Industry Resources

Tips For Finding Your First Legal Job

Legal recruiters don’t work with entry-level candidates; what steps can you take on your own to find a great first legal job?

Are you looking for your first legal job? First legal job in the U.S.? First legal job in a new practice area? Have you been out of the workforce or in a non-legal role for a number of years now and are looking to get back in? Have you been working outside the U.S. for some time?

Legal recruiters do not work with entry-level candidates for the simple reason that most firms have their own procedures for hiring at the entry level that do not involve recruiters. What steps can you take on your own?

Of course, feel free to reach out to me or any of my colleagues at Lateral Link if you aren’t sure if a recruiter might be able to assist. We can always help point you in the right direction.

 

Ed. note: This is the latest installment in a series of posts from Lateral Link’s team of expert contributors. This post is by Abby Gordon, Senior Director at Lateral Link, who works with attorney candidates on law firm and in-house searches, primarily in Boston, New York, and Europe. Prior to joining Lateral Link, Abby spent seven years as a corporate associate with Cleary Gottlieb, focusing on capital markets transactions for Latin American clients in New York and for the last five years for European clients in Paris. A native of Boston, Abby holds a J.D., cum laude, from Georgetown University Law Center and a B.A. in government and romance languages, magna cum laude, from Dartmouth College. Abby also worked with the International Rescue Committee as a Fulbright Scholar in Madrid, Spain. She is a member of the New York, Massachusetts and Maine Bars and is fluent in French and Spanish (and dabbles in Portuguese and Italian). You can view additional articles by Abby here.