Choosing a legal career: job interviews – say as little as possible?? March 19, 2009

Continuing the legal theme this week, I thought I’d discuss an interview tip given in a new book we have acquired. In “The Legal Job Interview”, Clifford Ennico gives valuable advice on every stage of the interview process from initial body language to negotiating salary, and the perspective on legal culture makes it particularly useful over general interview books. However his top tip, his “key rule”, stood out to me as somewhat controversial and needing a little more examination.

SAY AS LITTLE AS POSSIBLE

He calls this the 20/80 rule. In any successful interview he reckons he will do 20 percent of the talking, and the interviewer does 80 percent. Why?

• the less you say, the less likely you are to say anything risky, anything that contradicts their beliefs. You should be like a politician, even if you all agree on everything but one point, that one negative is what will stick in their minds. They are probably interviewing a lot of candidates for each position, so they might only remember a couple of key things about each candidate.
• lawyers like to play things safe. They want to pick the safe candidate who is keen to do things their way. If you assert your own opinion too strongly you might signal to them that you are not a team player, that you are more interested in doing things your way.
• they want someone calm and collected who will reassure clients with clear, concise answers. You need to be the lawyer they are looking for.

Of course, the key to success with this approach is asking the right questions.

Rather than demonstrating the qualities they are looking for in your answers, instead you demonstrate them in your questions:

• show intelligence and insight in your questions. If one of their specialisms is in an area that is economically doing particularly well or badly, ask how that affects the future of that area – which specialisms are growth areas?
• demonstrate your qualities as a good listener who values the opinions of others.
• demonstrate the skill of active listening, skilfully asking further questions to get beneath the surface and extract more information.
• show them your enthusiasm and ambition – ask what they think is key to being successful in that position (you will also learn if the culture values working hard and long hours, or is more about politics – getting on well with the right people)
• flatter the interviewer by showing interest in what they do and being keen to learn from them and soak up their views.

It is an interesting approach – it sounds a little too evasive at first, until you realise the importance of the questions you are asking. While I wouldn’t worry trying to achieve the magical 20/80 ratio, the main point to take away is how important it is to ask good questions. Some of the qualities listed above are difficult to demonstrate in any other way, it is a key way of showing your interest in the firm, and they will at least expect one question from you at the end to round off the interview. It is worthwhile preparing a few, so even if they answer some prior to the interview you still have something to ask.

No matter how detailed the recruitment brochure and website has been, no matter how clearly the presentations have explained everything about the firm, it is essential ask them questions!

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