Job Survey

Featured Job Survey: Updated Leave and Flexible Schedules

Results are still flowing in from last week’s ATL / Lateral Link survey on leave and part-time arrangements. So far, we’re up to almost 700 responses, and we have received quite a few tips about maternity leave. The running table of firms’ paid maternity leave policies that we posted yesterday has now been updated to […]

By Justin Bernold on February 20, 2008 4:45 pm

Results are still flowing in from last week’s ATL / Lateral Link survey on leave and part-time arrangements. So far, we’re up to almost 700 responses, and we have received quite a few tips about maternity leave.
The running table of firms’ paid maternity leave policies that we posted yesterday has now been updated to include new information on Heller Ehrman, Nixon Peabody, Kaye Scholer, Cahill Gordon, Kirkland & Ellis, Freshfields, Kramer Levin, Thelen Reid, Goodwin Procter, and to correct information on Winston & Strawn and Mayer Brown.
Today, let’s talk about how associates view their firms’ policies, and also explore the availability of part-time, flex-time, and other alternative work/life-styles.
Overall, it looks like firms have room to improve:

  • Roughly 30% of respondents of either gender felt that their employer’s part-time and leave options were adequate, but 42% of female respondents and 28% of male respondents disagreed.
  • Fourteen percent of female respondents said that they felt uncomfortable asking for leave or part-time status, a discomfort shared by eighteen percent of male respondents.
  • Most other respondents weren’t sure, but only twelve percent of male respondents and five percent of female respondents didn’t care.

    • Discussion continues, after the jump.


    Fifty-four percent of female respondents said that a firm’s parental leave policy was an important or very important factor in their interest in working for that firm, and about a fifth of male respondents agreed. Flexible schedules may be an even more important issue, with roughly two-thirds of female respondents and a quarter of male respondents viewing a firm’s part-time or flex-time policy as an important or very important factor in their interest in working for that firm. (Roughly half of respondents reported that they would be interested in working fewer hours for reduced pay if their firms gave them a choice.)
    So how much flexibility are firms offering?

  • 59% of respondents said that their firms allow attorneys to go part-time on a case by case basis.
  • Almost 20% said that their firms have a reduced hours policy that applies to attorneys in general, while another nine percent reported that their firms have a reduced hours policy that is only applicable to childcare.
  • About 15% of respondents said that their firms offer different billable-hour tracks, with different pay scales.
  • Roughly 14% of respondents are at firms with a flex-time policy.
  • A handful of respondents are at firms that allow full-time telecommuting.
  • About nine percent of respondents said their firms had no part-time, flex-time, or telecommuting options.