Intellectual Property

What To Do If You Don’t Have An IP Job Lined Up Yet

Developing your own network and immersing yourself in the intellectual property world can help open up career paths.

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The academic year is well underway, which means there are a number of 3Ls who are panicking right now if they don’t have a job offer lined up, particularly as their Biglaw classmates sit back and enjoy their third year. I get it. I’ve been there. And worse, when I was a 3L, I couldn’t really pinpoint what career path I wanted to take other than vaguely wanting to do something in the public interest sector. Intellectual property policy wasn’t even on my radar as a possibility and I was instead looking into direct services, like legal aid or immigration clinics.

So, what do you do if you don’t have an IP job lined up already? Well, here’s a few different options:

  1. Panic. Look at how much money you owe Navient or Discover and realize that you will never, ever pay it all back because you’re never going to find a job. Berate yourself for the decision to go to law school, which has caused this enormous hole of debt that you will never climb out of. (Side note: I’m 10 years out of law school and I still sometimes feel like I will never pay back my student loans.)
  2. Tell yourself you’ll find a job after you pass the bar. Do nothing right now because it’ll be much easier to find a job when you’re able to brandish your bar results to a prospective employer, right? (This is something I often heard when I said that I was applying for non-profit jobs, but the truth is, not everyone requires bar passage before hire.)
  3. Apply everywhere (even outside the IP field) and take the first job that comes your way. Um, you need a job. What could possibly go wrong with applying to every job posting you see? (Confession: I basically did this whole apply everywhere thing and looking back, it was a waste of time because I could have ended up in an area I really didn’t want to be. While keeping an open mind is good — I may not have ended up doing copyright or patent work otherwise — being strategic is also key.)

The truth is, I don’t have a magical answer for what to do if you don’t have a job lined up, but obviously the above options are not good ones. But if you are without a job, there are several things you can do to try and secure an intellectual property job. Of course, some of these tips may lean more heavily to the public interest sector, but some are applicable more generally.

  1. Network, network, network. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, networking is key and can open doors you didn’t know exist. There are jobs that are never posted on public job boards and, obviously, if you don’t know a job opening exists you can’t apply for it. Those working on copyright or patent policy know others working in this space or are on listserves where job postings occasionally pop up. Ask your intellectual property professor if there are any alums practicing in the city you want to work and connect with them. Ask your former supervisor to introduce you to people in the intellectual property space. Go to networking events, such as intellectual property conferences, talks or panels if you can and introduce yourself to the speakers as well as other attendees.
  2. Pay attention to organizational changes. Following on the networking tip, keep an eye on announcements of job changes when an individual announces he or she is (or has) moved to a new position; sometimes the job search lags behind when someone vacates their position. I got one of my former jobs this way. After I saw news that the previous staff attorney had just started at a new organization, I wrote to the Executive Director and asked whether the organization was going to fill her spot and, if so, when the job posting would be listed. He asked me to send him my résumé, we had a phone call and then two days later I had a job offer. This job was never posted on their website, to any listserves or anywhere else and had I not asked, I may not have ended up at that organization. Subscribe to newsletters from organizations you might want to work in for these key news items.
  3. Expand your subject matter search beyond traditional classes of intellectual property. While most individuals think about intellectual property in terms of patents, copyright or trademark — and often specialize in a single one of these areas — think about what it is that interests you about intellectual property. Do you have a science or technical background and therefore think you should do patent law? Do you love movies and therefore want to go into copyright? There’s a world of related issues to intellectual property including privacy, cybersecurity, entertainment, sports, technology, antitrust, advertising, communications, and more. You might find an opportunity where 90 percent of your job focuses on one of these related areas and intellectual property is only 10 percent, but it would allow you to get your foot in the door.
  4. Expand your search beyond law firms and big non-profits. There are so many organizations out there that work on intellectual property issues. I covered a few public interest paths here, but there are so many others, some of which focus on very narrow, niche subsets of intellectual property. Try applying directly to companies, particularly technology companies. Sure, there are the big companies that care a lot about intellectual property — Google, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, etc. — but think beyond the big names. Technology startups abound and if you’re willing to take a risk, opportunities exist to gain serious experience and have a pretty big impact on the organization. Many startups are willing to take a risk and pick up the right fit for their organization, rather than someone who has the traditional law firm experience.
  5. Fill out your résumé. Join bar sections. Write a law review article or an article for a legal magazine. Heck, write blog posts about interesting facets of intellectual property. Make sure to put these items on your resume or mention them in your cover letter. From my perspective, knowing that someone has a keen interest in intellectual property and has already thought through various legal or policy issues related to patents or copyright means a lot to a hiring manager. Showing a commitment to intellectual property will separate you from other applicants that really are applying to every job posting they come across.

Landing your first job can be tough, especially if you go a non-traditional route. Career service offices aren’t always set up to help students who aren’t looking for a clerkship or law firm position, nor do they specialize in jobs for specific practice areas. Developing your own network and immersing yourself in the intellectual property world can help open up career paths, including ones you may not have considered previously.

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Krista L. Cox is a policy attorney who has spent her career working for non-profit organizations and associations. She has expertise in copyright, patent, and intellectual property enforcement law, as well as international trade. She currently works for a non-profit member association advocating for balanced copyright. You can reach her at kristay@gmail.com.

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