Support for Lawyers

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SFL About us

About us

Industry-specialised wellness professionals

A wellbeing provider like no other

Support for Lawyers is a game changer. We’re transforming perceptions about mental health and re-designing the model of care to make tangible, sustained improvements for all. We combine responsive crisis care with ongoing preventative counselling, coaching, and education. We support individuals and law firms to improve mental health and resilience – because your work is essential and so is your wellbeing.

Meet our Founder

Margurite Picard
Margurite Picard
Marguerite Picard
Founder

I was admitted to legal practice in 1982. Over my career, I have experienced my share of professional challenges from the daily stresses of being a lawyer, like billing pressures, adversarial relationships, and failing to have work/life boundaries, to more serious issues, such as gender discrimination, vicarious trauma, and burnout. I have read the literature and participated in global discussions with industry leaders about the cultural, organisational, and systemic challenges lawyers and legal staff face. I’ve heard the lip service paid to wellbeing and have witnessed the harmful impacts of this. I have a profound belief that the industry needs to change because you, your firm, and your clients deserve better.

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Our foundation

Our mission

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To connect lawyers and legal staff with ongoing mental wellbeing support that works. While we do help in a crisis, our core purpose is prevention.

Our vision

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To remove the industry-wide stigma about needing and accessing mental health services by providing ongoing, preventative and responsive, one-to-one counselling and coaching. We work with individuals, progressive law firms, and industry leaders to engage with our new model of care, sending ripples through the industry to influence wider cultural change.

Our values

Preventative care

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Stigma-free care

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Tailored support

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Partnership

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Authentic action

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Our people

We work with highly skilled psychologists and counsellors, each with a minimum of 10 years’ experience and in good standing in their fields. We are dedicated to creating an environment of safety, private access to support, empathy, compassion, and professionalism.

We deeply understand the legal industry’s unique work and challenges because we’ve walked in your shoes. As a collective of specialists who have worked as lawyers or extensively with them, we know how to help you survive and thrive in the industry.

Meet our Head of Counselling

Dr. Tina Sinclair
Dr. Tina Sinclair
Dr Tina Sinclair
Head of Counselling

With more than forty years’ experience, I have dedicated my career to helping people cope with stress, reignite the joy and fulfilment in their life, and change unhealthy habits. I completed my PhD at Cambridge and have since worked extensively as a consulting psychologist with lawyers and the unique challenges they face. I help with communication, optimising personal and professional relationships, navigating conflict, and developing coping tools to build resilience. Support for Lawyers is a truly innovative wellbeing provider, caring for individuals whilst also striving for industry-wide change. We’re working hard to remove barriers to care, changing perceptions about needing and accessing support, and building a healthier, happier, and more resilient workforce.

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Margurite Picard
Marguerite Picard
Founder

My legal career started in 1982. I worked in community legal centres before moving into criminal law (both as a prosecutor and a defence attorney), then general practice followed by family law.

Over my career, I have experienced my share of professional challenges from the daily stresses of being a lawyer, like billing pressures, adversarial relationships, dealing with ‘difficult’ clients, failing to have work/life boundaries, and feeling out of my depth without adequate mentorship or coaching available. I also experienced more serious issues, including vicarious trauma and burnout. And as a female lawyer, I also faced gender discrimination issues. I was sacked from one job for being married and overlooked for partnership in another – given my age at the time, my bosses were worried I’d take parental leave soon after. I have seen colleagues suffer the same challenges and worse.

I have read the literature and participated in global discussions with industry leaders about the cultural, organisational, and systemic challenges lawyers and legal staff face. I’ve heard the lip service paid to wellbeing and have witnessed the harmful impacts of this. I have a profound belief that the industry needs to change because you, your firm, and your clients deserve better.

Lawyers and legal staff must be cared for. But traditional wellbeing services are all-too-often band-aid solutions that fail to achieve sustained results. What I learned is that we lawyers are perceptive to the need for help (in ourselves and others) but are very reluctant to seek it. We resist taking advantage of Employee Assistance Programs because we’ve all heard the gossip about colleagues who’ve accessed one and seen how they’re treated as a result of the stigma. We endlessly compare ourselves to others’ who appear to be coping, and we have little education in recognising our own triggers and how to deal with them.

In an industry that promotes stoicism as a badge of honour, we are more likely to blame ourselves for not coping rather than blaming external and structural causes. This only serves to erode our mental, and often physical, health. Lots of us have vivid fantasies of leaving law. Sometimes that’s the answer. More often, though, it is not. So, I founded Support for Lawyers to help lawyers and legal staff with a wellbeing alternative that actually works – because it’s worth checking in before you check out of the profession.

Preventative care

Support during a crisis is important. Preventing challenges becoming crises is better.

Stigma-free care

Wellbeing is as important as your work. So, it’s critical you can access the support you need. But all too often, we place a higher value on stoicism than authentic self-care.

We partner with progressive law firms to offer employee and leadership support. While sessions and their content remain private, we are removing the stigma about attending them. And adding regular, ongoing check-ins to your monthly routine makes it as common, and important, as something like monthly billing. It shifts the dial from passivity and weakness to action and strength.

Engaging with Support for Lawyers makes a bold statement. It demonstrates the value placed on your essential wellbeing and de-stigmatises mental health support.

Tailored support

Wellbeing is a unique journey – everyone's is different. We provide one-to-one support tailored to the individual’s needs as well as industry-specific challenges. Our ongoing therapeutic check-ins ensure lawyers and legal staff connect with, and feel empowered on, their wellness journey.

Partnership

Responsibility for employee wellbeing does not rest solely on the shoulders of the employee nor of the organisation – it must be done in partnership.

Support for Lawyers is the embedded ally, supporting both parties in their respective roles. Our therapists form trusted, therapeutic relationships with individual staff to manage wellbeing. We also partner with organisations, providing education and coaching to help managers and leaders support their people.

When we’re engaged by an individual, independent of their firm, our therapist forms the trusted partnership. They provide the safe, non-judgemental space for confidential counselling, coaching, and education.

Authentic action

There is a lot of research and discussion about mental health and wellbeing in the legal industry.

Support for Lawyers thinks you deserve better. We’re taking meaningful action to effect positive change.

Dr. Tina Sinclair
Dr Tina Sinclair
Head of Counselling

With more than forty years’ experience, I have dedicated my career to helping people cope with stress, reignite the joy and fulfilment in their life, and change unhealthy habits. I completed my PhD at Cambridge and have since worked as a consulting psychologist in Australia, Canada, and England.

Throughout my career, I have worked extensively with lawyers in different specialisations and settings. I have a deep understanding of the unique challenges they face and how to help, whether in crisis or building resilience. Working with individuals, couples, and in dispute resolution, I help people to cope with stress, reignite the joy and fulfilment in their life, and change unhealthy habits. My work encompasses improving communication, optimising personal and professional relationships, navigating conflict, both in and outside the workplace, and developing coping skills.

As the Head of Counselling, my passion and expertise bolster the Support for Lawyers mission. I work with our team of therapists to ensure we connect our clients with the highest-quality, tailored wellbeing support – from the individual counselling and coaching to supporting organisations with expert insights and a tailored program of resources. I am proud to lead our team of innovative thinkers applying a trauma informed approach to our work to achieve positive, sustained results.