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I do know that I am interested in litigation, however, I do not have a specific practice area that really has drawn my attention. When interviewing with BigLaw firms, can I focus on my desire to practice litigation—coupled with my experience at a legal clinic—without having to be more specific as to where I want to practice? I do not have a specific area of expertise based on past experiences, or based on classes taken. Should I just pick areas I am interested in that I know the firm practices?

If they ask what interests you about litigation, one thing i have found that works well is mentioning something about the wide variety of law you experience in a litigation practice. Particularly with experts. You have to / get to become an expert in their field in a couple of days prior to depos, etc.

Don't lie, it'll be obvious and show a lack of discretion.

Unless you've had extensive experience in the legal field before law school, your 1L classes and 1L summer job are probably not going to give you that much experience, certainly not enough to walk into an interview and proclaim your desire and commitment to practice in a specific area.

Imagine sitting there as an attorney, knowing the kid doesn't have experience to know what they're saying...what would you think of the applicant?

Use the experience you have and explain what you think you'd like to do, explain what you liked and would like to pursue, but be honest that you might be flexible and are interested in being exposed to other things they do.

Anonymous User wrote:Use the experience you have and explain what you think you'd like to do, explain what you liked and would like to pursue, but be honest that you might be flexible and are interested in being exposed to other things they do.

I agree with this (though I wouldn't go so far as to say don't lie since interviewing is often about stretching the truth right up until its breaking pint).

The best thing to do is hedge hedge hedge: bring up reasons why you like litigation based on what you've done, admit that you are not experienced so you can't really know for sure, hedge and say that you're still figuring out what you are interested in.

If your into sports I always go with this answer. I like litigation because I'm intersts withe the adversarial nature of it. I played sports my whole life so working on a team where there is one clear winner and one clear loser really appeals to me. Also my strengths line up with litigation because blah blah blah.

Head of the recruiting committe for the firm I'm at now said the fact that I listed litigation as an interest on my resume was an important factor for why I was hired into the litigation department.

As a law student, it is believable if someone says they know they want to litigate but aren't sure about a niche yet. That's because you won't find a niche until you get years of general practice, which is the common career path.

So say you're interested. Worst thing in the world for me, personally, would have been to get pegged doing corporate work because I never said I knew I hated that shit.

NotMyRealName09 wrote:I listed litigation as an interest on my resume

If you've ever acted before, that is a credible thing to work in

When I was going through OCI I always expressed a generalized interest in litigation, with a little bit of stuff thrown in about having a background in finance, but that still didn't make my responses much more specific than "Litigation. The businessey kind please."

Again, unless you have reams of pre-LS work experience, your interviewers aren't going to be expecting answers much more specific than litigation or transactional work. They know what you don't know. Just answer the question as specifically as you confidently can and then start talking about fantasy football.

My stock reply (which I've been told is a good one by a handful of people who make hiring decisions) is that I like the process. I genuinely like civ pro, legal research, and brief writing, so all subject matter is going to be interesting to me so long as it's in the context of litigation.

SBL wrote: start talking about fantasy football.

TCR FTW