How to use this book
then need to look at the organisations’ own websites, explore legal press archives and do some online research. Key questions to research are: • What are their main work areas? • Who are their clients? • How do they make money? • What’s their ethos? • Who are their competitors? • Where have they come from and where are they going (ie, history versus ambition)? What now? The rest of The Handbook expands on many of these themes. The sooner you start using it in earnest – understanding the challenge ahead, making a plan and acting on it – the better your chances. Most candidates who are unsuccessful fail because they haven’t followed the rules of the game. Take the necessary steps to give yourself the best chance of success. As ever, we wish you all the very best with your legal career and hope that The Handbook can help you along the way.
idea of the attributes that employers are looking for. The exact skill set may vary, but you can be sure you’ll be expected to be intelligent and able to communicate well, show determination, possess close attention to detail and operate well as part of a team. You need to review your experiences to pull out as many examples of these skills as possible and work out how to present them in the best possible light – employers like to see examples of go-getting, passionate, motivated people doing something constructive and interesting with their time. Read ‘Application technique’ and ‘Interview technique’ for more advice and use LawCareers.Net’s MyLCN dashboard to build up your record of achievements and activities. Things to consider are as follows: • Can you give a dozen detailed examples of activities you’ve participated in that demonstrate skills relevant to working in the legal profession? • Can you explain articulately why you want to be a lawyer? • What are the weaknesses in your CV that you hope employers won’t spot and what are you doing to address them? • What’s your unique selling point? Stage 4: Narrowing the field We’re only now getting to the stage of differentiating between employers. The Handbook offers comprehensive listings of more than 800 firms and nearly 200 chambers offering training contracts or pupillages. You can’t apply to them all, so you must refine your search – read ‘Types of law firm’, ‘Types of chambers’ and ‘Choosing where to apply’ as a start. Use the indexing pages to identify firms/chambers by size, practice areas and location. Ideally, you should be able to find a market sector you’re interested in (eg, leading commercial firms in Northwest England) and work out which firms/chambers fall into this classification. Their directory entries in The Handbook are your springboard for further research. You
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THE LAWCAREERS.NET HANDBOOK
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