Transcript
In this video, Harrison Barnes notices that the attorney has switched from one practice area to another. He was a patent attorney, then changed to be a trademark attorney, and then to a general type of work. This resume is appropriate for in-house jobs rather than for law firms. It is a bit alarming for law firms if someone switches their practice area as it raises many questions about their commitment to the job. For attorneys with an experience like this, here are some things you need to note if you are looking to apply to a law firm.
- Law firms will be a little bit worried when they see that you are jumping around from one practice area to another.
- Information on the resume should not be too much to avoid showing a dramatic change of practice area.
- Your resume should be focused on one particular practice area and deemphasize those that are not related.
- It will help if you establish your commitment to your practice area.
Transcript:
First resume, let's see here. So this is a looks like a patent attorney and they are working the same firms since 2020. And then before that they were at another firm where they were doing trademark attorney trademark work. And then also before that they were doing this person's a trademark and patent attorney.
This is actually interesting. And we don't get a lot of in these sort of reviews, we don't get a lot of patent attorneys. So this is a actually a very good resume, but there's a couple of things about it that. I'm not really quite sure about what this person's doing. This particular attorney major in electrical engineering, which is a great thing to have if you want to be a patent attorney.
And then it looks like they worked at a patent firm doing patent work for quite a while and which is, five years and then went into doing trademark and then litigation and but mainly trademarks. Thanks. That's almost like a switching practice area. And they went from doing a very complex practice area to doing trademark, which is not as difficult.
And then and now they're doing general related work. So a couple of things about this resume. Anytime someone does a practice area switch that can be a little bit alarming sometimes to law firms. This person may have moved to a smaller market. I don't know but now they're doing different types of work and they may have their own practice.
I don't know exactly what's going on, but to move from doing patent prosecution, to doing trademark to now doing general more general type of work is a pattern where the person's seems to be. I don't know what the reason is. Type of movement are, but I would a couple of things about this resume is I wouldn't try, if you want to try to market yourself as a trademark and patent attorney, I would probably try to put in a little bit of information about not and make it not look like such a dramatic practice area switch because you have five years of experience doing patent prosecution.
And then all of a sudden you went over to doing trademark law which doesn't require even an electrical, like even a science degree to do. And now you're doing a general practice. There needs to be some sort of explanation for that and why you're doing that. Because being part of the patent in doing the patent U S PTO Mino admitted there which is a good thing.
It's not necessarily going to help you in this general type of position. So I would almost, th this resume would almost be better if it stopped in 2018, but trademark is certainly in demand right now. But if you want to do trademark, I would try to maybe to some extent and talk about to be more focused, talk about the work you're doing here, that's related to IP and really deemphasized.
Real estate and litigation cause most law firms are looking for people that are specialists and and one thing I think that I talked about and most most meetings is just here most of these meetings is when law firms are evaluating your resume, they want to know can you do that?
Will you do the job? Long-term so they want to know, can you do the job?
Will you get a job long term or can you be managed?
Will you do the job?
Do you want the job? There's another one.
Yeah. So here the, I think law firms are going to wonder if you're going to stick around wherever you go, because it just seems that then your terms or your resume, this resume is moving from something that was very focused on patent work to now trademark for a year, and now something more general.
So a lot of times there's nothing Robin like in the practice of law and lots of people don't, but you've been moving into kind of all these different things. Now this may be a good resume for going in house, for example, because you can do all sorts of different types of work and be an in-house counsel, but a law firm is going to be a little nervous about it.
So I like the resume, but they're going to be a little bit nervous.
