How can a lawyer get a real job after a long absence from the workforce?
September 27, 2014 7:16 PM Subscribe
46, lawyer, musician. I have been fallow for an extended time and am coming out of a bankruptcy and divorce. I have a couple years experience as a criminal defense lawyer (from 4-5 yrs ago) but haven't really done much since. I don't want to continue in criminal law. I find jobs that are intriguing but my resume is spotty at best.
So how do I write an effective cover letter and create a resume that doesn't reflect my lazy attitude toward work these last few years?
I don't remember much about what I learned in school (lol), although I have been doing some appointed criminal work and contract discovery review. Now I am ready to find something steady and 9-5
Some interesting job ideas I have seen:
Trial lawyer for GEICO
Some sort of compliance officer
I don't remember much about what I learned in school (lol), although I have been doing some appointed criminal work and contract discovery review. Now I am ready to find something steady and 9-5
Some interesting job ideas I have seen:
Trial lawyer for GEICO
Some sort of compliance officer
I have a lawyer friend who was unemployed for a while because of medical issues. What she did was get a back-office grunt work job writing briefs for dumb, boring corporation-on-corporation litigation to get her resume back, then got some law journal articles published to prove she's intellectually alive, then took the first law school instructor position she could get, and then got a tenure-track position elsewhere.
posted by univac at 4:00 AM on September 28, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by univac at 4:00 AM on September 28, 2014 [1 favorite]
Start by volunteering your legal services while you are looking for a job. Contact any battered women's shelter or go into any poor neighborhood. Dedicate half your week to pro bono work and the other half to applying for jobs and going on interviews. You will then be a working lawyer, looking for a job, instead of an out of work lawyer, wanting to start back. And you will also be in the position to help people who have absolutely no voice in court.
posted by myselfasme at 5:35 AM on September 28, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by myselfasme at 5:35 AM on September 28, 2014 [1 favorite]
I hired a lawyer who was coming off a period of hard to translate work and had listed himself as offering work at a discount to members of my partner's labor union in order to get his own practice started. He was working (iirc) with unions related to airlines: flight attendants, pilots, machinists. This might be something to check out for getting restarted.
posted by BibiRose at 5:56 AM on September 28, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by BibiRose at 5:56 AM on September 28, 2014 [1 favorite]
Best answer: You need to increase what you're doing now so you can plump up your resume -- I know you don't want to do criminal law, but see if you can up your appointments or apply for appointments in neighboring jurisdictions. Look also into instructor positions -- not law school, necessarily, but community colleges hire lawyers for basic criminal justice, legal writing or paralegal classes.
You're probably not ever going to be able to write the kind of resume or cover letter that can gloss over not only a significant absence from the work force, but what also sounds like disinterest in the practice of law generally. You say you want a nice and steady 9-5 job, but that being a insurance trial lawyer also sounds like it's your thing. Insurance litigation is probably more like criminal defense work, in terms of hours spent preparing, pouring, memorizing and losing sleep for what turns out to be a five minute hearing because the other guy folds. The only difference is you just might occasionally think, "Gee, I get paid enough for this headache."
Think about what makes insurance litigation "intriguing," research the specific qualifications employers are seeking in those positions, then work on ways to maximize those skills. Obviously they want trial experience, so get trial experience -- and if that means you stop talking your appointed clients into pleas, then stop talking your appointed clients into pleas. Then, when you apply for a job like the Geico job, you say, "As you can see I have extensive courtroom experience, having conducted X number of criminal jury / bench trials in the last three years."
That's it. You've got to get out there and hustle. No one's going to hand you a job because you think it sounds cool, just as there are very few legal jobs that are "9 - 5." If you seriously don't think you can handle the grind of beefing up your resume, it might be time to look into a different field altogether.
posted by mibo at 4:59 AM on September 29, 2014 [1 favorite]
You're probably not ever going to be able to write the kind of resume or cover letter that can gloss over not only a significant absence from the work force, but what also sounds like disinterest in the practice of law generally. You say you want a nice and steady 9-5 job, but that being a insurance trial lawyer also sounds like it's your thing. Insurance litigation is probably more like criminal defense work, in terms of hours spent preparing, pouring, memorizing and losing sleep for what turns out to be a five minute hearing because the other guy folds. The only difference is you just might occasionally think, "Gee, I get paid enough for this headache."
Think about what makes insurance litigation "intriguing," research the specific qualifications employers are seeking in those positions, then work on ways to maximize those skills. Obviously they want trial experience, so get trial experience -- and if that means you stop talking your appointed clients into pleas, then stop talking your appointed clients into pleas. Then, when you apply for a job like the Geico job, you say, "As you can see I have extensive courtroom experience, having conducted X number of criminal jury / bench trials in the last three years."
That's it. You've got to get out there and hustle. No one's going to hand you a job because you think it sounds cool, just as there are very few legal jobs that are "9 - 5." If you seriously don't think you can handle the grind of beefing up your resume, it might be time to look into a different field altogether.
posted by mibo at 4:59 AM on September 29, 2014 [1 favorite]
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You aren't necessarily worse off than your competition by the way. There are lots of lawyers on the job market who have no experience or who haven't worked for 10 or 15 years while they were stay at home parenting.
posted by MattD at 3:05 AM on September 28, 2014 [1 favorite]