Two new reports show that lawyers within both Canadian law firms and Canadian government legal agencies are feeling their organizations are successful even as they continue to confront critical challenges
As the Canadian legal market stands, law firms and government lawyers can rightfully feel pride in their success after the tumultuous recent years during the pandemic and afterward. Large majorities of lawyers within Canadian law firms said they feel that their firm has been successful over the past year, while Canadian government lawyers overwhelmingly said they consider their departments to be successful.
To examine this further, the Thomson Reuters Institute and the Canadian Bar Association have released the inaugural State of the Canadian Law Firm Market and Canadian Government Lawyers Benchmark reports. These two reports — offered in English and French — provide critical insights into how law firms and government lawyers in Canada assess and measure their success, goals, risks, and challenges in today’s legal landscape.
The 2024 State of the Canadian Law Firm Market shows that Canadian lawyers generally view their law firms as successful, indicating a strong acknowledgement of the professionalism, dedication, innovation, and resilience of law firms in Canada given the multitude of changes of the past several years. Indeed, rather than holding firms back, those very characteristics that helped law firms weather the past few years will continue to be a factor as firms move forward into a still-uncertain legal environment.
As the report shows, Canadian law firms have seen a strong post-pandemic recovery, albeit one that has been accompanied by rising competition for talent, among other challenges.
Further, in one critical finding, the report describes how law firms’ definitions of success do not always align with how they are measuring or planning for such success, presenting both opportunities and challenges for today’s law firm leadership.
You can access the “2024 State of the Canadian Law Firm Market” here in English and here in French.
The 2024 Canadian Government Lawyers Benchmark Report describes how lawyers within the Canadian government generally view their organizations as successful but not without many challenges that will have to be confronted in the future. While government lawyers say that steps have been taken to address many of the challenges related to the shifts in ways of working that have arisen over the past few years, they point out that other, perhaps more pervasive problems remain.
The very characteristics that helped law firms and government lawyers weather the past few years will continue to be a factor as they move forward into a still-uncertain legal environment.
Indeed, confronting these challenges will be the work of the next few years as government lawyers try to balance completing their work, meeting their budgets, and protecting their work/life balance and own mental health — all as technological advancements like generative artificial intelligence (Gen AI) might well dramatically change how legal work is done within the government (and elsewhere).
This report also shows that pandemic-related disruptions dramatically changed how and where government legal work is conducted, how colleagues interact with each other, and much more. Even as the challenges of the pandemic continue to recede, government agencies are still having to adjust, seeking the proper balance of return-to-office strategies with remote and hybrid working arrangements.
You can access the “2024 Canadian Government Lawyers Benchmark Report” here in English and here in French.
