Working With A Recruiter: How To Get Big Time Results As A Small Time Attorney
Most job postings by recruiters will ask for candidates who have big law firm experience. However, if your legal experience has been limited to smaller law firms, there are still recruiters out there who will work with you.
Job hunting as a small time attorney can be extremely difficult when there is no one willing to help you. Recruiters are often willing to work only with those who have Biglaw backgrounds due to the nature of the recruiting market. Larger firms are privy to the generous budget necessary to shoulder the expense of hiring recruiters. They want Biglaw and Biglaw is what they get. Unfortunately, this results in a system where those who are already able to secure plum jobs are given a golden ticket and those who need the most help finding a job are rejected from boarding the recruiting train at all.
Most job postings by recruiters will ask for candidates who have Biglaw firm experience. However, if your legal experience has been limited to smaller law firms, there are still recruiters out there who will work with you. The trick is to focus on regional recruiters who are able to tap into a mine of jobs being offered by regional firms. In general, regional recruiters are more open to a variety of candidates as long as they have the requisite experience for a job. You’re not going to jump into Biglaw or earn the higher end of six figures, but you may just be able to find yourself a job if you know how to take advantage of the situation.
I spoke with Michael Prager of P.G. Prager Search Associates, a recruiting firm that specializes in serving the greater Long Island market for the New York City area. Mr. Prager shared his insights with me on how an attorney can work with a recruiter to obtain big time results and make themselves stand out among the plethora of job seeking attorneys.
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Stay in touch with your recruiter.
If a recruiter has responded to you, thinks that you would be a good match for the position and firm, and agreed to forward your resume, follow up every so often to stay on his or her radar and check on your status. Cold calling doesn’t really work in a regional market and a recruiter can speak to a client on your behalf to see how their application process is going.
Also, Biglaw recruiters tend to shuffle people around and call a lot of potential candidates. By keeping in regular contact with a recruiter who works with smaller firms, you can develop a continuous rapport where he or she will look out for you and think of you when an appropriate job comes across their desk.
Your resume is more important than you may realize it is.
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Obvious, but perhaps not so obvious, is the art of a simple and effective resume. When a recruiter has to weed through hundreds of resumes, each resume gets only a cursory glance–thirty seconds if you’re lucky. Make sure that your academics and work experience are easy to review for an objective third party. Additionally, while you might think something like interesting fonts will set your resume apart, it will be for all the wrong reasons. Remember that a great recruiter will try to make the most of every candidate and a great resume is a significant part of helping to make that happen.
Keep your thank you emails short and sweet.
If you’ve successfully scored an interview, you may wish to send a thank you email, which is more optional these days but still a nice touch. Just keep it short and sweet if you choose to do it. Many attorneys make the mistake of trying to sell themselves via the thank you email and looking desperate as a result. You’ve already had the chance to prove that you should be hired for the position. Your recruiter is already rooting for you. So avoid a re-sell and maintain your professionalism while leaving intact your good impression on the interviewers.
Don’t respond to more than a couple of job postings by the same recruiter.
Another common mistake is to respond to 7 or 8 job postings by the same recruiter. Presumably, all those jobs don’t require the same qualifications and again, it makes you look desperate and thus an undesirable candidate to promote to firms. You want to show that you have a certain expertise and a certain interest, not be all over the place and applying to be in-house counsel at a pharmaceutical company while also applying to be an employment law associate. If you can demonstrate focus, it will be easier for the recruiter to find something for you and match your qualifications and interest with a client.
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So the next time you feel discouraged that you need to be in Biglaw for a recruiter to pay attention to you, look up the regional recruiters who are more willing to play ball with you and promote your talents. Their clients are usually more flexible as well in hiring attorneys who are less cookie cutter and more creative in what they can bring to the firm. Good luck and let the job hunt begin.
Sunny Choi is the Writers in Residence Coordinator for Ms. JD. She is a former participant in the Writers in Residence program, where her monthly column Legally Thrifty focused on beginners personal finance advice for law students and professionals. A graduate of the University of Michigan Law School, she currently practices commercial litigation and creditors’ rights while freelance writing and blogging in her spare time. She can be reached at contentdirector@ms-jd.org.
