Define "Work Experience" Forum

[dood]

Where would Marketing and Human Resource jobs fall?

unless you're the director of HR or marketing, probably sales. i mean, its just a simple concept of "value" based on perceived difficulty in obtaining it (whether it is a certain type of job or gold). and im sure you're position was special and you were in high demand, but just seems like HR or marketing or sales or paralegal jobs are a dime a dozen.

[dixiecupdrinking]

Where would Marketing and Human Resource jobs fall?

It's probably not going to impress anyone substantively, but they will still be glad to see you have had a real job for a while.

Not really worth trying to make fine-grained distinctions as far as the value of work experience. If it's substantively relevant (worked in banking/finance, want to do corporate work), then that's great. If it's not relevant but interesting (used to be a detective, owned a weird business, etc.), then that helps you stand out. If it's just a full-time job that you had for a while, then it won't get you any special points but still helps versus someone who is K-JD.

[HawkeyeGirl]

Does anyone know if firms try to pigeonhole you based on your prior experience? I have significant M&A experience, but I'm more interested in bankruptcy/restructuring, of which I only have limited experience.

[Lincoln]

Does anyone know if firms try to pigeonhole you based on your prior experience? I have significant M&A experience, but I'm more interested in bankruptcy/restructuring, of which I only have limited experience.

I had significant experience related to corporate M&A but wanted litigation. I was pretty up-front about wanting lit, so I mostly interviewed with lit people, but several of them said things like "your experience is obviously more related to corporate, but it will serve you well regardless of what practice area you pursue."

[westphillybandr]

Sorry if a thread already exists, I did a cursory search. And maybe this is common sense, but I'd like some opinions on what types of Pre-LS work experience might fall into the following categories (and some comments on whether the categories really make a difference whatsoever):

Solid -
Focker's investment position: strong to quite strong -
Decent -
Meh, don't try to spin it too hard -
Don't mention this in an interview or include it on your resume if you can help it -

IMO:

Solid - IBanking/MBB Consulting/Military Officer
Strong - Military Enlisted/Relevant Legal Work/Policy Work
Decent - General unrelated professional work (i.e. accounting/engineering)
Meh - unrelated quasi-professional work (i.e. Sales)
Shitty - retail

ETA: 0L so I'm just talking about admissions process, not OCI

i would reverse what u categorized as strong and decent. broad generalization - but the higher your pay grade, the higher its regarded by admissions and during OCI. and if you mean paralegal by "Relevant Legal Work" - put that in the meh category.

Paralegal work for the type of employer you are interviewing with is solid. It gives you an answer to "Why Law School", "Why Us" and it should give you useful contacts.

[justonemoregame]

I think my experience falls somewhere between "meh" and "decent," and one thing I fear is feeling pressured to spin it as strong. Maybe some people can pull this off, and it benefits them, but I'd feel much more comfortable just sharing anecdotes and talking about how fun my previous jobs were. I've worked in sales for a large non-profit publisher, interned for a well-known "entertainment" and "sports" "programming" "network," and started/operated a small business related to publishing. None of it is complex stuff, and I would rather not attempt to make it out to be. Maybe I'm over-thinking it.

Basically I feel like if a firm was trying to screen me for normality/sociability, no problem. If they need to me illustrate how my previous experience has prepared me for a firm workload, oh boy.

[lisjjen]

Entry level ≠ busboy.

As an illustration, I'm currently an investment banking analyst. My "entry level" job takes up 3/4 of my resume, because frankly, everything I've done at my "entry level" job has been more meaningful to future employers than anything I did in college. I'm not sure if career services will tell me to change that for OCI, but I can't imagine they'd tell me to cut down my 2 years of banking into 1 bullet.

I mean, that makes sense. One of my entry-level jobs going into 1L was interning for a Congressman. Another was delivering pizzas. I made the internship like 5 bullets and didn't add the delivery job. Different HR people who looked at it told me I should have trimmed the internship back and added the pizza gig, esp. the part about how much Spanish I had to speak while I was working there.

[y2zipper]

Ugh, I don't even know where to begin on resumes, lol. I have unpaid experience that I can talk about in a pretty positive way, but my work history sucks, lol.

[Lincoln]

Ugh, I don't even know where to begin on resumes, lol. I have unpaid experience that I can talk about in a pretty positive way, but my work history sucks, lol.

This counts, and is true for many people in law school. Don't stress about it, and highlight what you think is most interesting or valuable to employers.

[splitsplat]

i would reverse what u categorized as strong and decent. broad generalization - but the higher your pay grade, the higher its regarded by admissions and during OCI. and if you mean paralegal by "Relevant Legal Work" - put that in the meh category.

I would say it's also worth mentioning there is a difference between paralegal work at a solo practitioners office doing housing rights shit (very meh) and a solid gig at a big vault firm in a relevant practice area (decent to strong)