Training contract conundrum: to train or not to train?
LPC student Dee Gupta tells us about her experience in looking for a training contract and gives her advice to students from what she has learnt.
Finishing the first half of the LPC has been like climbing my very own Everest. And I know pretty much everyone feels like that. A few days of rest weren't enough, yet they had to be.
I fall into the ‘self-funded’ for the LPC category of people – aka, the non-training contract ones. I have spent the past few years trying to break through the industry; I have been able to break the vicious cycle of 'you need experience to get experience'; I have managed to get the 2:1; yet I still haven't managed the training contract.
I have read enough articles on how to get a training contract and on how to write job applications. I have networked and gone to my fair share of law fairs. Of course, you don't need to hear this from me. I'm a jobless LPC student myself, but along the way I have learnt some pretty useful things. And no, not one of them contains the answer to the question 'what is commercial awareness?' and 'how to get it?'
If you find yourself Googling ‘how get through commercial awareness?’, I hate to break it to you, but you may not be in the right career. That doesn't mean that law isn't right for you, but maybe working in a corporate law firm isn't for you. Even though the pay will be great and you will be able to strut in heels or wear fancy brogues, you need to desperately want, and like, knowing about the economy around you. You need to be willing to give up your free time to browse through FT articles, because you are genuinely interested.
Quality matters, but that doesn't necessarily mean quantity doesn't. Each firm gets roughly around 1,200 applications each year, with the big firms hiring around 40 candidates, and the smaller ones hiring much less. The competition is fierce, and if you have visa problems, it's going to be that much harder. Let's say you are fighting for 40 positions, you are either a law graduate or a non-law, and firms nowadays want a mix, for diversity. So, from 1,200 job applications, you might be one of the lucky few, one of their trainees. Or, you might not.
Don't let rejections bother you that much; it doesn't mean you’re not ‘good enough’. You might not be writing really kick-ass job applications. If you suspect that that’s the case, then reach out to a mentor or close friends who have jobs, and actually listen to them. Constructive criticism is your best friend when writing job applications. We have all spent quite a bit of money to get where we are today, and whilst rejections can really bring down morale, there’s a strong reason for them. If at first you don’t succeed, you know you’re aiming high enough.
When I got rejected the first time it didn't make sense. After which, I worked with much different corporate law firms, and then I realised how much happier I was in that atmosphere. If you are getting rejected, you might not be cut out to get that particular job at that particular firm. Each firm has a very unique environment. Not all ‘Magic Circle’ or ‘Silver Circle’ law firms are completely alike. The HR people actually know what they are doing. If you got rejected, then that wasn't the firm for you. Try widening your search. And you don’t necessarily need to go through the direct route. Ring someone in the firm; send them a bunch of questions; try and arrange coffee with someone who works at the firm. That will go a long way. At the worst, they might say no and tell you to apply for an open day.
In-house; paralegals; a law blogger; switching into corporate; it all matters. And they are all brilliant jobs to have. However, if you cannot for the life of you figure out why you can’t get through it and get a training contract – Don’t.
Don’t figure it out. If, in your 20s, you’re not sitting behind a computer till 1am, well that might not be the most awful thing in the world.
Go out and get some essential life experience. Work at a retail shop, for example. Managing customers and inventory in such jobs will give you so much hands-on life experience, it might come through in the next set of job applications you write. Head to Indonesia or Africa and get involved with NGO work, teach English, aid the underprivileged. There are a lot of ways to mould yourself for a better job for the future and, contrary to what most people believe, it IS okay to not have it all sorted out post-undergraduate.
In light of employability week, I just had to blog about this. I am no guru in this field but it’s coming from an honest place. If you’re reading this and contemplating doing the LPC without a training contract, go for it. Just don’t put all your hopes in the fact that you have to get that amazing job in the top ten corporate law firms of London. The economy is volatile and so is your life, you don’t have to have it all figured out.
If you truly enjoy law and reading, no amount of job rejections will stop you from getting there eventually. Well, here’s hoping!
At times of need, I look to a certain Mr Abraham Lincoln:
“If you are resolutely determined to become a lawyer, the thing is half done already.”
