australasian legal industry research.

ALPMA conducts a range of legal industry research, aligned with our practice management learning and development framework, to help members benchmark their firm against others and understand current legal industry trends, issues, performance and best practice.

Current Research Projects

Legal Industry HR Issues & Salaries

The most comprehensive review of salaries paid across 65+ positions at legal firms in Australia & New Zealand, and reveals the hottest HR issues and challenges for the legal profession by firm size and geographic location to enable benchmarking compensation strategies against similar firms.

The Impact of the Changing Legal Landscape on Australasian Law Firms

In conjunction with the Principal Summit partner, ALPMA conducts annual research to track the changes that are impacting Australasian legal firms today, how law firms have responded to date, and their plans to do to accommodate these changes and how prepared the legal industry is to survive and thrive in the "new normal".

State of Sustainability Priorities in the Legal Industry

ALPMA has partnered with sustainability experts at Ithaca Impact to assess the Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) priorities and activities of Australasian law firms and ALPMA members.

Workflow Management & Productivity

Research covering a wide range of cutting-edge legal trends including lateral hiring, efficient work allocation, diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, and hybrid working practices for 2022 and beyond. By gathering in-depth data from senior Operations, HR & Secretarial Services professionals working at law firms around the globe, we’re able to get unique insight into the latest back-office trends.

Law Firm IT & Practice Management Solutions (PMS)

Through the analysis of the survey results, ALPMA has gained insights from 241 firms across Australasia on their IT and practice management solution usage. This report highlights the current trends, challenges and functionality firms are seeking, making it a vital piece of any firm's review process for new IT services or platforms, in particular practice management systems.

Legal Industry Financial Benchmarking

Research that enables Australian & New Zealand law firms to compare the financial health of their practices compared to similar firms, identify areas for improvement. Benchmark your firm’s financial performance against key indicators including profitability, work in progress days, debtor’s days, interest expense, labour cost, rent, and working capital. Gain insight into the industry’s financial performance expectations for the coming year and find information on law firm growth strategies, remuneration, pricing and charge-out rates.

Past Research Projects

Business Development & Marketing

Research into the emerging trends for marketing & business development initiatives that can assist Australasian law firms to benchmark their efforts to similar firms and prioritise investment. Understanding how your current business development & marketing programs compare to similar firms is essential to successfully growing your law firm, and knowing where to focus your efforts to create effective strategies can be difficult.

Pricing & Profitability

ALPMA is working in conjunction with BigHand to conduct a global industry survey around legal pricing and profitability trends. We’re asking legal finance staff from mid-large sized law firms to take part and find out how law firms plan to adapt pricing and keep work profitable during the current economic uncertainty.

View 2020 Research

Impact of COVID-19

The Associations Matter 2020 COVID-19 Member Impact Survey was conducted on behalf of the Australasian Legal Practice Management Association (ALPMA).  The purpose of the survey was to help ALPMA better understand the impact of COVID-19 on the profession and individual legal firms.

View 2020 Research

Emerging Legal Professions Survey

In 2018 ALPMA, in collaboration with the Centre for Legal Innovation at The College of Law (CLI), undertook one of the most comprehensive surveys into the emerging professions within the legal industry across Australasia.

The drivers of change have been clearly identified as technology and AI; client demands, globalisation, diversity and inclusion, and the need for continuous improvement.

View 2018 Research

Client Experience Benchmarking

ALPMA is proud to partner with CXINLAW for its 2018 Client Experience Benchmark Research assessing the client experience priorities that result in an inspired service culture, outstanding client loyalty and profitable growth.

The results gleaned from this research are both interesting and, at times, alarming.

View 2018 Research
WHITEPAPERS

whitepapers & member only resources.

Practical resources provided free for members, including: templates, checklists, articles, speaker presentations, additional links for members

LEARNING & DEVELOPMENT

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