​The New Zealand legal market is changing. Some firms are embracing legal tech and moving quick and others are watching how it all unfolds. In 2025 we saw firms starting to stabilise after a period of uncertainty, and technology started to reshape the way legal work gets done. For legal support professionals, these shifts started to create both opportunities and new expectations on what hiring firms were starting to seek out.

2025 showed us that the legal sector is no longer about hiring for volume. Instead, firms were focusing on skills driven recruitment, seeking people who bring value beyond traditional administrative tasks. The priority for legal support candidates is flexible and hybrid work arrangements. The ability for legal support candidates to move into these roles is very much team and practice area reliant, and firms are still pushing for in office teams for ease of communication and collaboration. AI and legal tech have increasingly been embedded in workflows as well. In short, it was a market of quality over quantity, and the winners were those who could adapt and add real impact.

Looking ahead to 2026, the sector is expected to prioritise specialised skills across legal support roles. Admin and secretarial professionals who can manage compliance, navigate technology platforms, and coordinate complex workflows will be in high demand specifically for medium or large firms. In-house teams are starting to expand, particularly in governance, risk and compliance, which is creating new career pathways for support staff, specifically in Legal Executive or Paralegal type roles to support in-house legal teams. At the same time, automation and AI is beginning to handle routine administrative tasks, shifting the focus of legal support roles toward oversight, process improvement and value-added contributions. Specialist firms in property, corporate / commercial and litigation still prioritise those who offer a more traditional in depth technical skillset within the practice area than being tech savvy.

For legal support professionals, this market presents both challenges and opportunities. Upskilling and diversifying capabilities; combining legal knowledge with tech literacy, project management, and compliance expertise; will make you highly sought after. Adaptability will be key: those who can bridge traditional administration with new technology and processes will thrive. Understanding where demand is growing is key to positioning yourself strategically to be in demand in a competitive market. In the legal support area, these practice areas are corporate, property and litigation as well as certain specialist areas that have had some growth such as resource management, technology, financial services and regulation, energy, Biotech and Agritech.

If you are hiring in 2026, you will find that the market is starting to slant more towards being candidate driven. We don't expect it to be the same demand that we saw in 2021 and 2022 as we came out of lockdowns but this evolving landscape means that securing the right legal support talent has never been more critical. Firms that invest in experienced, multi skilled support staff will see efficiency, accuracy, and operations improve across their teams. Hiring decisions should now consider not only technical ability, legal expertise and understanding, but also adaptability, technological proficiency and the ability to add real value beyond day to day administrative tasks. In this candidate led market, being proactive about recruitment, retention, and professional development will be the differentiator between teams that thrive and those that struggle.

The NZ legal sector in 2026 will reward strategic thinking, adaptability, and cross functional skills. Legal support professionals who embrace this evolving landscape will move beyond traditional administrative roles to become trusted, value adding partners at the heart of their legal teams. Now is the time to invest in skills, embrace technology, and position yourself in a team where you can make the most impact.