you know, running then just naturally sort of said, well, that's a really good avenue to get people out. And in half an hour, if you run with people who can share their similar experiences to you, that's where that all came from for me.
SPEAKER_02I I want to ask you, Mark. I mean, because this is a sort of trend, isn't it? You have a vision for your tenure as president and what you want the law society to engage with. Just to say, was it a weight on your shoulders? I mean, you're the 181st president of an organization that celebrated its bicentenary. That's 200 years last year. You came in in October. That that feels like quite a big mantle to be taking on and then driving change as well. Did did that put stress on you at all? Or did you sort of, you know, you you were raring to go?
SPEAKER_03So to to answer that, I'm just going to go back in time. So I was in private practice um for nearly like 30 years. When I started to run, I basically realized then that do you know what? There's there's other challenges maybe I need to take on board, or there's other things that I need to do. And whilst I was running, I decided then that I would give up being a lawyer in private practice, being a shareholder, director, and manager. And I joined the University of Law full-time as a lecturer in 2021. So that's after I'd completed my marathon. And for the next sort of four or five years, then I've been working on a daily basis with the next generation of lawyers. And I've been listening in Liverpool and Manchester to those students about their opportunities, about their, you know, threats, about their, you know, worries and concerns. And that really then stemmed into my presidency because I realized then I've got a potential to do something for the next generation of lawyers. You know, I've had a great career, and now listening and working with students entering into the profession, I've been listening to their views. And so the themes that I've pushed forward really, and you know, having a son who's 25 as well, you know, sort of making, you know, I've got a commitment really to sort of make sure that the profession is in a better place. And so it's not a burden on my shoulders at all. I don't feel like that. I I feel it's more, you know, I've got an opportunity to try and make a difference. And if it works, it works. If it doesn't, we've had that conversation, you know, and and I'm not frightened to have a conversation, you know, or to put something forward and get rejected, you know. I think maybe the naivety for me is coming from a small village where we're all the same class, we're all nobody, there's no hierarchy or everything else. I don't, I've never felt under pressure to to prove myself to anyone. So whenever I've met anyone senior or or politicians or judges or whatever, you treat everyone with respect and dignity and you know everything else, but you're not, I'm not frightened to put forward my views because you know, ultimately we're all human. And and often, you know, I think people appreciate if you treat them with that respect. So that influenced me with sort of the burden. I don't see it as a burden. I view it as a sort of, you know, it's it's part of who I am. You know, uh my my DNA is about helping the community. And I mentioned my dad before. My dad, you know, worked six days a week in the steelworks, two mornings, two afternoons, two nights. And yet he was the chair of governors of a local primary school, which I then later became. He, you know, was captain of the golf club. He did a lot of charity work, he was Father Christmas in the in the community, which I then became Father Christmas as well, um, for six years. I've been, you know, in case there's any young viewers, I was assisting Father Christmas in the grotto, uh as such.
SPEAKER_02But I have to throw my hat in now and say I too was Father Christmas at my my son's primary school and at the nursery many times. Uh I it's uh it's a it's a special bond we have. It is a special bond. Yeah, it is.
SPEAKER_00I was an elf for a few years without elves.
SPEAKER_03Can can I just say that um I found that's the most stressful job you could ever have in the world. 180 three-year-old to 11-year-olds coming into the grotto in the whole day, and you have to be politically correct. You have to be making sure you don't obviously frighten them or scare them. My wife was the elf because she worked in the primary school. It was the most I was sweating. I mean, it's the stress of being Father Christmas, you know. I mean, the pressure is just another level. And I'm sure Andrew, you know, you know that you've appreciated it.
SPEAKER_02A lot of children, when they're younger as well, they're terrified. Their parents sort of shove them into the grotto, and you have this terrified child, and there you are, and suddenly, of course, you think, well, I've stuffed all these cushions in. Although people did say, Are you sure you need that cushion? Uh and that used to hurt me. But you've stuffed all these cushions in, so you also look particularly large. So you're like a giant, and you have these children in floods of tears saying, I don't want to. And you're saying, No, come in with this deep voice and everything. I mean, you think about it, it's a tough, it's a very tough acting gig. I think it's a good one.
SPEAKER_00I just put a shout-out for the elves out there because as an elf, I mean, last time I had a clipboard, this was last Christmas or the Christmas before. I had a clipboard and a spreadsheet of all these kits with all the different deniri intolerances, gluten intolerance, halal, something. And I got so stressed. And the my elf boots, we'd lost one and they were both the left shoot.
SPEAKER_03So I was like falling over the elf boots whilst trying to sort of give different children the different treats that they it's very, it's very I'm gonna big up the elves because my wife used to be an elf in the grotto, but my son, he was at university at the time, when he came back, my wife dressed him up as an elf and she had to he had to record a video of delivering presents to the children in their classrooms. So he got involved as well as an elf and secretly filmed videos of delivering presents to all the different classrooms. I mean, you know, he's quite a big guy as well, you know, and so he had to dress up as an elf as well. So we we've had great fun as a family, you know, and but it stems from the fact, you know, it goes back to this thing of going being part of the community, you know, being part of, you know, your village life, your community life, um, and sort of really embracing it. And, you know, it's always been part of my life growing up, you know. My my mum volunteered in the playground as an assistant, my my grandmother was a volunteer, you know, and they had very little, very little, but they were so willing to share their time with the community.
