Practicing lawyers know something that most professors don’t tell their students: The analytic skills that you learn in the classroom won’t help you stand out in trying to get that first job. Reading cases, understanding statutes, writing things like memos and briefs, and arguing in courts? Those “technical” skills won’t get you hired or promoted.
They’re necessary, but they’re not enough – whether you’re looking to find jobs and careers in traditional law firms, small practices, government service, social enterprise, or conventional nonprofits.
Only a handful of people have great grades. Most students have average grades. But all students have the power to go on and be great lawyers. Great advocates and colleagues, great for their clients, and their communities. Transcripts have little to do with getting in the door and succeeding.
What does it take to succeed and how do you get that training and education?
It takes early and continuous learning in three overlapping areas:
- Emotional intelligence. Knowing yourself and using that self-knowledge as a toolkit in navigating relationships. It means self-awareness and resilience, among other things.
- Organizational intelligence. Knowing how organizations work and your role in them. This involves collaboration, teamwork, project management, the economics of legal organizations, change and relationship management.
- Tech. The future of the professions has everything to do with technologies as tools, technologies that take the place of humans, and technologies that shape societies and communities. For lawyers, that means legal analytics, legal operations, and AI.
At least three free online webinars have been launched to help students start to build their skill sets.
- The CLI Summer Learning Series
- The Passport to Practice Series
- The Bucerius Law School Legal Tech Essentials Program
These are not identical. They’re not substitutes for each other. Each one is only a first cut at some relevant material. But any of them could be a worthwhile beginning. Here’s a quick guide to their respective strengths and weaknesses:
|
Program |
Strengths |
Weaknesses |
|
CLI |
Good coverage of the nuts and bolts of legal organization survival skills |
Largely the voice of a single company, NetApp |
|
Passport to Practice |
Comprehensive view of non-analytic competencies; diverse speakers |
Introductions only, no space for depth
|
|
Bucerius |
High-quality team with a focus on tech stuff |
Not intended to address EQ or Org Q competencies |