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Hello Guys!

Firstly, thank you to the team of TCLA for starting a wonderful online platform to connect people around the world to help them reach success in LAW.

Secondly, a brief about me, I'm an engineering student from India, studying master's in management at UCL. When I moved to the UK, I thought similar to all other business graduates, complete a master's, apply for a job in either consulting or investment banking. However, when I came to the UK, I heard people complaining about their jobs, that they are not satisfied with their job and don't like them. And this moment, a big question struck me, am I going to be happy with my work? That question stumped all my career plans because I didn't want to do a job where I was not satisfied. (No offence to other people, but I think people can only give their fullest if they like and enjoy what they are doing.)

So, with the question in mind, what is the job that I want the most and which job will I be satisfied with? I started to look for various jobs in various sectors. And at last, I came up across careers in Law and began to explore and over time, I began to like it. So, I decided to pursue a career in Law.

Thirdly, my big question, so, I have got down a timeline regarding my career shift into the Law. But, I have a blank left to fill in my timeline and planning, which is the two-year wait time before we start our trainee contract.

Timeline:
September 2022 - Complete postgrad

September 2022 to July 2023 - Apply for Vacation Schemes and Trainee Contracts while working. (Assuming that I secure a trainee contract for 2025)

September 2022 to July 2024 -The big question - What job to do so that I can maximize my chances and make it look good on my CV so that it can maximize my chances of securing a trainee contract? (I'm going to work, and specifically, I'm planning to work in law firms so that I can learn about the firm and make sure that I'm comfortable with the firm culture, vision and goals.) This is the big, leading question I'm struggling with.

If you suggest law firms, which type of job I should do in a law firm so that it would improve my chances and look clean on my CV, or should I work in any other firm? I have thought about the option of being a paralegal, but I can't go for it because law firms won't sponsor visas for a paralegal job. So, to be in the UK and improve my chances and becoming a lawyer, I must stay in the UK. So, I've to get a job in a firm where that sponsor visa to remain in the UK (after the postgrad work visa). But, as I mentioned earlier, I'm not sure if I should go for a job in a law firm(Sectors I'm looking at jobs in the law firms: Business development, marketing, or personal assistant) or lookout for jobs in other firms rather than Law.

March/September 2025 - Start Trainee Contract.

Lastly, thank you for your valuable advice in advance.

Hi everyone

As the thread title suggests, I have been invited to an interview on Microsoft Teams for a paralegal position at Rosling King. The interview is tomorrow. In the meantime, I received the following email:

------

I have now booked your interview in for 3pm tomorrow and you should receive a Teams/Zoom invite shortly from Laura Matthews.



Laura will be interviewing you along with another colleague from the Litigation team. She has yet to confirm who, as her usual interviewing colleague is on holiday.



There will be a problem question for you to complete and one of them will dial into the call first to give you this. You will have some time to complete it before you meet them both for the interview.



Please do let me know if you have any questions prior to your interview.

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What can I expect with regards to the problem question? Is there anything I should look to prepare for prior to tomorrow's interview? I assumed it would be CV related and competency/strength-based questioning but I wasn't expecting this. Any kind of insight would be appreciated.

If anyone has applied for this position before, please let me know.

@Jessica Booker

Hi I am applying to a small boutique law firm online but there doesn't seem to be any helpful information online/social media platforms to assist in explaining why I'd like to apply to them in my cover letter. The firm doesn't seem to have any presence online. There are reviews from clients on their website but I cannot look at their top clients online as they are confidential due to them being high value clients. I have checked out Legal 500 but there is nothing on the firm there either. What should I focus on if there isn't anything to go by? If I just focus on their practice areas, wouldn't this make it a generic application? Thank you.

Absolutely butchered my company law exam and I wouldn't be surprised if I receive a fail given the extent to which I think messed up the PQ. The questions are supposedly equally weighted but I just have this lingering feeling that the extent to which I messed it up will lead them to failing me on the whole module. My 2nd year average was 68, and I doubt I'll be getting a first to be honest.

For anyone else who has also failed a module, how did this impact your applications?

Hello everyone, I am undecided either to do a PGDL or a MA Law. Both of them are conversion courses.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of these two courses, apart from the price?

My goal is to do a conversion course and after that start preparing for the SQE1 exam.

Thank you for all your answers!

Hey guys,

I received this fairly mysterious mail from SullCrom a couple of days ago:

"...The Recruitment Committee has now reviewed your application and for the short term, we would like to place your application on hold. We will consider your application further towards the application deadline, 15 July 2022, at which time we will advise you as to whether or not you have been shortlisted for interview..."

Thoughts? Is this good or bad?

Thanks

I recently graduated with a first class degree in English Literature and History from a RG university. I’ve long had an interest in studying law and even wrote my UG dissertation on British legal history. However, I have poor a levels (ABD). I’ve had mixed responses on whether these A levels might hinder me in my pursuit of a career as a solicitor. I would hate to spend extra money to further my studies, only to be blocked off from success because of exams I took when I was 18 years old. I had excellent GCSEs prior to my A levels. I’m becoming increasingly worried that a small blip on my academic record may haunt my legal career for the rest of my life. Some clarity on whether my pursuit is worth it would be greatly appreciated!

