Episode 5 · March 2026 · 7 min
Pearl Chan’s day as a fractional lawyer
Client work, motherhood, two computers, and the first-ever Goodlawyer of the Year award — a regular Tuesday that used to come with guilt.
Overview
Pearl Chan was Goodlawyer’s first Goodlawyer of the Year. This episode spends a day in her house in North Toronto to show what that actually looks like: Sammy the dog, school drop-off, a home office with two workstations, and dinner she cooks herself. She does not have a nanny. That was a choice.
The line that stays is not about hours. “It’s not even so much that you have more time, it’s that you have less guilt.” She still picks her daughter up. She still sometimes works after dinner. She no longer feels she should have been at a desk instead. One computer is dedicated to a main fractional client for security. The other is everything else. She rolls back and forth. She says the setup is better than what she had at the firm.
Before she made the leap she had a checklist: sophisticated clients, work from home, a comfortable living, the strategic work she loved, and the flexibility to walk the dog and make it to volleyball. Goodlawyer, she says, checked every box. The hard part is the entrepreneurial flavor — you still interview, you still sell yourself, matches take time. Without the platform she thinks she would still be in-house, burnt out, and not long from quitting law for interior design.
What to take from it
- The unlock is less guilt, not a shorter to-do list. She still does pickup and still works after dinner.
- She designed the week on purpose: no nanny, her own drop-offs, dinner every night, and senior client work.
- Security is practical. A dedicated machine for the main fractional client; everything else on the other desk.
- The checklist came first — sophisticated clients, strategic work, pay, flexibility — and the model had to clear all of it.
- Fractional still means selling yourself. The platform gives choice. It does not remove interviews.
Who this is for
In-house lawyers who feel guilty leaving the desk for pickup. Parents who want both jobs — the legal one and the home one. Anyone who thinks “fractional” means unserious work.
Keep exploring
- Practice on GoodlawyerHow independent lawyers join the network, set capacity, and get matched.
- Future of Law Awards 2025Pearl was the first Goodlawyer of the Year. Meet the winners.
- Why lawyers are unhappyBurnout, autonomy, and why so many lawyers leave.
- Hire fractional counselTell us what your team needs — we match the right lawyer.
Transcript
Lightly edited from the video for readability. Speaker labels added.
Narrator
You know what it’s like to be a lawyer, but what about a fractional lawyer? We spent today with Pearl Chan to see what that actually looks like. Client work, motherhood, and building an entirely different type of legal career. Did I mention she was Goodlawyer of the Year? So yeah, she’s kind of a big deal. This is a day in the life of a fractional lawyer.
Pearl Chan
We made it. Hello, hello. Who’s this guy? This is Sammy. Welcome in. Thanks for having us. Why don’t you have a seat? I’ll make some coffee.
Pearl Chan
A regular day for me is I wake up and walk my dog. I come back, I make breakfast, I pack my kid’s lunch, I take her to school, and then I get started working. After school I pick her up, come back, make dinner, and then sometimes I do a bit of work after that. But you know what? During those times, I don’t have to feel the guilt of stepping out to pick up my daughter. I mean, we all do it, but I think we all still feel like we should be at our desk. So I think it’s not even so much that you have more time, it’s that you have less guilt.
Pearl Chan
My home office is upstairs. This is where all the magic happens. I have my multiple workstations. One is for a certain client who I have a dedicated computer for — for security. And then for everything else, I do it through here. Most days both computers are on and I just roll back and forth. This is better than my setup when I was at the firm.
Pearl Chan
The inaugural Goodlawyer of the Year award. First ever. For a long time I was actually kind of ashamed of — I would say my journey was not traditional. My mom worked at a Biglaw firm, and she’s like, I don’t understand what you do. I understand these people are lawyers that I see at my firm every day. You’re like a lesser version of them. She didn’t really understand what that was. I went in-house right away, into a small Canadian distributor of As Seen on TV products — ShamWow, Slap Chop. I was a brand new lawyer. I didn’t yet have the experience and the confidence to say, no, you absolutely cannot say that.
Pearl Chan
Before making the leap into the Goodlawyer ecosystem, I had a checklist. I wanted to be able to work with sophisticated clients. Work from home. Make a comfortable living. I wanted to do the type of work that I loved — the size of company, the kind of strategic work, with smart leadership teams. Goodlawyer just actually gave me a way to find those more easily. Flexibility: to walk my dog, to go to my daughter’s volleyball tournament, do my own pickups. I make dinner every night. I don’t have a nanny. It was a choice. I said, I want to be able to do that and this. Those are both my jobs. This model and Goodlawyer 100% solved all of those problems for me.
Pearl Chan
What’s been the hardest part about becoming a fractional lawyer? The platform allows you to be selective, and allows the client to be selective. There’s a lot of choice of lawyers, and there’s a lot of choices of clients. Sometimes it takes a little time to find a match. It definitely requires a bit more of this entrepreneurial flavor of a lawyer. You still have to sell yourself. You do the interviews. There are multiple candidates still interviewing with the same client. Some of us haven’t had to do that.
Pearl Chan
If Goodlawyer didn’t exist, where do you think you’d be right now? I think I would still be in-house, but I would be burnt out, and it would probably not be a long time before I just quit the practice of law and became an interior designer.
Chad Aboud
Coming from a house full of psychologists, I’ve always been acutely aware of the mental health challenges, substance challenges in our profession, and just the sheer number of lawyers that leave. You don’t hear about doctors quitting being doctors all the time, but in our profession it feels far more common than it should be. Imagine that you get to do the work that you’re doing now, but you get to choose the clients that you do it for, and you get to choose how many hours of the week that you do it for, and you get to get paid more. I think it’s a no-brainer.
