Better way of addressing 1L summer job in interview Forum

[Anonymous User]

I've been getting rejections from my screeners/cbs, and I think one area I can improve on is addressing my 1L summer job.

What I did over 1L summer was draft memos and do legal research. In the interview, I'll give an anecdote on one case I liked and try to connect it to their firm work.
However, when I tell the attorneys about this in the interview, they don't seem satisfied with my answer. Is this not substantive enough?
What are ways to improve my answer about my summer job?

[Anonymous User]

tagged since me and you have to be the same person

[Phil Brooks]

Instead of connecting what you did only to the substantive work of the firm, try mentioning one or two skills you learned that would fit into the firm's culture or structure. For example, "this experience showed me how to be proactive and I would bring the same initiative to [firm's] entrepreneurial environment." or "this experience showed me how to work well in teams which I feel would make me a good fit in [firm's] collegial practice groups." These are canned answers but you get the idea.

Firms often discredit the alleged 'substantive experience' of 1Ls but they seem to credit more the skills that 1Ls bring to the table.

[Anonymous User]

Also this should be a given, but be fairly careful about not disclosing anything that was privileged during your interview.

I usually brought up this concept whenever anybody asked more probing questions. I'd pause and say something like "I discussed with my boss what I could and could not discuss in these interviews without violating privilege, but I want to speak a bit more carefully and slowly to make sure I don't mess it up..." and then did give more slow answers when describing my work for 1L summer. A fair number of my interviewers seemed to appreciate this, and some commented that it bothers them when they see interviewees tell them information that they suspect they shouldn't have.