Post a CommentKnock! Knock! Who's There Behind That Office Door?
3/25/2008 Your future. It’s out there … somewhere. All you need is the right organization, the right door and the right person impressed enough with you to open it.
Now, chances are, opportunity won’t come calling. You’ll be the one knocking—and rapping on quite a few doors at that. So it’s important to make sure you’re not wasting your time on prospects that don’t fit your strengths and goals.
Walk the Right Neighborhood
Sound too simplistic? Don’t be naïve enough to believe that only several years of working experience—or your school’s career-placement staff—can tell you everything you need to know. As you narrow your field of firm prospects, you want current, concrete business facts to help you make good business decisions. (Think about it. Isn’t that what you advise your clients?)
So you need to know which firms in your favored locations litigate in your specialty. And if you’re transactional, whose transaction work brings in billions.
But that’s just a starting point.
For example, the martindale.com® Lawyer Locator can show you firm specifics, such as firm locations, practice mix and client industries, but it also gives you an inside look at docket history. It’s easy to pull up full-color graphs that show litigation activity—exactly what firms are doing. Dockets can’t be skewed like associate atmosphere surveys.
You can also get overviews on transaction work like M&A—how many deals and the estimated total value—on the martindale.com service. Even get details on corporate counsel and corporate legal departments.
As you refine your prospects, ask the sources that specialize—and excel—in law. The martindale.com service combines intelligence from Martindale-Hubbell®, the top name in legal services information for decades, and LexisNexis®, a leader in legal, news and business information.
Want to Work There?
Then Know How They Live
Once you target your job hunting, you can focus your preparation on your target firms. Of course, you need the basics, like firm size and all locations. But it’s also important to mine for important specifics and subtle details that could give you an edge.
It’s easy to be well-versed on total practice mix. But keep drilling. For example, on martindale.com you can get practice mix, client industries and a look at docket history graphs that makes it easy to see how the mix is spread across court jurisdictions. Doesn’t do much good to focus on the Cleveland office if your specialty is environmental, and all the environmental litigation is filed in Denver.
If you specialize in transactions, you can search on martindale.com to get an outline of a firm’s recent transaction work as well as its total value—vital facts to know before the interview. Where do you see a place for your talents? Know the answer. Someone there will ask.
And what about your three years of Spanish? Find out what second languages are important there. Be ready to showcase every unique expertise and how they—that is, you—fit.
Even go the extra mile and ferret out any available clues to firm atmosphere. For example, study its diversity profile and determine what law schools seem to be popular feeders. Find out average age of experience. Look beneath the surface. For example, after reviewing the diversity profile on martindale.com, link to recent articles published by the lawyers and the exclusive Martindale-Hubbell® Peer Review Ratings™. Anything stand out? See any trends?
You Got in the Door …
Now Make it Count!
Once you get in the door to the interview, you’ll face a partner in a steel-gray suit with a steel-gray attitude—tough and no-nonsense. He’s looking down his glasses, wondering if you’re going to waste his time by being too young and too inexperienced to add anything to his business.
So connect—and do it quickly.
Instead of just talking about your law-review experience and summer associate gigs, be prepared to relate it back to his background and what’s important to him. Did he graduate from the same law school? Was he law-review editor too? Knowing the answers can better focus the discussion.
That’s easy enough to find. Just enter the partner’s name on martindale.com Find out what type of deals he’s been handling recently. What’s he been litigating? You can also get a lot of good bonus information to prepare you, including:
- Home-town and biographical information
- Boards and charitable organizations
- Bar memberships
- Published articles
- Reported cases and/or reviews of major transactions
Plus check out Martindale-Hubbell Peer Review Ratings. (You can’t find that service at other no charge legal-information sites.)
martindale.com® Lawyer Locator—
Right Here on the Hub
Each time you open the Lexis® Hub, you get no-charge access to the martindale.com Lawyer Locator. Click here to move to the quick-search box.
Each month, corporate counsel and other sophisticated buyers of legal services conduct more than two million searches across martindale.com, making the Martindale-Hubbell network number one in online legal services decision support in the world.
LexisNexis, the Knowledge Burst logo, Lexis, martindale.com and Martindale-Hubbell are registered trademarks and Martindale-Hubbell Peer Review Ratings is a trademark of Reed Elsevier Properties Inc., used under license. © 2008 Return to Career GuidanceBack to top
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