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Any tips? There are candidates with much better grades than me--how can I sell myself to employers?

Anonymous User wrote:Any tips? There are candidates with much better grades than me--how can I sell myself to employers?

What's unique about you? What can you bring to the table that other candidates can't? Do you have any special skills or strengths that would make you an asset to the firm that other candidates likely don't have?

Knockglock wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:Any tips? There are candidates with much better grades than me--how can I sell myself to employers?

What's unique about you? What can you bring to the table that other candidates can't? Do you have any special skills or strengths that would make you an asset to the firm that other candidates likely don't have?

That's the problem--these firms have their pick of the top students and my credentials don't stack up.

Anonymous User wrote:

Knockglock wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:Any tips? There are candidates with much better grades than me--how can I sell myself to employers?

What's unique about you? What can you bring to the table that other candidates can't? Do you have any special skills or strengths that would make you an asset to the firm that other candidates likely don't have?

That's the problem--these firms have their pick of the top students and my credentials don't stack up.

Hmm, there's something out there i'm willing to bet that would make you an asset, even if you can't think of it yet. Perhaps you're really good at being friendly and outgoing and meeting new people and you could bring in new clients; or maybe you're great at reconciling different points of view and opinions in a group setting and keeping the group focused and productive. Maybe you would bring energy to the firm.

Since your credentials don't quite stack up you're probably going to have to be creative.

You can always be "the guy." A lot of firms are looking for "the sports guy", the one that will run the fantasy leagues, betting pools, etc. Others would ask you to be the comic guy, always knowing the newest and funniest jokes.

I dunno, you kinda said it yourself... there's a lot more qualified people than you so you're kinda in a tough spot.

Ildeuce wrote:You can always be "the guy." A lot of firms are looking for "the sports guy", the one that will run the fantasy leagues, betting pools, etc. Others would ask you to be the comic guy, always knowing the newest and funniest jokes.

Legen - wait for it....

You need to distinguish yourself:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ALmgArYW8Y

kazu wrote:

Ildeuce wrote:You can always be "the guy." A lot of firms are looking for "the sports guy", the one that will run the fantasy leagues, betting pools, etc. Others would ask you to be the comic guy, always knowing the newest and funniest jokes.

Legen - wait for it....

Haha, glad to see someone could pick that reference up.

Ildeuce wrote:

kazu wrote:

Ildeuce wrote:You can always be "the guy." A lot of firms are looking for "the sports guy", the one that will run the fantasy leagues, betting pools, etc. Others would ask you to be the comic guy, always knowing the newest and funniest jokes.

Legen - wait for it....

Haha, glad to see someone could pick that reference up.

I'm sort of a HIMYM fanatic. Plus that episode was hilarious.

"because I have no desire to do anything in life but bill more hours so that you can make more money"

If you can't see reasons why you are unique and the best candidate for a job I doubt your potential employers will.

impossible is nothing brah.

dig deep, make something up. as a lawyer, this will be your job.

Tsispilos wrote:"because I have no desire to do anything in life but bill more hours so that you can make more money"

in reality, this is basically all they want, with a few caveats:

1) you need to convince them that all those hours aren't going to burn you out. nobody wants to invest a years' salary into a person who will work for a year then go crazy and have to leave. you can accomplish this by either convincing them that you really do enjoy menial tasks (probably a long shot) or by demonstrating some outside interest that will keep you emotionally balanced (so long as it will not detract from your billing time).

2) they want to be assured that your work will at least be of passable quality--nobody wants someone to bill 2900 hours and have the end product be 30,000 pages of ungrammatical misspellings with unsheppardized cases unintelligibly strung together with no pincites. This is where bragging about actually being smart comes in handy--but you have to back this up with real evidence, like grades or journal or something. If you have a 2.8 and aren't on a journal, you will need to get creative.

3) they don't want you to (a) disrupt the firm's culture/atmosphere, or (b) scare off their clients. This is where age/sex/religious/political discrimination is at its strongest. If you're not a good fit, that's just too bad. The best thing you can do in this regard is just be socially relaxed and adaptable, and deftly avoid answering sensitive questions and avoid airing any controversial views you might have.