Law firms made huge profits during lockdown as lawyers adjusted to working from home. After the storm passed, firms tried to reconcile a workforce that had come to appreciate the flexibility of working from home with the long-term leases signed before 2020.

While experienced lawyers resisted being called back to the office for in-person sessions, even though they knew their firms were still thriving, partners and the younger cohorts worried about training and collaboration. Some firms responded with paranoid back-to-the-office policies. Others embraced hybrid work models and found that lawyers actually returned to the office on their own more often than expected. Some firms opted for three days in the office, others for four. Some opted for mandatory anchor days, others opted for flexibility.

DLA Piper has so far been cautious about office attendance. And just to be on the safe side, they also regulate the lawyers’ work from home in detail!

The firm informed lawyers yesterday that it would begin pushing them back into the offices:

In recent years, the firm has had a policy of high performance flexibility, where lawyers were expected to professionally manage their time between working in the office and working from home. To improve collaboration, training, mentoring and client service, the firm has updated its policy to provide a more structured view of the expectations placed on lawyers.

Effective September 3, the firm’s work location policy will take effect, requiring lawyers to work from their assigned firm office at least three business days per week.

That change worried some employees, who told ATL that management told them a year ago that the company would never implement a return-to-work requirement. And while the memo uses words like “encouraged” rather than “required,” it ends with vague “or else” rhetoric.

Attorneys at all levels are expected to take the policy seriously and increase their office presence if they do not already work in the office three days per week. As stated in the policy, while the firm has currently chosen not to mandate exact work hours, we will consider an attorney’s compliance with the policy as part of our overall evaluation of the attorney’s future career within the firm.

According to one source, the “recommended” language may also reflect the firm’s inability to effectively accommodate all of its lawyers on the same day, as some locations have terminated, leased and subleased vast amounts of office space based on the previous policy.

Imagine buying a home knowing that the commute, while annoying, is doable because you only have to make the trip a few times a month, and then you find out that you have to show up at least 150 times a year to secure your career trajectory. It’s really not as easy to pack up camp and move as it is for partners to change office policies at will.

Unhappy with the new office policy and angering employees, the firm decided to take a little more granular control over how lawyers do their work from home:

When lawyers are not working in the office, they are expected to create an appropriate work environment. This includes, but is not limited to, setting up a work area free from noise, distractions, and other disturbances. Individuals working remotely must make care arrangements for any dependents, as lawyers should not care for children, the elderly, or anyone else during work hours. Individuals working remotely are also expected to create a safe and healthy work environment.

Wildly condescending.

Of course, you can’t work full-time and be a full-time caregiver at the same time. But you can also trust them to get it all done. These lawyers managed to generate a whopping 8.8 percent increase in profits while everyone was waiting for a vaccine and no one had to scold them for taking care of their kids at the time. If they have to pick up the kids from school for a week while their babysitter has the flu, or make lunch for Grandpa after he breaks his hip, that is none of the company’s business. Do something if the lawyer starts messing up, and otherwise let him get by in his work environment the way he needs to do his job for the client.

Finding the right balance in the post-lockdown world is not easy. But to paraphrase Kamala Harris, we are all burdened by what was and is, in the context of everything we live in. It is one thing to jump straight to a three-day rule and quite another to tell your team that there will be no office rule before you pull the rug out from under them. Perhaps there are good reasons to believe that the old rule was not ideal, but Decisions have been made and an abrupt reversal will not benefit the company from the people who have been busy turning the company into a $3.8 billion company.

Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email us with tips, questions or comments. Follow him on Þjórsárdalur if you’re interested in law, politics, and a good dose of college sports news. Joe is also Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.