Guest Editorial: Where Has All The Work Ethic Gone?

Guest Editorial: Where Has All The Work Ethic Gone?

Slovakia
Tools
Typography
  • Smaller Small Medium Big Bigger
  • Default Helvetica Segoe Georgia Times

Some memories never fade away. I remember the first months of my trainee career at Allen & Overy’s newly opened Bratislava office as if they were yesterday. The year was 1998 and we had just moved into new office space. It felt way too big for the team of three lawyers, one PA, and one office manager.

A few weeks in, and without much warning, we were asked to conduct simultaneous due diligence exercises over three state-owned banks that were being privatized. Our team had little to no experience handling such tasks. We could rely on only one native English speaker in our Prague office to help us transform our convoluted and verbose notes into a halfway-understandable report for the client. The hours were brutal. We started in one data room at 7 AM in the morning, moved to another midday, and returned to our office at around 10 PM to start drafting our reports. We rarely finished before 4 AM, went home for a quick nap, shower, and change of shirt, only for it to start all over again. When I wanted to see my then-girlfriend (now-wife), I could only offer her a short walk between the data room and our office. I remember she would bring me cookies for the road and worry about me. How she ever put up with me during those weeks remains a mystery to me.

Despite all the personal inconvenience involved, there was not a shred of doubt in our team’s mind that the work we were doing was exciting and meaningful. For all the anxieties about our lack of experience and qualification, we felt an immense sense of pride and privilege to be involved in such projects. We wanted to emulate the cool professionalism, eloquence, and cosmopolitan attitude of our colleagues from other offices. 

Almost two decades and quite a few all-nighters later, I try to put myself in the shoes of the new generation of lawyers, both at my firm and elsewhere. I wonder whether they feel the same sense of awe and excitement when they are faced with projects that are likely to spoil their work-life-balance plans for a couple of weeks. My conclusion is that, luckily, they do not succumb to such emotions as easily as my colleagues and I did. 

Although at times I catch myself having some sympathy for the school of thought that proclaims the new generation of young lawyers to be a bunch of spoiled and ungrateful fools, overall I must admit that they seem to have it figured out much better and earlier than most of my generation did.  To them, to sacrifice one’s youth on the altar of billable hours targets, deadlines, and pursuit of clients’ rare praise is not a virtue, but a sign of desperation. Although they understand the importance of work, in particular of the meaningful type, they reject the slave (Slav?) mentality that will cause them to burn out before they turn 40 and, if they are women, force them to postpone or abandon plans to have a family.  

Writing these words from the position of a managing partner and employer might seem heretical. But over the years, I have come to realize the truth behind the saying that any idiot can work 16 hours a day for months on end, but only smart people can consistently generate real added value working 8-10 hour days while keeping their weekends free. 

It is true that I will be never able to guarantee to my colleagues that they will not end up stuck in a difficult and time-consuming project for a couple of weeks, perhaps months. But I would like to think that I lead by example in showing them that commitment does not have to be measured by the number of hours spent in the office. It takes energy and time to nurture social relationships, invest in physical well-being, and broaden one’s knowledge beyond what is directly work-relevant. I know it would be detrimental to the long term interests of the firm I represent if I would continuously seek to deprive my team of that time which they need to spend outside of the office. In this day and age it is very likely that I would not be able to get away with it in the first place. And that, I believe, is a very good thing.

By Martin Magal, Managing Partner, Allen & Overy, Bratislava

This Article was originally published in Issue 5.3 of the CEE Legal Matters Magazine. If you would like to receive a hard copy of the magazine, you can subscribe here.