How to Be a Lawyer. Jason Mendelson

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СКАЧАТЬ to be in the moment as an interested attorney, not a bored law student.Real Estate Transactions by an adjunct and Administrative Law by a tenured professor are two courses Alex chose with this method, and those experiences continue to pay dividends today, despite very little work with the direct content of each. Jason took a course called Blood Feuds about Icelandic law. These experiences of learning from master teachers were worth way more than any particular subject matter.

      3 Prioritize top adjuncts.As two very competitive people, we don't view tenure as a positive for the business of law schools. However, we're stuck with it, so make the best of it. Certainly, during your first year mostly you will have the standards with tenured or tenure-track professors, and plenty of opportunities to take classes with those you enjoy the most in year two or three. It's the adjuncts where there are considerable arbitrage opportunities.By finding the best adjuncts at your school, you can leverage your school's reputation for your benefit. That's because it's prestigious for practicing attorneys to teach a course in your law school, which enhances their brand. It's a level of competition and market selection that is more absent from the internal politics of tenure track positions and professorships. Our advice for choosing top adjuncts extends to choosing a law school that hires adjuncts from the real world in subject areas that you find interesting. Finally, because being an adjunct is hard work and time consuming (as Jason has experienced firsthand), the ranks are consistently refreshed, helping the content to be more relevant and timelier.

      4 Don't specialize too early.None of us know what we don't know. While a truism, keep this in mind while in law school. A lot of times, students come with some preconceived notion as to what type of lawyer they want to be. They choose a specialty early (say second year or before) based on limited anecdotal evidence rather than data, and eliminate whole areas based on nothing more than conjecture. For example, tax law might sound boring at first blush. However, once you realize that tax law is really about human behavior, incentives, unintended consequences, and power, it becomes a lot more relevant and interesting. Of course, you need a good professor to teach it this way.Instead, strive to be a great lawyer, which among other things means versatility and not being siloed. All areas of the law overlap, and to be successful, you need to understand those overlaps. Our era of hyper-specialization is driven by efficiency in allocation of resources, not by maximizing your individual potential to be a great lawyer. Realize the considerable pressure to specialize early on isn't helping your particular brand and fight it.You will meet students who have a clear path right away. Perhaps they are the offspring of a corporate lawyer or litigator who knows from day one they want to follow in a parent's footsteps. That's great, but we believe that even those who know what their specialty is would benefit from greater breadth. You learn how to practice law by practicing law, not by being in law school. Rather, law school is your opportunity to enhance what will be the substance of your brand, and you should use it to broaden rather than narrow your reach.

      5 Look for opportunities outside the building: clinic, externships, other colleges.We both had extraordinary experiences outside of the classroom. While at Northwestern, Alex worked in the Legal Clinic, assisted on death penalty cases to overturn wrongful convictions, and represented juvenile clients in juvenile detention within Cook County Jail. Those experiences provided more insights into procedure than any course in the area. Working at the SEC Division of Enforcement helped Alex gain a fundamental understanding of administrative law, government power, and a deep sense of fiduciary duty. Externships will supercharge your understanding of certain positions and lead to job offers, all while placing you in an uncomfortable yet safe supervised position, thereby maximizing learning. In fact, Alex still relies on contacts created while at the SEC.Jason got out of the law school to take business school classes in accounting and venture capital. He didn't even know what venture capital was and took the course because he was a former software engineer who wanted to learn about startups. Four years later Jason was hired at a venture capital firm. Later, he was promoted to head up all operations including finance. Going back to our specialization paragraph, this breadth of choice opened Jason up to his future career.

CHAPTER 6 What Should You Get Out of Law School?

      Throughout this book, we refer to hard and soft skills you'll need to acquire and develop to be a great lawyer. Later, we dive into other strategies for doing well and not making common mistakes.

      A short chapter on what you should get out of the law school experience is helpful to better frame the objective. Note that each of the items are discussed in other parts of this book, but here are all our thoughts in one place. Consider this your checklist that you'll use to build your future practice.

      We divided these into “hard” versus “soft” skills, but let's face it, many of these are both. Please be patient with our categorizations, but realize you'll need all of these in your toolbox if you want to be your best.

      And the punchline? Note that you'll need a lot more things than the skills you'll learn in law school to actually succeed.

      Hard Skills Necessary to Be a Great Lawyer

       Ability to solve problems and think analytically.

       Legal knowledge in your practice area and all practice areas that touch on your specialty (if you have one at all).

       Ability to negotiate and debate.

       Strong communication skills, both oral and written.

       Strong research skills.

       Experience and ability to work in a team setting.

Soft Skills Necessary to Be a Great Lawyer

       Empathy.

       Ability to listen first and then talk.

       Ability to ask good questions.

       People management.

       Conflict resolution.

       Self-organization.

       Good health, both mental and physical.

       Ability to work under pressure.

       Enthusiasm to always be learning.

       Passion for the job.

       Creativity.

       Good judgment.

       Resiliency in the eyes of failure or other hardship.

       Knowing when to trust or distrust.

       Perseverance and an ability to grind through lots of work.

       Strong integrity (however you define that).

       Positive attitude.

       Ability to disconnect.

      Other Stuff You'll Want to Be a Great Lawyer

       An evolving and strong professional and personal network.

       Mentors who want to see you succeed.

       An identity outside of being a lawyer.

      At this point, we are done focusing on school. Let's talk about what happens after you graduate.

CHAPTER 7 Be a Fiduciary

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