While lawyers are adept at navigating conflict on behalf of clients, they are often ill equipped to deal with their interpersonal conflict, says one barrister and solicitor-turned-mediator and executive coach. In this episode of The Lawyers Weekly Show, host Jerome Doraisamy speaks with Maria Newport, a “recovering lawyer” now working as a mediator and executive coach, about her journey in the legal profession and what drew her to such work, why discussing lawyers’ inability to manage interpersonal conflict is such a critical conversation, whether such capacities have gotten worse since the onset of COVID-19, and how commonplace it is across the profession.

Newport also unpacks lawyers’ cognisance of such issues and the time constraints to address them, examples of how an inability to manage interpersonal conflict can have flow-on consequences for lawyers, the nexus to profession-wide mental health concerns, the practical steps that lawyers can be taking to better manage interpersonal conflict, how difficult such self-improvement can be, and why lawyers cannot let this issue fall by the wayside. If you like this episode, show your support by  rating us or leaving a review on Apple Podcasts (The Lawyers Weekly Show) and by following Lawyers Weekly on social media: Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

If you have any questions about what you heard today, any topics of interest you have in mind, or if you'd like to lend your voice to the show, email [email protected] for more insights!