SPEAKER_02I've been looking at the Life in the Law 2025 survey, which I'm gonna say now as a journalist, these are the the sorts of data sets that are absolutely critical for interviews like this. Three figures really stuck out to me. 64% of people who who uh were involved in the survey reported having low mental health at some times. And in a way, that might be fairly predictable, I suppose, in any industry, but 59% of them, roughly speaking, also scored at what they consider to be the low end of the well-being scale and the the scale that LawCare's put together. And then 56% had said they were thinking of moving on and didn't see themselves in the industry in five years. I mean, that feels like a sort of uh a sort of a ticking well-being time bomb a little bit for the legal industry. And you you're, I suppose, trying to leave that sort of charge of those ideas that are going to turn that around to get more young people into it. So tell us, tell us more about your vision for the industry and how you address this sort of these trends.
SPEAKER_03It's now part of our corporate strategy for the next three years to look at well-being and mental health. And so we're looking at from 2025 to 28, how we can support our members. And these are we're gonna be reporting in the autumn of this year, after year one, what we think are some key finds of the research that we've been doing from our round tables and our discussions. And we'll be giving sort of hopefully um, you know, ideas for individuals or firms to take away. What we're not gonna be saying is this is what you must do. We're gonna give people a variety of things that you can pick and choose what relates to you and what you think may work for you. And so we're gonna be giving examples of what individuals can be doing to make improvements in their lives. We're gonna be talking about what firms should be doing to look after their staff, um, you know, and and setting a role model for managers or something of that. We're gonna be talking about how we can help and support managers, you know, offering that advice and also stepping into retirement and the worries and the concerns that they've got, you know, the worries and the concerns in the in-house community, you know, and then from that, we're gonna be using hopefully our findings to sort of just have these discussions with the regulator and you know, the people looking after the profession. But ultimately, we want to be feeding into the government with statistics and figures to say, should this be looked at uh at a more you know corporate uh, you know, sort of government level and where rules and regulations like an employment law need to be addressing this? Because, you know, we all have like working hours regulations, we all have all these other things, but at some point, where does technology and the pace of life fit in where you say, well, you need to switch your computer off now? You know, if you're driving a vehicle, you you know, or if you're a lorry driver or a coach driver, you cannot go and drive belonging so many hours without having a rest or a break. You know, the law prohibits you from driving for safety reasons beyond that. We haven't got those perimeters yet in the legal profession. We haven't got that switch off, which means people are working longer and you know, churning it out. And eventually that's going to have a toll on your on your health um physically and and mentally. And so we're trying to have conversations, collect as much data, but also sharing good practice, you know, sharing what works for people, sharing things that, you know, um, you know, that you could adapt or you you change. And and I've been fascinated by some of the stories I've heard from a range of practitioners this year. Um, but I'm also, you know, amazed at how much people don't communicate with their team, that they still have this little bit of stigma or this still sort of, is this really a topic we need or should be talking about? Because of the image of the profession, you know, and I want to knock that barrier down because to be a good lawyer, you have to be physically and mentally, you know, alert and strong. And it's not a weakness in any shape or form, you know, um, to be at times having, you know, an illness or suffering uh as such, you know, and it's it's been nice to hear some real positive stories. When you look at the figures, you think it's doom and gloom and everything else. But I think we have an opportunity to turn it around and make it better for the next generation to come. And, you know, I'm excited for that challenge.
SPEAKER_00One of the things that I thought was a good thing to do, and and I I did this at my old firm actually, was we took the well-being policy, and lots of firms have a well-being policy now, which is great, but sometimes it can feel like a kind of aspirational document. And we looked at it and we looked at all the different aspects of it in the supervision policy. And we took a sort of traffic light policy where we were like, okay, we're gonna give this a green if we feel like we are abiding by what we're saying in our policy, like we only work nine to five or whatever. We're gonna give it a red if we're not at all, and we're gonna give it an amber if we're somewhere in between. And we went through each point in each policy and kind of gave it a red, green or amber, and it discussed it in groups, you know, all different kinds of levels of seniority within the team. And what it did was it introduced a conversation about the tensions because sometimes tensions arise between different people's well-being. You know, if you leave to go to yoga at six o'clock, I'm here till 11 p.m. Like whose well-being takes precedence. So I think, like you say, it's trying to kind of improve that communication, isn't it? And sort of really kind of see, okay, well-being bleeds into everything. It's like into supervision and use of AI and you know, client communication. So trying to address some of those tensions um, I think is is crucial in all of this.
