Strategies for Navigating a Tough Legal Job Market

Ongoing or complete investigation sets the stage for the approach and contact of employers. It is too difficult to tailor your background to each employer, even if the employers all practice in your field of interest. However, the other extreme a rigid, unvarying approach will fail to attract a particular employer's interest.

The best contact is personal. Personal acquaintance, through family or otherwise, is the surest means of discovery, obtaining an interview, and finding a job. Personal contact can cut to the heart of the job search the offer and obviate frustrating bureaucracy. Cultivate and use any possible personal contacts. Employers need a reason to separate you from the pile; personal contact insures your escape from the anonymity of that pile. Without underestimating the necessity for sophisticated presentation, the benefits of personal acquaintance in law practice cannot be overemphasized. Law, as a personal service business, builds by trust and confidence more in the lawyer than the law. Personal relationships in law practice are of utmost importance use any and all to enter the practice.


The cover letter and resume are the initial tools for entry into the law job realm. Mechanics of composing the various writing items appear in the next section. Cover letter, resume, and writing sample should, in general, balance between bland generalization and too-tailored specificity. The cover letter is more flexible than the resume and writing sample in this regard.

See 6 Things Attorneys and Law Students Need to Remove from Their Resumes ASAP If They Want to Get Jobs with the Most Prestigious Law Firms for more information.

Two schools of thought govern the cover letter. One propounds that the cover letter, as incidental formality to the resume, is subject only to cursory perusal and, frequently, disposal. Another, more advisable, view of the cover letter holds that the cover letter, though brief, demonstrates the applicant's sense of professionalism and command of grammar and writing style. Because the letter is short, small errors in style or misuse of words will leap out at the reader.

The cover letter should relate the applicant's interest and background to the type of law practiced by the lawyer reading the letter. Relevant employment experience and law school courses should be mentioned. For example, social work can be pertinent to public defender practice, language fluency can be important to work in international trade.

Writing samples in the relevant area of law are useful. Avoid non legal, non law-school memoranda and samples. An orderly progression through law school and law-related jobs produces legal writing samples. Any published writing, preferably law related, achieves good effect as physical evidence of accomplishment and visually separates you from the pile.