For some time now it has been brought to my attention that a lot of very competent young people graduate from one of our law faculties at one of our local universities and join a law firm, only to be worked into the ground. They are expected to work a full day at work and then expected to work well into the night whether from home or the office, and even receive phone calls late at night with a request for work that must be ready by start of work the next morning from one of the partners of the company. And that this happens day after day after day without let up, and month after month, and year after year, and if they object to this treatment they are brought in front of HR and their jobs and even their careers are effectively threatened. Even whilst they are on official holiday leave they can expect a phone call from a partner requesting that work be done. It is my understanding that Candidate attorneys and young associates are particularly vulnerable and pushed to the very edge of what they can bear as functioning human beings, even suicide.

Indeed, I would have thought that the employer/employee relations within a law firm would be perfect considering that it is the law that they purport to be their guiding light.

I would like to confirm that my above impressions are indeed true and not just isolated events, especially as I have gained the impression that such treatment of junior staff is fairly ubiquitous and thus wish to hear from people who have been treated in this manner or from people who know of friends who have been subjected to such treatment or who have heard of someone subjected to such treatement, and believe, as I do, that if this is all true, then the practice should be exposed, and receive the criticism and exposure that it is due.