KC Ambassador Louisa Woods shares her thoughts on the recent ‘Skills of a Future Lawyer’ webinar.
On Friday 24th July, KC hosted a free webinar called ‘Skills of a Future Lawyer’, alongside The Legal Line Up. The panelists included Host of the Legally Speaking Podcast, Robert Hanna, and co-founders of The Legal Line Up, Blaise Nsenguwera, Leen Kayali, Gemma Shohet and Annabel Smith.
The event began with the chair, Gemma Shohet introducing all four guests and outlining the agenda for the webinar.
The main skills outlined throughout the webinar included:
- Entrepreneurship,
- Networking,
- And personal branding.
Entrepreneurship is an undervalued area within the legal profession. This is an area that can show proactivity and a willingness to step outside of your comfort zone. Gaining entrepreneurship experience can increase resilience and allow you to understand how businesses work. In turn, this can make your application stand out when applying to law firms and help you to become a well-rounded lawyer. This experience can be achieved through attending open days with different firms or through taking an entrepreneurship course.
The panelists touched on the importance of networking with both your peers and with legal professionals. The aim of networking, whether it be formal or informal is to create long term relationships that add value to both of you. It was incredible to hear the firsthand experience from Annabel about informal networking that led to her applying for Allen & Overy First and subsequently led to her obtaining a training contract.
The importance of personal branding was highlighted, particularly as the legal field is fiercely competitive. In particular, a phrase mentioned by Robert ‘it is not who you know but it is who knows you’ resonated with me. Leen also provided valuable insight on how to sell yourself within an application. She suggested that this can be developed by asking the people around you what skills you have that make you stand out.
The webinar concluded with a Q&A session, with questions regarding legal technology, how to obtain work experience abroad, and obtaining training contracts. The panel answered all questions succinctly and gave genuine advice.
Blaise recommended two books that helped him obtain a training contract:
- Commercial Law Handbook by Jake Schogger
- All You Need To Know About The City by Christopher Stoakes.
I look forward to developing all the skills mentioned in Skills of a Future Lawyer webinar throughout my university studies and legal career.
If you missed the webinar, you can watch the recording here!
