If your mind is set on becoming a personal injury attorney , you’ll want to start building the brand of your practice as soon as you can. One way of going about this process is getting as much experience as you can under your belt. Whether it is in personal injury, litigation, corporate or real estate, having a good brand is essential in your success in your chosen personal injury attorney practice area. However, you won’t get much traction as far as experience goes if you can’t get someone or some firm to hire your services. So, what can you do to get people to notice and hire you?
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While fresh personal injury lawyers graduates are usually brimming with idealism and enthusiasm, inactivity and the lack of opportunities can wear down these positive qualities easily. Along with building your brand, therefore, put in the extra effort to keep a positive outlook as you work on getting yourself hired. This way, you’ll become more efficient and effective as you follow and apply the following tips on getting hired.
Send Out as Many Applications as Possible
You’ll be surprised how this simple job hunting tip applies effectively to law practice as much as it does for other types of profession. Regardless of the legal practice area that you want to jump into, approaching it just as you would any other competitive job market goes a long way in getting your legal career started. Sending out applications to job openings that you come across increases your chances of receiving job offers. This is also a good way to at least, get the opportunity to fly in the radar of a personal injury law firm.
As with any highly competitive job market, you wouldn’t want to pass up on opportunities that come along. You can’t be picky and hold back in the misguided hope that your dream lifestyle job will find its way to you. By sending out applications en masse, you are swinging the law of averages in your favor. Remember, it is better to start working to level up your experience than end up miserably working in an unrelated industry.
Be Ready to Move
According to a personal injury attorney if you are aiming to practice in California, it will be a good idea not to confine yourself to only a number of cities. Send out applications everywhere in the state with the mindset that you might get the opportunity to practice in a location that you did not expect. Even if you got your degree from a less popular or lower tier law school, you’ll increase your marketability if you took steps to broaden your geography.
Just like the previous tip, you cannot afford to be too picky when it comes to location. While there will be snobs who would rather go jobless than work in an obscure city, you will be better off staying sharp and active while racking up the experience at the same time. Once the offers start rolling in, you’ll even have the luxury of selecting a job that comes closest to your expectations.
Use Technology to Your Advantage
The most important step for you to take in this regard is to review socialbusiness networking accounts thoroughly. Make sure to scrub off any content that you deem will be detrimental to your chances of landing a job and to your career as a lawyer. You should do this even before you start sending out resumes. Imagine your would-be employer seeing a picture of you passed out and half-naked at a fraternity or sorority party. If the picture holds such sentimental importance to you, it will be best that you put such pictures in private mode. In the same vein, should you see any of your past posts that others may deem as sexist, dogmatist, boorish or insensitive, delete them.After making sure that you have your existing social media accounts in order, you are ready to use them to your advantage. Overhaul the look of your accounts to appear suitable for someone in the legal practice. Start sharing content that is relevant to the profession and your target clientele.
For instance, if you’re set on becoming a California attorney, you can create a graphic-based, simplified explanation about a provision for personal injury lawyer If it is share-worthy enough, you’ll get free advertisement by adding your contact details in the graphic. You can also use your accounts to offer occasional pro bono work that will help build your brand even more.
Build Your Network
While this may sound like a cliche, you will find this tip in many job-hunting articles simply because it works. Putting in the extra work in expanding your professional contacts and networks also increases your chances of gaining referrals. Reach out to law firms, legal departments and even staffing agencies that might show interest in your services.
It will also be immensely helpful if you are more visible and active in your community. You can offer to take part community events that offer free legal advice, be present in chapter meetings, attend seminars and rub elbows with personalities who also work in the field to gain a better feel of the legal practice in the area. If you are lucky, you may also get some leads about possible job openings.
Stay Positive
Be conscious of maintaining your enthusiasm as you put in the extra effort to land a job. Allow your positive outlook and enthusiasm to become evident in the way you compose your resume, establish contacts and expand your network. Displaying enthusiasm and positivity will help you make a better impression on people who can be instrumental in helping you getting your legal career started. It will also be easier for them to remember you if you made a good and lasting impression.
Keeping yourself busy also helps in staying positive, especially during periods where job offers come in trickles or do not come at all. Apart from building your network and offering pro bono consultation ― both of which should keep you busy ― you can also seek out a legal professional who is gracious enough to let you shadow him or her. This will not only allow you to get a better feel of the practice, but it also allows you to establish even more connections. Alternatively, you can also try to advance your education by getting a Master of Law degree, preferably in your area of expertise. Having an advanced degree will surely add to your marketability.