How to Do Your Homework - Educate Yourself About Practice Areas, Transactional Vs. Litigation, Pick An Area, Sources Of Information
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Doing your homework is important, especially during callbacks, small-firm, and government interviews. Never interview “cold.” Even during initial interviews, you must know a substantial amount about the employer and the interviewer. This chapter tells you how to prepare for all kinds of interviews by doing research, anticipating questions, and finding common conversation topics.
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Firms often do different types of work in different offices. When your interviewer asks “Why do you want to join us?” or “What type of work are you interested in doing?” you should be able to articulate something better than “Your firm has a great reputation.” If you have a specific interest in, say, Russian capital markets or international arbitration, it…
Most small firms either specialize in a narrow field or practice “eat what you kill” specialties and work on a wide variety of cases. Meanwhile, large firms departmentalize. Know precisely what the firm's practice areas are. Most medium and large firms consist of at least two major departments, transactional and litigation. The practice groups in a transactional department may…
At the callback stage with larger firms, the firm's recruiter may ask you about your interests in certain practice areas, so that he or she can arrange interviews with attorneys who do that type of work. Even though you may feel forced to commit to a practice area before you have actually had a chance to figure out what you want to do, brush off this feeling. Again, you will have plenty of …
There are numerous resources that can provide you with more than enough information for your interviews: the employer's Website, the NALP directory, the Vault.com guide, Martindale-Hubble, information gathered by law school career services, newspaper articles, and employers’ press releases and publications. Consider using one or two but not all of them, as that will likely overwhelm …
Knowing the facts about the interviewer can have its perks. Charlotte once noticed that her interviewer listed gourmet cooking as one of his hobbies on the firm's Website. It so happened that Charlotte had an interest in that area as well. Knowing about the interviewer's passion, Charlotte brought up gourmet cooking during the interview. Their previously dry conversation took a pleas…
We will not give you a laundry list of the common interview questions; it will not help you prepare. Questions will vary greatly from one employer to another, and those that repeat themselves are, frankly, not the best questions. A good interviewer should ask you questions that are uniquely tailored to your background, resume, and skills. Clichéd questions do not accomplish this goal. Moreo…
Interview questions about politics, sports, and news are rare. But they do come up, especially if there is something in your background to trigger them. If you are from New England, for example, you may have to talk about a recent Patriots game. You may have to discuss basketball if you are a Dukie. If you are from Southern California, your interviewer may ask about wildfires. Or he or she may inq…
In addition to researching your employers, remember to Google yourself before the interview. Be prepared to deal with any questionable, inappropriate, or scandalous entries linked to your name; if necessary, contact Internet providers and ask them to remove your name and/or likeness from their Websites. Make sure any personal Websites, blogs, or photographs therein look professional. Finally, if y…
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User Comments
6 months ago
Is there a job fair on monday 8-8-12 at the university.