As the pandemic drags on, law firms and other legal employers continue to navigate the challenges of a remote work environment. Few challenges may be as daunting as recruiting and onboarding top talent 100% remotely. Vetting candidates and building relationships with new attorneys can be a totally different ballgame than maintaining connectivity with old colleagues. As with every other potential pandemic-related stumbling block, firms and other legal employers have done their best to rise to the occasion. We offer our views about the hits and misses in this process through the lens of the life cycle of legal recruiting, training and integration.

It is worth noting at the outset that most legal employers did not start from scratch on this issue. Video conferencing has been used for interviews and training programs long before the onset of the pandemic. In the past, however, those processes typically included some kind of in-person component, such as a group dinner or in-person visit to the office. Now, the process is entirely virtual.