The Yale psychiatry professor and formally practising lawyer will speak at Canadian Legal Summit in October
In a recent episode of CL Talk, Canadian Lawyer’s podcast, Dr. Traci Cipriano, assistant clinical professor in the Department of Psychiatry at Yale School of Medicine and author of The Thriving Lawyer, discussed the urgent need to address burnout in the legal profession, the barriers to meaningful change, and the structural solutions required to support lawyer well-being. Cipriano explored why self-care alone is not enough, the critical role of leadership in driving cultural shifts, and practical policies that can make a real difference in legal workplaces. She will speak on these issues at the Canadian Legal Summit 2025 in Toronto on October 9.
Below is a summary of the conversation:
Burnout in law is a workplace crisis, not just a personal struggle. “The World Health Organization actually defines burnout as a workplace phenomenon. And I find this very interesting, because it's not a medical diagnosis or a mental health diagnosis, it's a workplace issue,” Cipriano says.
Her own shift from law to psychology came after realizing there were aspects of the day-to-day practice that she didn't enjoy or found draining. “I had to do some soul searching to think about where my skills, interests, [and] personality would best have my needs met,” she says.
She aims to move the profession beyond a narrow focus on self-care. “I wanted to help the community recognize, yes, self-care is an important part of it, but it's really just one component. There are many other individual … and workplace factors that come into play,” she says.
Underlying burnout, she argues, is a clash between individual needs and workplace demands. “When people are experiencing burnout, they might feel exhausted or depleted in terms of their energy, detached from their work, or increasingly negative or cynical, and they might have decreased professional efficacy,” she says. Many lawyers are very high in perfectionism and have difficulty managing their competing demands, causing them to be highly distressed.
One of the biggest barriers to fixing the tension between individual needs and workplace demands is denial among leadership. “It's important for leaders to be able to recognize and acknowledge that there is this incongruence happening,” she says. “The hope would be that they could reflect on, ‘What are the expectations of our workplace? What are our policies, what is our work environment like, and how are these things influencing the experience of the lawyers and staff that work here?’ … Leadership to be involved in this conversation.”
There’s no one-size-fits-all fix. “The needs and pain points are different in each organization. So what I would like leaders to do is to survey their lawyers and staff and get a sense from them. ‘What are the issues? What are the pain points? What are your needs?” she says.
Wellness workshops alone don’t cut it. “A one-off workshop isn't enough. So, I can raise awareness by being there, and I can give you some skills, but then you need to be held accountable and reinforce all those skills that you learned,” she says. “Are our partners attending? Are they engaging? Are they utilizing the skills? Are they role modelling outside of the workshop?”
Real change means real policies. Flexibility is key. “An obvious example is flexibility in terms of flexible hours or remote versus hybrid versus in-person. We learned during the pandemic that, hey, we actually can do some work via Zoom,” she says. She also suggests mandatory office closures during the summer and the holiday season. “By shutting down the office for a week now, no one feels like, Okay, I'm letting the team down.”
Leaders need to spot burnout early. “Some things to look out for are detachment, decreased participation, maybe fewer ideas. People might be less engaged. In general, they might be slower to get their work done. [The] might be more irritable, maybe deadlines are missed. You might notice people seem even more tired than usual, or you might have concerns about substance use,” she says.
Law’s perfectionist culture makes things worse. “If you're setting ... unrealistically high standards and expectations for yourself in all aspects of your life, something has to give somewhere, and so changing your mindset is an important piece,” she says.
Individuals can’t fix this alone, but they can start small, she says. “What are your needs? Where are you struggling most? Is it self-care? Do you need to do more to engage in exercise, eat healthy, get more sleep, get outdoors, and have fun, things like that? Or are your relationships suffering?”
Cipriano isn’t naïve about the pace of change, but she’s not giving up. “I do have hope. I do. I feel like things have changed since 2020. There was an awakening in the legal profession by necessity with a pandemic, and I see well-being has now become a pretty mainstream topic when it may not have been before,” she says.
Cipriano will appear on a panel entitled “Breaking the burnout cycle - What needs to change and how we start?” at the Canadian Legal Summit 2025 in Toronto on October 9.
This conversation can also be found here:
The episode can also be found on our CL Talk podcast homepage, which includes links to follow CL Talk on all the major podcast providers.
