Description
Why you Should Strive to Get the Best Recommendations
Speaker 1:[00:00:00] I'm a graduate of an unranked law school, but I've interned clerked for four judges at both state and federal levels. How can we make ourselves look like we are in demand without coming off as cocky, boastful and how can I get larger firms to look at my applications?
Okay. Basically the best way to look like you're in demand, first thing, is if you've clerked for four judges then you want to get very good recommendations from those judges. You probably want to get recommendation letters from them, if you can. And those would be useful to even include with your applications because those judges can write about what a good job you've done, how hard you work, how dedicated you are.
A lot of times people are putting the cart before the horse. So do not put the cart before you. What that means, a lot of times this person here with a short-term vision of not getting the law firm job you want. What this person is doing is going and worrying about what can they do. Is it hopeless because I went to a top 30 law school? And that's not true.
The problem before you right now is getting the best job you can. Once you've done that, you need to put yourself [00:01:00] into it. You need to commit. You need to go 100%.
Here's what most people do by the way. When they don't get the jobs that they want, initially, they're sour grapes. They don't try hard. They don't put themselves into it. They say, "Oh, I'm not getting paid as much money as I should." They have a bad experience. They look at their firm negatively. Their firm looks at them negatively and everybody's unhappy, and they have crappy careers. That's what most people do.
Instead, wherever the hell you go, you need to throw yourself into it and give it everything you got and be the best fricking attorney they've ever seen. And then that'll make you much more confident. And then later on when you've done all these things and people see your confidence and what a freaking outstanding person you are and how well you're doing and how much you're underpaid and under challenged because you've just given it everything you've got and that you're an overachiever, then when you get a job in a big firm, you'll get a job in a better firm. From there, you'll build yourself to a bigger firm. This is what people should do.
But instead people approach this, frankly, I'm not saying you're doing this, as if they've already lost. That's not what you do. Winners always emerged from stuff. Whoever people, when they call them a loser, they always win. [00:02:00] This is what winners do. So you need to do the same thing. You need to say, "Oh, I did these clerkships. How can I not come off as cocky and boastful?" Whatever you did for these judges needs to be amazing. And you want them to talk about you and to say good things about you and to always be very positive about you.
And then when you go into interviews, those people need to see how fricking awesome you are and how excited and how hard you work. This is what the best people do. The best people go into interviews and they give the impression that, "I will work harder than anyone. I'll do whatever I possibly can to be the best employee you've ever seen," and so forth. And if you do that, you're going to do well. And that's what you need to do.
I'm not trying to be so direct here, the better you are at whatever you're doing now, then the more confidence you're going to get, the more you're going to be proficient, and the more that's going to come across when people interview you. And they're going to realize that they're getting energy and all sorts of things.
You're selling two things, by the way, when you're selling yourself. You're selling your experience and so forth and what you can do, but you're also selling energy.
