Interview with the Committee of Queensland Young Lawyers
QYL Committee L-R: Mr Beau Foley (President), Ms Joanne De Jesus (Management Committee), Ms Helen Driscoll (Immediate Past President, QYL LCA Rep), Ms Kimia Zarei (Vice-President), Mr Sam Billingsley-Dadd (Treasurer).
What does it mean to be awarded the 2023 Australian Young Lawyer Organisation Award?
Queensland Young Lawyers (QYL) is a not-for-profit independent association dedicated to encouraging and supporting the personal and professional development of young lawyers, barristers and law students in Queensland.
We are unique in that we are not supported by a law society body or other entity. We run entirely on volunteer early career lawyers who are passionate about making life as an early career lawyer fun, supportive and full of opportunities to be better. Behind the scenes, team QYL works tirelessly to overcome challenges, logistics, funding and the personnel to deliver.
We are extremely proud of what we do and believe we have an important role as facilitators to empower our peers, colleagues and friends.
For us, this Award is an acknowledgement of our place in the profession and validating the hard work of our volunteer team. We are so chuffed – truly, it is such an honour.
Can you tell us about the Queensland Legal Salary Survey, which was the project for which you received the award?
The Queensland Legal Salary Survey (QLSS) is a comprehensive exploration of legal salaries and trending insights in Queensland, collected by lawyers, for lawyers. As far as we are aware, there is no other project like it in Australia. The data is entirely organic, collected directly by QYL anonymously (should participants choose).
The QLSS has been running annually for the last six years, and each year it gets bigger, more detailed, and better. The QLSS is proudly sponsored by our long-term supporter, Peppercorn Recruitment. For the last two years, QYL has partnered with Ronan Analytics to elevate the project and focus on improving credibility, analysis and the data collection quality. This partnership has taken the QLSS to new heights.
The QLSS is a tool used by lawyers at the negotiating table, as a reference point and as a basis for any considered move. We always receive countless messages leading up to review period: - i.e., “When is the survey out?” or more specifically “please can you let me know what a three year estates lawyer in a medium law firm earns on average?”.
Premised on the mission ‘Know your worth’, the QLSS, in recent years, has expanded beyond just salary data, and examined more qualitative data trends.
We recognised that lawyers (particularly early career lawyers) are searching for holistic information about law firms and what they could expect for their post-admission experience, practice area and type of firm. The dollar figure is still a major variable for any prospective or climbing lawyer, but it certainly is not the only one. Turns out (probably unsurprisingly) job satisfaction means a lot more than the money.
Of course, nevertheless, for early career lawyers particularly, the QLSS is critical to knowing your worth and having the backing of reliable, trustworthy data, when heading to that performance review.
The survey itself is run for five to six weeks, after which is transformed into the online public publication, with a launch night where the results are discussed with a panel. All up, it is a three to four month project, timed for performance review season.
Given the extremities in salaries over the last few years, QYL has worked with Ronan Analytics to deliver a live interactive dashboard which collates our salary data since 2020.
The benefit of this (as well as being a smorgasbord for any data nerd) is that you can slice and dice, compare and contrast all the variables and see the amazing trends over the last few years.
You can view the 2023 Salary Survey here.
What’s next for the Queensland Young Lawyers in 2024 and beyond?
Queensland Young Lawyers has a vital role to play in the Queensland legal profession and takes great responsibility and pride in this role. However, QYL would not be able to do the work it does without the support of the legal profession, its partners and sponsors.
There are countless individuals and organisations who help us whom we are so grateful for.
Over the last few years, QYL has taken huge leaps in its professionalism, capabilities and credibility.
We want to ensure QYL maintains this trajectory and let’s just say, there are some big things in the pipeline.
What does the Committee consider are some of the key legal issues and challenges the legal profession needs to focus on, particularly for young lawyers?
We have an entire cohort (or two) who have come through university or critical graduate to 0-2 post admission experience who have not had the advantage of a bustling tutorial room, physical interactions, networking events in a COVID-19 and now hybrid wfh and studying online world.
As a result, QYL has observed a reluctance to network and socialise for fear of not knowing how amongst very junior lawyers. We feel as though there is an important balance to strike between online and in person, especially when it comes to learning and becoming more confident in soft and foundational skills – such a critical to lawyering. Picking up the phone to a client and the confidence to do so is important. QYL believes we need to explore how we can support these cohorts and future cohorts in modern profession.
Feeling isolated, disconnected and unsupported is significant among early career lawyers. We need to ensure there is adequate mentoring from senior lawyers as well as the expected flexibility in working arrangements. It is a difficult balance to strike.
Last Updated on 28/02/2024