President’s Corner > Legal Practitioners’ Well-Being Is Not a Luxury But a Core Professional Skill

COLUMN

BY FRANCIS ADEWALE

“[F]or me as a law professor, I have come to see mental health literacy and mental health skills as being as fundamental to lawyering as writing and research. To me these are nuts and bolts because these skills underlie everything else that you do.”

— Lynda Collins, University of Ottawa law professor¹

Until very recently, neither of my two daughters wanted anything to do with the legal profession. Every attempt I made to help them see the virtue of this profession I love and care about was always rebuffed with this curt response: “Daddy, you are not helping.” My wife eventually asked me to back off and leave the girls alone. It pained me to no end, but I had to stop “encouraging” them to become lawyers, just as my own dad had let me find my way. It is therefore a “cause célèbre” when my two daughters recently expressed their desire to read law. One of them is awaiting her LSAT score as I write this.

When I asked my children why they have trepidation toward the legal profession, my oldest daughter’s response was direct: “Your work-life balance sucks, Dad!” Throughout my 33 years of legal practice, I know I have achieved countless victories for my clients, myself, and my profession. I don’t regret the time I spent preparing for trials that freed clients from incarceration or visiting them in jail to obtain their side of the story. I believe that as a public defender, my job is vitally important to my clients’ freedom. But it all comes at a great price: missed drill team practice, ballet recitals, cross-country meets, and many other important events in my kids’ journey to adulthood. I know many other lawyers make these kinds of sacrifices, too.

Herein lies the crucible: How do we find work-life balance, be present with our family, and still perform our obligations as legal practitioners? In my experience as a lawyer, I believe this is where many of us struggle. It is a tough question we must answer as a profession. Many have swung the pendulum so wildly that it impacts their mental well-being. Some lose their family or their ability to practice law in the end.

Writing in the Santa Clara Law Review in 2019, Professor Deborah Rhode, the late former director of the Center on the Legal Profession at Stanford Law School, reprised a heartbreaking story for readers:

In the summer of 2017, many in the legal and leadership community read with shock a front-page article in the Sunday New York Times business section. The author, Eilene Zimmerman, movingly described the death of her ex-husband, Peter, from an infection related to drug abuse. Peter Zimmerman was a leading partner at a leading Silicon Valley law firm who, for several years, had exhibited signs of serious ill health and substance abuse. It is, of course, no secret that many highly successful lawyers suffer from such problems. But what the article brought home is just how serious and tragic their difficulties may be when others look away or fail to look at all. Eilene Zimmerman writes, “Of all the heartbreaking details of his story, the one that continues to haunt me is this: The history on his cellphone shows the last call he ever made was for work. Peter, vomiting, unable to sit up, slipping in and out of consciousness, had managed, somehow, to dial into a conference call.”²

I have seen colleagues I love and treasure suffer from severe depression and other serious mental health crises. I talked about this issue when I first ran for the WSBA Board of Governors for District 5. I didn’t want us to dance around the issue of well-being in the legal profession. I wanted real solutions, not trifling ones. To my eternal joy, I found kindred spirits in then-WSBA President Kyle Sciuchetti, WSBA Director of Advancement Kevin Plachy, and WSBA Wellness Program Manager Dan Crystal.

LISTEN ONLINE

Join President Francis Adewale in his new podcast series, Voices of the Heroes of Justice, as he explores leadership, service, and community impact through candid conversations with heroes of justice from all over Washington. Discover from podcast guests what influenced their views on the rule of law and legal practice and how they are helping to shape our profession, lifting others up, and continuing to move us toward a more just and inclusive legal system. Learn more at www.wsba.org/heroes.

With the help of my Member Engagement Council co-chair, Governor Matthew Dresden, we crafted a charter for the Well-Being Task Force. The response from bar members willing to serve on the task force was massive. We had far more volunteers than we needed. Those who weren’t chosen to serve on the task force were asked to provide input as presenters. The task force included Washington Supreme Court Justice Raquel Montoya-Lewis and King County District Court Judge Michael Finkle as judicial members. Justin Bingham, the Spokane city chief prosecutor, was the chair of the task force. Justin and I have spent many years ruminating on this issue while watching our friends and colleagues get consumed by their work. The task force’s final report was submitted to the Board of Governors at our May meeting. Please read the final report at www.wsba.org/Legal-Community/Committees-Boards-and-Other-Groups/well-being-task-force.

Looking forward, the task force recommended a shared responsibility for well-being and emphasized the following priorities among others: confidentiality and normalizing help seeking; building community and mentorship opportunities; training and continuing legal education courses; access to well-being resources; and institutional, rule, and policy changes. I urge all Bar News readers to take time to read and reflect on these recommendations.

Finally, I would like to acknowledge the tremendous contributions of Immediate Past President Sunitha Anjilvel, President-Elect Kari Petrasek, Treasurer Nam Nguyen, and Governor Allison Widney. Nam and Allison served as Board liaisons to the task force. You can find the names of all of the task force members on page 2 of the final report. Kindly let them know how much we appreciate their commitment to this cause.

Above all, I hope all our members will take the issue of wellness in our profession seriously. It does matter. As Professor Deborah Rhode once wrote, “Lawyer well-being is a critical leadership issue both because the pressures of their position make leaders particularly susceptible to stress and mental health difficulties, and because leaders bear part of the responsibility for workplace conditions that give rise to such difficulties in others and impair organizational performance.”³ As leaders in our firms, small or large, private or public interest, we need to take our responsibility seriously to address the working conditions in our places of employment. It is time to move away from voluntary opportunities for wellness to more incentivized participation. More importantly, seek help from the WSBA Member Wellness Program to learn how you can address mental health issues. It is time to act.

Bend the Arc!

GUEST COLUMN > In each issue of Bar News, WSBA President Adewale asks one Washington legal professional, one “Hero of Justice,” to share how they came to practice law, read the column here.