As law firms, like every business at the moment, continue to review their costs and headcount, business support staff will naturally feel uneasy. Is my department going to be cut? Am I going to be cut? This feeling is quite natural but we should console ourselves with the thought that gone are the days when law firms can live and breathe without a fair representation of support staff. The experience, business acumen and value that business support professionals were recruited for in the first place are still needed. In fact when times are hard, they are needed more than ever.
Many business support professionals now sit at the top table and help make difficult business decisions. They have helped law firms in engineering a more business-focused approach. In some ways it is testament to how far firms have come that they have the information, tools and focus to do such stringent cost and income reviews. And remember, it is not only support staff who are feeling like this, as fee earners are also being let go as firms strive for a leaner shape to carry them through the period of economic uncertainty that casts a shadow over everything we do.
