February 2022 | Magda Marciniak | Partner, Justitia
To me, mentoring means...
sharing your knowledge, experience, connections and ideas with other women to help support and empower them. Our industry is incredibly conservative and excludes so many people. Some are not aware of it, or don’t want to look too hard. Certainly we are not talking about it. It does not have to be that way. Mentoring a woman whose culture and/or class is different to what is dominant in our industry, through a mentoring scheme or informally, is one way we can all contribute to changing this. But of course law firms and other legal organisations have a major role to play, if they are genuine about real inclusion. However, we first need to be honest and acknowledge that some people have been conditioned their whole lives to take “their place” in our privileged industry whereas others, who are the best and brightest in their own communities, are playing catch up right from the start. What are we going to do about that?
I love practising law because...
I get paid to problem solve all day. What a huge privilege! There are people smarter than me who never get the chance to use their brains all day. The key legislation in employment law changes regularly - just when you think you have mastered it there is a change of government, a new Act and we are all starting again. Which means one cannot get too comfortable as there are always new things to learn. This keeps me interested. And employment law is all about people, so there is never a dull moment, as everyone is unique. I also love working with organisations that share Justitia’s values, as this means that I get to play a part in creating healthy workplaces for their employees. Which leads to the next question….
A career highlight has been...
my career turning point. At university the message was that if you want to have a successful and fulfilling career then you have to work at a big law firm; anything else is just second rate (which means you are second rate). What crap. I lapped it up at the time, not knowing any better. Boy did I get a shock when I first started working. Some people genuinely love BigLaw I’m sure, but many others have to suppress their true personality, identity, feelings and values just to survive in that environment. After more reflection and experience, I promised myself that I would live an authentic life, and at that moment I knew I had reached a turning point in my career. I quit, blew my home deposit on a year of travel, then returned to Melbourne and started working at Justitia. Once you start living an honest life, everything just starts to flow.
