“And You Know What We Think About Sole Practitioners, Ha!”

Richard Susskind has written about the "grand bargain" between the legal profession and society. Lawyers were granted privileges and exclusivity because they were expected to provide expert legal services in the public interest. They didn't. The expense of it denied access to justice. ABS arrived along with technology.

I was at lunch last week when an older lawyer leaned over to me and said "And you know what we think about sole practitioners, ha!".

I laugh when I hear law firm lawyers say sole practitioners can't hack it. I feel like patting them on the head and saying 'There, there. You really don't know what you are talking about’.

We are redefined as freelance. Regulated individuals rather than regulated businesses. Free from the burden of having to run a law firm. So we can hack it a different better way.

You have to have the courage to be disliked. The courage to take responsibility for the regulation, the compliance, running a business and the fee earning. You need bandwidth in your character to carry all of it.

In many ways, a sole practitioner is closer to that ‘grand bargain’ than a law firm. There is nowhere to hide. The client experience, the quality of advice, the contact with the client, efficiency of the service, responsibility, accountability and the reputation of the practice rest on one set of shoulders.

I became freelance in 2025. I ran a law firm before that. I started in a provincial firm then moved to a city firm for litigation. Petrified most days making applications before the Masters at the RCJ. I learned to type fast. No one in the typing pool would take my dictation tapes. I would listen to the partners I was working for chat every day frustrations in administration, decision making, new partners coming in and old partners expected to leave and everyone just everyone wanting the month end figures. No one wanted the training budget (if there was one) to come out of their department. The other trainees were super competitive.

It was one of those environments where an attempt at humour could kill your career. Where feeling and prizing relationships might be considered a waste of energy and associated with fudged thinking.

The law is a serious public service. A profession built around managing uncertainty, prizing logic, huge amounts of data/books, organisation, scheduling, being observant, conscientious and dedicated. It is about being correct in the information we offer, competent in our subject area with an ability to evaluate and apply what we know.

2016 I attended a conference for RAVN, a legal technology company recognised by the ALTA for its Applied Cognitive Engine. The system could identify, extract and summarise large volumes of legal and regulatory material in ways that closely mirrored the work of lawyers, but with greater speed and consistency. BLP demonstrated a bank sale and purchase with 6m instruments. A transaction this size normally required 100 people in a room the size of an air craft hanger with pencils, paper, tea and morale. ACE achieved due diligence of those documents in 16 seconds.

The top 100 firms attended and then there was me at the back. Sole practitioner. I knew that because the host asked. “Anyone other than top 100 here ?” I put my hand up. “can I ask what brought you?” I said “I have the same issues you do on a smaller scale and if ACE is doing it quicker I compete or die”.

I spoke to a partner who told me he had responsibility for tech for 6,000 employees. We talked about buying the new Surface Pro. He said I cannot buy one until I buy one for everyone. Same for phones. I thought to myself “You are Leviathan”. You don't turn easily. You cannot pivot. I can buy a Surface Pro tomorrow. I could see then that staying on the tech bus would level the playing field.

There is exponential change surrounding us. With AI, the playing field has levelled. I can clone my productivity. I can pivot in response to change. Talk to all my clients everyday . I am mobile. A digital nomad any day I choose.

As a profession, we have often been slow to develop especially in a management and leadership. Too often employing process where understanding, awareness and intention is needed. An ability to reach people where they are. All too often we sacrificed relationships for tasks and results and now here we are heading in reverse in the face of mental health stats. A simple open door is a great mentor.

I mentor young people and I get to hear young lawyers in large and small firms in distress, unsupervised with a lack of resources, isolated and trying to get qualified. Others burnt out disillusioned wanting to leave the profession and afraid to lose the badge.

It is not a badge of honour to sacrifice your children’s childhood, health, sleep and common sense for process, internal bureaucracy and achieving another’s bottom line. The public interest is not served by exhausted lawyers.

The grand bargain was never with law firms it was between lawyers and society. The answer is not more process. It is better leadership of self and then others, better understanding, awareness and intention towards self and then others. Better supervision and a profession that remembers its primary purpose: serving the public effectively with access to justice. If Ai shoulders part of that so be it. We were warned.

I always remember, no matter who I worked for. Fee earners, consultant. associate or yourself. It is my practice. I qualified.

And while we're here, we should be stamping out those who dispense legal advice and practice illegally. Public trust depends on it. That part of the bargain still matters.