Working Hours at Herbert Smith Freehills

My company has an Agile60 policy, which places the expectation that you attend the office 60% of the time. The unofficial expectation of grads in most teams is to attend the office as much as possible, which for me is an awesome expectation. When this is pushed by those from the top down, it shows an understanding and care for junior development. It also helps mean that our time in the office has more intent, whether it be organising team coffees and catch ups, or being called into client meetings or other more exciting learning opportunities. That being said, the company respected the LSA and also is extremely understanding when it comes to commuting or other life activities.

My company has an Agile 60 policy which allows us to work from home 40% of the time if we wish. There is great flexibility to allow for other commitments that people might have in their day.

I have mostly been working from 9 to 6:30, with longer hours as required when a deal is closing. I've also been able to work quite independently from home.

Extremely flexible and always trying to be considerate of our outside work commitments.

Not flexible with some leeway, but highly team dependent and also highly dependent on business needs. Most people would work 3-4 days in the office each week. The hours are "flexible" in the sense that, at least for my team, because I am expected to be flexible with my hours, some leeway is given as to being late, or taking a longer lunch or dinner break.

Flexible with commitments and WFH.

The hours can be long but I've never felt as though I'm required to stay back. I choose to stay back because the work is interesting and I want to keep up to date with the matters I'm working on.

Long hours are a common experience in the industry and largely unavoidable given the client-centric nature of the work that we do as commercial lawyers. Having said that I strongly feel that our firm has the protections in place including frequent utilisation reporting, check-in sessions with senior lawyers and HR as well as informal team meetings to manage this. Further, the firm is really flexible with its work from home policy and benefits for employees who are required to work late.

My work hours vary, but the team is very strict on the LSA requirements, so I can't work past 6:30pm. Otherwise the team is quite flexible - I know others in the team will work when it suits them (early in the morning if they have kids) etc.

Quite flexible overall, but it is very team dependent. My team for example starts later in the morning, and will work later at night. One of the solicitors has a newborn baby, so they leave at a little bit earlier, then jump back online later on at night. If someone has a drs appointment or they need to pop out, it's really flexible as long as the work is done at the end of the day. it's also around 3 days in person a week, but again, this can be flexible.

Work is very flexible around my needs.

Hours can be long, but that comes with transaction work. Generally not that flexible regarding hours, but there is flexibility in terms of where you work and, in some cases, what time you work.

It is comfortable. The firm is flexible with working from home and from other offices when needed, and if personal matters get in the way.

So far, the hours have been good. However, I will say that they are getting longer as I get more experienced. Hour also varies from team to team. HSF mandates 3 days in the office per week.

The works hours are the usual 8:30 to 5, but there is a lot of flexibility in working from home, fitting in appointments, and working later in exchange for a later start to the day.

Very.

Hours are ok but they do peak to longer nights.

I roughly start at 07:30 and finish at around 17:30 or 18:00.

Ebs and flows, so there may be overtime but not always.

So far, my hours have been very reasonable. I have only worked on weekends occasionally, and I am generally home before 8pm.