Summer Days

In theory, all lawyers get summer holidays. In practice, the problem is not earning enough time to get away but getting your work under control so you can actually leave the office.

Worse still for hard-pressed associates, everyone else in the office is trying to get away as well. July and August is the perfect time for partners to dump their remaining work - the stuff they can't put on hold - on their unsuspecting associates.

And for those loyal troopers who are good enough to work through the dog days of summer, shouldering the burden of other people's deadlines, what rewards lie in store? Only the email from HR, telling you that you have just lots your holiday entitlement, and that can't roll it over until next year. After all, you should have taken it when yoy had the chance.