SPEAKER_03And I think, you know, what you just said is is great. And I think a lot of firms now are having those discussions internally. But for me, some of those discussions maybe would be better placed to be going on a walk together, or even I'm not going to say go on, I've said running or whatever, but you know what I mean? It's getting you out of that work environment. And my wife, you know, if there was a disruptive child in the school, often they'd go for a walk down the school corridor or in the playground to let them calm down or to let them share their views. And and that's where you need to find space and time to have a conversation. It doesn't necessarily need to be in a meeting room or a boardroom. That could be literally going for a walk along the River Thames, you know, for half an hour and with your team and just talking to each other as such. And you'll be surprised at the conversations that come out and the changes that you can make. But it's also, you know, we don't really know the people we work with that well, you know. The you know, you never really get to know the characters of people that you're you work with. And we had a round table of senior lawyers, you know, and I said at the very beginning, I went around the table to each of them and said, give me one thing that you enjoy doing. One thing, you know, and we went round the table, and people would say dog walking, or you know, I like to sing or I like to do sport or whatever. And then the second question I asked them is, Do your team that you manage know that? And none of them said they said no. I said, So to you, that you're there, you're the manager, you know, you're there to sort of crap the whip and tell them what to do, but they don't know you as an individual. And don't you think working in in together would be a bit more beneficial if they really you dropped your guard a little bit or you you explain to them your human element of who you are, because they don't see that. They view you as this person who's churning out the hours and churning out the bills, but they don't know you like, you know, you keep bees, or that you, you know, that you, you know, you you like to do yoga or you like to do this. Because then you'll find your team will say, Well, I keep bees too. Oh, I you know, it opens up a new conversation that, you know, is something that law firms at the moment uh, you know, it's oh, it's sort of stiff up a lip, sort of, you know, this is our job, let's just get on with it and you know, go home. But it's opening the door to new conversations and and seeing where it will take us.
SPEAKER_00My final question is about your new role as CEO of Law Care. And what are your what are your plans then? I mean, you've touched on it a little bit, but what would you like to see happen? What are you excited about?
SPEAKER_03I mean, I obviously am on a career break at the moment because when you're president of law society, it's a full-time post. So I'd always envisage going back to being a lecturer in November of this year. And then obviously, um, I'd signed up to run the London Marathon this year for Law Care. Uh, and it was during that training period that Elizabeth Rimmer announced that she was stepping down as the C chief executive. And I I just realized, I thought, you know, this is a window of opportunity for me. I've met so many fascinating people in the legal world that going back to lecturing, I would lose those connections and lose the work that I'd been doing on well-being, especially. And so it was a springboard for me to say, well, actually, I can carry this on, but in a different role. So, you know, I'm excited to be joining Law Care. I'm excited to meet and work with the team that is there. There's some fantastic volunteers and trustees within the organization. And the more I've met of them, and I've not even been there yet, the more inspired I am to drive it forward, you know. And yes, what the charity is there predominantly as a phone line charity to help people confidentiality at their times of need. But the second part of the job is these preventative measures to stop people from phoning the charity, you know, to help and support and encourage new ways of thinking. And so, and the beauty for me is it's not just limited to solicitors, it's a UK-based charity. I've had engagement in Scotland and Northern Ireland and, you know, in obviously Wales, where I am. And, you know, I've been lots of meetings with people from the bar and, you know, the Silex and Power Legals and the Judiciary, all of whom are covered by the charity, you know, and their support staff. So it's really an exciting time for me to see, you know, what we can do. And and, you know, for the first six months, I'm I'm sure I'm just it's going to be reflective to see where are we, what needs to be done. Um, you know, and yeah, I'm I'm I'm excited for the the challenge ahead, but I'm more excited to be doing something that I'm quite passionate about now. Um, and about, you know, not being frightened to to sort of say that these are conversations we need to have.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, absolutely. Thank you. Thank you so much for giving us your time today. And I have to say, I'll say my final point is this you absolutely practice what you preach because when I emailed um, I think it was your assistant to with my sort of slightly wheedling email of would Mark consider coming on the podcast? I fully expected to hear nothing and then get a very nice polite no. And actually within a day, it was yeah, yeah, I'll do it. That's great. And I just thought that that's absolutely it, isn't it? Just being accessible to people. So thank you. Thank you so much. Um, you can find all of Mark's details at the website of the Law Society, uh, lawsociety.org.uk. You can find me at our TCC website, cavalliotherapy.com, C-A-R-V-A-M-L-H-O, or my LinkedIn page at linkedin.com forward slash in forward slash amory cavallo. Um, check out the rest of our podcast episodes at sustainsaininlaw.busbruck.com or wherever you get your podcast. Finally, Mark, thank you so much for joining us today. Can you say a quick goodbye?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, thank you so much. Del Covell.
SPEAKER_00That was brilliant. I love that. Okay, thank you. And I wish I could say this in Welsh now, but I'm I'm inadequate. So I will just say remember everyone, we are all a little bit wonky. You are not on your own. And thank you to Mike for a brilliant episode.
SPEAKER_02And that's a level uh mark from us two. There. Is that running? Did I get that running?
SPEAKER_03You got that close close, close. I'm not gonna go from it. You're you're a fellow fan of Christmas, so I can't call I can't say anything against you now, so don't think you. I bet you never thought, Amory, this conversation was gonna go down that route at all.