IndyBar: A Collaborative Column Has Practicing Law Really Changed?

A. Scott Chinn, Faegre Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP, IndyBar Masters Division Chair; Monica McCoskey, Paganelli Law Group, IndyBar Young Lawyers Division Chair

This is a joint column co-written monthly by the Chairs of the Masters Division and Young Lawyers Division to compare, contrast, and relate practicing law 25+ years ago to practicing law today. Each column will examine a new general subject.

Hard Truths and Some Hopes About Work-Life Balance

The legal profession possesses a well-earned reputation of demanding hours for its practitioners. Perhaps you’ve noticed. While work-life balance for lawyers has been paid lip service in the past, the stereotype of the lawyer who is always “on” is likely closer to the mark than the well-adjusted lawyer who is able to measure out adequate portions of time for family, recreation, exercise and promotion of mental health. And most legal positions reward quantity of work – placing incentives on doing more of it and less of the things that promote personal well-being.

Work life balance for lawyers may now be getting more attention than in the past and there are some reasons for that. Generational expectations are changing. Technology has changed – you can be “on” 24/7, thus, clients expect it. Remote work has allowed people to shift their hours to the time of day they prefer. Mental health is talked about more freely than in the past and with less stigma. And to some extent, attorney labor (think “law firm associates” and lawyers who are employees of various other institutions) have more market power to demand lifestyle accommodations.

Although Scott was familiar with the phrase work-life balance when he started practice more than 30 years ago, it was not something that he or most people in his legal world took seriously. Being able to work (and bill) as many hours as possible – he remembers a 300-hour February in about 1996 – was glorified, a right of passage, and an illustration of the phrase “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” It’s not that Scott was all work and no fun – but the fun was in the context of another perhaps trite phrase – “work hard, play hard.”

Fast forward to 2025, and as a leader of a large group at a law firm, Scott and his firm management colleagues spend a lot of time thinking about the engagement and needs of all lawyers at the firm, and especially associates. While more senior and more junior lawyers at firms still may not always see it the same way regarding demands and expectations, there are decidedly different norms in terms of work flexibility, family friendliness, and personal well-being than in previous decades. Many if not most new lawyers more freely ask for flexibility and policies that promote health. (We have and use a personal well-being app, for example.)

For Monica, the phrase “work-life balance” is really just a notional term. The concept of finding and implementing manageable and sustainable ways to juggle the demands of a legal career, with the highs and lows of everything else in one’s personal life should be easy, right? Not quite. For many professions, logging off at 5, taking the vacation, and not responding to email within the day is appropriate, anticipated, and sometimes even expected. Unfortunately, for attorneys, especially the “fresh and eager” ones, setting those boundaries is far more complicated. Monica’s reminders to herself: (1) work will always be there; (2) find the appropriate way to decline what is not/will not serve you; and (3) stay ambitious without self-destructing. The reality is the only person who can create “work-life balance” is you. Employers, partners, coworkers, etc. are simply there to (hopefully) support the careful and conscious decisions you have made to persevere through another day.

As the tone of this column reveals, there is still undeniable tension between changing attitudes about policies and norms that actually promote work-life balance and the hard truths of economic incentives. First, there are the changes that are modeled behavior in the current context. Good legal employers allow healthy boundaries regardless of whether they were acceptable back in the day and do not create a culture of obsession about surpassing billable hours expectations. And lawyers should both look inwardly and take advice about how to model sustainable success for themselves. In short, if you find yourself out of balance, reset – and do not be deterred about work “consequences” from doing so. Most often these days, people will respect the choice if it is earnest.

But now the hard truths. Be willing to accept some work “consequences” – especially economic ones – from treating your body, mind and spirit the way you think they need to be treated. If someone wants to and does blow away the billable hours target and eschew a more balanced life, the economic model will reward them – and some will choose that. And we shouldn’t cast aspersions about that choice. The import of this discussion is the ability for modern lawyers to make the opposite choice to pursue more balance.

On a final note, it is almost certainly true that our norms in this area aren’t static. As just one example, what will the greater use of artificial intelligence for legal operations and for client work do to change the dynamics of the work-life balance question? We’re not sure. But it seems unlikely that we will return to a time when work expectations for lawyers were akin to a hazing exercise.•

A. Scott Chinn is a partner at Faegre Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP where he represents public and private clients in state, municipal, and public sector legal matters. He provides advisory, transactional, and general counsel representation for public finance, procurement, regulatory, infrastructure, environmental, and economic development matters. Prior to joining the firm, he served as counsel to Indianapolis Mayor Bart Peterson and as Corporation Counsel to the City of Indianapolis. Chinn currently serves as the Chair of the Masters Division, is a member of the IndyBar Board of Directors, and is a past president. Chinn is also a Distinguished and Life Fellow of the IndyBar Foundation. He earned his B.A. from Indiana University and his J.D. from the Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law.

Monica McCoskey is an attorney with Paganelli Law Group where her practice concentrates on business and real estate litigation. Prior to joining Paganelli Law Group, McCoskey was an associate attorney with a law firm in Northern Indiana, where she practiced securities litigation and represented plaintiffs and defendants in various legal matters. She is the Chair of the Young Lawyers Division, a member of the IndyBar Board of Directors, and Co-Chair of the Social Subcommittee for the Litigation Section’s Executive Committee. She earned her bachelor’s degree from the University of Michigan and her J.D. from the Indiana University Maurer School of Law.