Questions to Discuss What do you think about the benefits of Job Crafting? What are the key strengths of Job Crafting? What limitations do you see? What are the reasons to personalise our legal work through job crafting? Have you witnessed other colleagues Job Crafting? If so how? Did this initiative impact your work in a positive, negative or neutral way? Deb H

Job Crafting involves a bottom up change made by an individual person to their own work role. Adopting the STAR [Situation, Task, Action, Review] framework we can explain it as follows. The Situation is the work role. The Task is the opportunity to make small changes to a job. Which can better align the job with a person's preferences, strengths and values. Yet the basic structure remains (as in the Job Description). Adjustments are simply made to ensure a better fit. It's like adjusting the size of a suit. The Action is to modify the work tasks, relationships or mindset and is employee driven not imposed by the organisation. the Review stage involves analysing the success, in terms of the initiator's wellbeing, work enjoyment or professional development. This is an iterative process. Job crafting can help a lawyer better align their work for their own interests, wellbeing and needs. This will sometimes be done secretly, without the knowledge of their organisation. Alternatively the legal organisation may choose to disregard the positive work initiatives, tweaking, a lawyer introduces even though it is aware. This later approach highlights the findings in my PhD findings that lawyers often undertake informal leadership work which is not recognised, rewarded or supported adequately by their legal organisation. Their motivation in doing this work is to achieve better work outcomes. For their own sense of achievement as well as to contribute to the legal organisation. Legal organisations can fuel the success of their people, in part, by undertaking the following four activities set out in this diagram. More clarity about who, what, when, why and where such small changes are occuring offers a sound base upon which to create opportunities for crafting conversations and personalised check-ins with lawyers about the opportunities they identify to improve their work role. Legal organisations that tap onto this often hidden resourcefulness can benefit also with enhanced retention, efficiency and effectiveness, collaboration and constructive feedback into processes and procedures. This will become increasingly important with the advent of AI and software legal practice tools. We will explore this further when we consider Role Sculpting. What are your thoughts about this approach to role improvement for lawyers? regards Deb H

Welcome to a collaborative safe space where your voice, your thoughts and feelings will be heard and valued. I really appreciate you coming by. Your contributions will be invaluable in helping to gauge the efficacy of Legal Working Culture (LWC) .https://www.coreeq.org/post/legal-working-culture-revisited Many of you may have read the blog, Silos and Swimlanes in which I introduce Legal Working Culture. Amongst other things LWC can underpin a Professional Capability Curriculum. It provides a constructive creative approach to retaining the collegiality in law by distilling observational research and valuable insights from leading lawyers across the three main disciples of law, the judiciary, academia and practising lawyers. https://www.coreeq.org/post/silos-and-swim-lanes-where-does-legal-working-culture-fit-with-the-australian-academy-of-law At work lawyers navigate a dual identity as a professional and an organisational worker. Many lawyers also acquire formal and sometimes informal leadership roles. Legal Working Culture offers a framework to help lawyers, their managers and people and culture experts to identify and balance out their professional development needs in both professional and organisational leadership. Many lawyers work as professionals employed by legal organisations. Within this context, their management and leadership and work-based learning are seen as an insignificant by-product of their professional legal work. Many lawyers undertake this additional responsibility when they do not have formal positions of authority. This work is not formally acknowledged or validated. By making visible this "better work" important shortcomings of the prevailing organisational and professional culture (and leadership) can become apparent. Possibly an uncomfortable truth for some organisations. However People and Culture practitioners may see the benefits of such a work based professional development framework and approach.

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