If you are considering a career in law, it is essential that you get work experience. You will need this both for applications to firms and chambers, and for your own benefit to make sure you are making the right choice (before you shell out for all that extra training…).

Today’s tips relate to work experience you can get prior to applying for vacation schemes and mini-pupillages.

6 top tips for getting work experience

1. Use contacts in friends and family to get a week of work-shadowing.
2. If you don’t have contacts (and many of us don’t), try to get paid or un-paid work as an administrator or receptionist in a police station, court, high-street solicitors’ firm, barristers’ chambers, or legal body such as the Legal Services Commission. Even if you are photocopying and getting coffee, you will have the opportunity to observe how people work, how they spend their time, how they handle clients, what legal resources they use and ask pertinent questions. Try visiting in person with your CV.
3. Visit the courts – useful for both aspiring barristers and solicitors. Follow a case and you can talk about it in interview.
4. Join your university Law Society for access to talks and debates.
5. Check with your careers service to find out when legal firms are coming to talk on campus and have networking events. You might not feel confident at first, but if you keep on networking it does get easier! These conversational skills will help you sound professional and knowledgable when approaching firms in future.
6. Voluntary work is available in legal, civil rights and social justice areas. Search for it using Directgov – select voluntary work, and search in your area for Legal Aid & Justice (you are more likely to find long term opportunities than one-off events). Opportunities include prison befriender, witness support and Citizen’s Advice Bureau work. See also Vinspired.com for opportunities tailored to 18-25 year olds, and try your university volunteering service or society.

Remember competition is very strong for legal careers:

Some top legal names calculate that they have 1000 applicants for 100 training contracts.

McAlpine, M. 2009. Law Uncovered. Trotman. p. 82.

And some say the recession is heightening this as well-qualified students who would have gone into finance, choose law instead as a ’safer’ route to high salaries.

What are you going to do to ensure you stand out?

For more information see:

McAlpine, M. 2009. Law Uncovered. Trotman.

AllAboutLaw.co.uk

LawCareers.net and Launchpad to Law 2009 (pdf)