All change please

Before we get down to the nitty gritty please start to ponder on the vexed question that most solicitors have had to confront at some stage in their careers: what do you do with a smelly (sorry '“ hygienically challenged) client?

Now, most of my pieces for this page talk of good times and bad times, but there has been an underlying thread of optimism throughout. But not any more '“ at least for the time being. I am very shortly to become a statistic.

It happened on Thursday, as the clocks wound their hands or flicked their digits round to 5pm. I was tired, and was planning to put my heap of unsorted papers into a neat pile (a deceptive device to give the impression of order) and to set out through the Norfolk gloom to a relatively early evening.

'The partners have decided. . .'

There was something about the expression on the face of my partner that alerted me. He was smiling but the smile was not quite right. Nor was it usual for him to come into my room at that time of night and sit down '“ still less to close the door behind him: doors are seldom closed in the office.

'The partners have decided . . . ' he began. And I knew the rest. Ever since my quirky and unconventional return (after some years dabbling in multiparty cases) to the firm, I had been struggling to rebuild a clinical negligence practice. And indeed I had - but the problem with such cases is that if you do them on a no win no fee basis you do not get paid until the end '“ and the end takes years to come. I wrongly thought I could turn in a profit after two years. I was wrong, but after three years it is beginning to come good '“ but not soon enough for the partners. In one day last week 20,000 people lost their jobs. I have now made it 20,001.

Many high street firms with a mixed practice are literally haemorrhaging at the moment. The housing market has collapsed; even probates (which you would think would be recession proofed) have tailed off, and of course commercial activity as declined almost to zero. People literally cannot afford to get divorced, because there is no way of realising what is often the main asset (the home). Fee incomes are dramatically below target. But what has not reduced are the overheads of running a practice. Firms across the country are seeing their bank balances drain away and even those prudent firms that did not run on bank loans are having to go cap in hand to their bankers '“ just at a time when banks are wary of lending money to anyone. It is a dire situation and those who thought they were reasonably secure in their jobs are no longer so.

I am writing this from the heart because every day hundreds more in the legal profession are going to be in exactly the same position and will, like me, be facing the prospect of a life without the security of knowing that the mortgage will be paid or that there will be something left for the necessities in life.

So what is to be done? At the moment I am still at the 'rabbits in the headlights' stage. I had a long drive home and during that drive I was running the gamut of human emotion '“ anger, despair, defiance, hope, then more despair. I had already given my long suffering wife two barrels of grief, so I turned my attention to others as I drove, ringing anyone who might not put the phone down on me. But it did help. Slowly ideas began to crystallise.

Here is stage one of the Richard Barr guide to not panicking when you too get that ruefully smiling visit late in the afternoon from a partner.

There is nothing to be ashamed of. We are in a situation that is completely outside our control. It is not our fault that those who run the banks and financial institutions are so inept that they have precipitated the biggest financial downturn for nearly 100 years.

We worked to get where we are in our jobs and we must not equate what has happened with our failure. Think what the situation would be if there had been no downturn. We would still be in our jobs (or at least you would '“ don't know about myself!)

So what's to do?

First take advice. You may have a long time out of work. Make sure you get what you are entitled to. Remember the old adage that the solicitor who represents himself has a fool for a client.

Consider going direct to counsel rather than instructing your own solicitors. You may save a penny or two that way.

Second, use your friends and contacts. It is probably worse than hopeless to apply for jobs at the moment (even if there are any). But someone you have met in your career might know of a niche in a niche practice. Solicitors will not disappear altogether (at least I do not think so). There will still be new jobs somewhere '“ perhaps related to the very thing that is causing job losses.

Third, take stock of your life. Do you really want to be a solicitor for ever? I tell people that I have not yet decided what I want to do when I grow up. Now may be the time to grow up. Try the More to Law website which offers access to jobs both within and outside the law: www.moretolaw.co.uk. Consider sole practice. One of the kind people who wrote to me after hearing my news said: 'Speaking as a sole practitioner, why don't you set up as a sole practitioner? Then you will never be let down again. I practise from home and have done for the past 14 years. I am not a millionaire but it is a much nicer life'.

Sole practice has become a dirty words. But maybe partnership is a dirty word too. Perhaps there is a halfway stage. Some firms are pioneering what are essentially virtual solicitors' offices, where you work at home but are still part of the firm. That might suit some.

It may not even be worth, at the moment, applying for any job. If you can afford to do so, take a year off. One firm dealing in overland holidays is offering a discount to anyone who produces a recent P45. By the time you return the recession may be over.

And while you wait, prepare advice to your new firm on what to do if a really smelly client comes into your waiting room full of fragrant clients. We had that situation last week and the whole downstairs area had to be fumigated. I am sure the answer will look good on your CV.

Oh, and whatever you do, do not cancel your subscription to Solicitors Journal. Otherwise you won't find out what happens next.

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