Alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) often tout work flexibility as a perk that improves the work-life challenges that plague most corporate legal departments and law firms. But attorneys’ mental health challenges don’t instantly disappear when they take on temporary contract-based work. 

Many ALSPs are tasked with large-scale document review projects that they employ lawyers to conduct. Mental health advocates, however, noted that document review and even substantive contract work can leave some attorneys uninspired or raise fears that they are wasting their professional abilities. Instead, ALSPs can only improve mental health when lawyers are honest about their professional goals and what makes them happy, advocates said.