I start my training contract in September and will be moving to London within the next.few months. Does anyone have any.recommendations for places to find other trainees that might be in a similar position?

Hi everyone,

I’m launching ‘90 Days To A Training Contract’.

It’s an email series over the next 90 days, distilling everything that I have learned about securing a training contract.

I hope this will be especially helpful to those who don’t have existing connections in law or access to an environment with this type of advice.

You can sign up here - I hope you find it useful!

Best,

Jaysen

Hi everyone, I have just received an extremely lucrative training contract offer, but not perhaps an ideal choice because I feel that it leans extremely heavily in a particular practice that I am still rather unsure about, plus I am interviewing for a summer internship, which I think may be a better suited firm. I was therefore planning to make further applications in any case in June, but I asked about the deadline to respond to the offer, and I was told that I had to respond in two weeks. This seems like a rather short response time frame for me, was wondering if there are any regulations surrounding how long a candidate is allowed to make a decision.

Alternatively, would it possible/is it market practice to accept a TC offer before reneging at a later point, and if so what are the consequences that flow from that? Would love to speak to someone with direct knowledge of this thanks!

Two have me a bit stumped:

1) "Tell us about a time you disclosed information that was private or confidential. How did you rectify the situation?" (200 words)

This is by far the one I'm more confused by. I'm unsure what to answer for this. I currently work as a paralegal and obviously what clients tell me is totally private (aside from colleagues). I also work in an area in which they could be put at real danger if I decided to blab to anyone, which also motivates me not to. So I just don't talk to anyone about it. I'm not sure what the law even is on this, but I don't even talk to my therapist about it.

I've previously worked in a couple of other roles where I had to deal with confidential information, and again- I just never disclosed it to anyone I wasn't supposed to. I've never found that difficult to do.

So what should I answer this with? 200 words of "I've honestly never done this?"

2) "What do you consider to be the most interesting/exciting emerging issue or trend in the legal sector and why?" (200 words)

To be honest, this one is OK- I was thinking about writing about either how climate change is going to impact the legal industry (and the firm in particular) in the long-term, or about the SQE and how that will change the legal profession.

I was just wondering if anyone knew any good materials on either of those issues?

Hello!

If I apply for commercial firms that seek minimum A-Level grades of AAB, but obtained A*BB, will I be automatically rejected? I am unsure of how technical the recruitment process can be. I do have a mid 2:1 from Exeter, so I am hoping that would help cover me. Sorry if this is a daft question!

Hi all!

Received an interview invite from Hugh James for their summer placement scheme. Was wondering if anyone has any advice/tips that would help me prepare! Any advice would be greatly appreciated

Hi, I am currently a final year Scots law student with a TC contact from a firm in London. I was hoping to get some advice on the SQE process as I am finding it all a little overwhelming.

Would it be a good idea to do the SQE Essentials course and then go on to study the LLM in legal practice (SQE 1 & 2)? or Is it better to do the PDGDPL and then go on to do the LLM in legal practice?

Thanks in advance.

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Hello all,

I'm currently doing research for a mooting competition where I have to write an appeal composed of two ground of appeal to the supreme court. I however don't know how one would start an appeal, what is the proper written form? And as for citations, does one use OSCOLA(the moot instructions don't mention it)? Thanks in advance.

Hello, this is a bit of an odd question however, I'm a bit worried about the oral section of the SQE and I was wondering if anyone could suggest anyways I could go about improving/ practicing my advocacy skills? Does anyone know of any courses, tutors, groups etc ? Unfortunately, I'm not a student so I can't just join a society and I wanted to take advantage of the summer and learn/ practice during this time.

Hi everyone,

The TCLA team feel like there has been a lot of success within our community in training contract offers over the last 12 months. We are keen to try and gauge this success and quantify it on some level, and the easiest way for us to do this is to poll our community and ask the question directly to you.

Therefore we'd be incredibly grateful if you could answer the poll in this thread. The individual responses are not identifiable, so no one will be able to work out how you have personally responded.

Please note this is for training contracts only - you can find a similar poll here for vacation scheme offers in the same period.

For the answer, you should count any formal offers you received between 1 May 2021 and 30 April 2022 (the date the offer was made to you), even if you had to turn them down due to conflicting offers.

The poll is open until the end of May 2022.

Many thanks

Jess

Hi everyone,

The TCLA team feel like there has been a lot of success within our community in securing vacation scheme offers over the last 12 months. We are keen to try and gauge this success and quantify it on some level, and the easiest way for us to do this is to poll our community and ask the question directly to you.

Therefore we'd be incredibly grateful if you could answer the poll in this thread. The individual responses are not identifiable, so no one will be able to work out how you have personally responded.

Please note this is for vacation schemes only - you can find the same poll but for training contract offers here

For the answer, you should count any formal offers you received between 1 May 2021 and 30 April 2022 (the date the offer was made to you), even if you had to turn them down due to conflicting offers.

The poll is open until the end of May 2022.

Many thanks

Jess