CAREER COUNSELOR'S CORNER
1. 800. 973. 1177
Alternative Legal Careers [Danielle D. Hansen] So you went through three years of law school only to eventually decide that you don’t want to practice law? No problem. Your J.D. offers you a plethora of other opportunities that don’t involve typical attorney work.
Last week, we began our look at alternate
these editors must sometimes “translate”
Several publishing companies have made
careers you can explore with your J.D. if you
the legalese of the authors and turn that
Legal Codes for the states available for
find that you just don’t have it within you
language into something simpler for lay
years, and over the past decade, the laws
to actually practice law, per se. Yes, your
readers, or at least first-year law students,
within those books have made their way onto
friends and families will think you’re crazy
to handle.
the Internet. While this conversion requires
and that you’ve wasted your time and hard-
plenty of work by programmers and web
earned money-especially if it’s your parents
On the other hand, oftentimes these books
designers, people with legal knowledge are
who have wasted THEIR hard-earned money.
cannot and should not be altered. The legal-
also required.
But the bottom line is that thousands of J.D.
ese should not be changed in many cases,
graduates each year will never go into actual
especially if a professor/writer is trying to
Before they make their way from the books
legal practice. So, despite what the naysay-
make an intricate point about a detailed and
into their online version, these laws need
ers will complain about, you’re not alone in
complex matter of the law. In these cases,
to be checked and double-checked. And
wanting to explore an alternative career.
the publishers’ editors and proofreaders will
who better to do that than an attorney with
be lost. They lack the expertise to realize if
(at least) a basic understanding of the law?
the author has made a spelling or gram-
It’s not as simple as taking the Workers’
mar error. Would a publisher’s average
Compensation Code, for example, and copy
One of the big options for J.D.’s who don’t
proofreader realize that the sentence, “She
and pasting it into one gigantic HTML file.
want to practice law is in the field of legal
was a summer of counsel and then externed
That would work, technically speaking, but
publishing. This is a multi-million-dollar
elsewhere,” is a complete thought and very
it would only give users a clunky document
industry that employs thousands of attorneys
understandable to legal readers? Probably
with which to work. Instead, the documents
throughout the U.S. and the world. It’s also
not. That sentence looks like a train wreck,
are broken up into sections.
an industry with dozens of options within the
but grammatically there is nothing wrong
field.
with it. And more than likely, it would take
Researchers-again, these researchers are
someone with legal expertise to understand
mostly attorneys-must track the laws and all
For example, there is the world of textbooks.
this. An author might become irate with a
applicable amendments. Publishing an out-
These are generally written by attorneys
publisher for changing such a sentence; so
of-date law enters into dangerous territory;
who are well-established in their respective
the publishers hire plenty of specialized edi-
it not only looks bad from a public relations
fields and who have some formal academic
tors with specific sets of skills.
point of view and will not help a publisher win
Publishing Careers
and writing training. Writing such a book on
over customers, but there could be potential
your own when you’re fresh out of law school
The boom of the Internet has given new life
legal ramifications involved if a trial lawyer
might prove to be futile; your lack of experi-
to legal publishing over the past few years.
uses outdated information in court.
ence will not endear you to book publishers,
Dusty old tomes cluttering valuable space in
whose bottom-line is, “Will this book sell?”
law offices are slowly being replaced by the
With printed books, there’s somewhat of
More than likely, yours will not.
mouse and the monitor. Stacks and stacks
an expectation for things to be out of date.
of yellowing paper were first replaced by the
That’s why we were always instructed to
But that doesn’t mean that you can’t break
floppy disk and now the CD-ROM. There are
check the pocket parts first before diving into
into the textbook industry. This field employs
countless websites devoted to the law and,
the statutes themselves. But on the Inter-
thousands of expert editors who, at the very
like our own LawCrossing, to legal profes-
net-with its ever-growing immediacy-people
least, must know the intricacies of “legal-
sionals.
expect legal sites to be up to date. The major
ese,” the language of lawyers. Moreover,
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legal online publishers realize this, and they
continued on back
CAREER COUNSELOR'S CORNER
1. 800. 973. 1177
employ thousands of attorneys to constantly
often employ many attorneys to go to the law
monitor state and federal goings-on to
schools and get the students hooked. In this
ensure the accuracy and timeliness of every
capacity, the publishers’ attorneys are part
single section of law on their sites.
salesperson and part trainer, part public relations guru and part savior. It makes you
It’s not just a matter of reading law jour-
wonder how students did their research 10 or
nals or scanning the Internet to find new
20 years ago, before the advent of the Web.
amendments to published laws. The major legal publishers have liaisons who work in
Of course, legal publishers employ attorneys
conjunction with state and federal secretar-
in more traditional roles as well. Perhaps
ies, officers, information keepers, etc. There
you don’t want to work at a firm, yet you have
is indeed competition among the publishers,
a love of contracts. Online subscriptions
and anything they can do to get a “scoop”-to
often are written contracts which must, of
get their website updated with a new law or
course, be closely examined down to the last
amendment before their competition does-is
letter. What if a customer wants to cancel
fair game.
service, for example? What if they want to add additional users without being charged
Usually, knowing the instant when a new law
any extra money? These matters must be
or amendment has been passed or repealed
thought out in advance, and usually they are;
is not enough. Legal researchers need to
they’re contained in the contract.
keep abreast of all legislation from inception onwards. Many legal websites now have
As you can see, there are plenty of jobs in the
sections devoted to future laws or laws on
legal publishing industry for attorneys. It’s
the way-laws that are passed but not yet
another field with a large number of lawyer-
codified. Attorneys are needed to find those
employees who simply did not see them-
laws and, in many cases, write commentary
selves in a traditional legal career. Someone
about them.
like yourself perhaps. These jobs are out there to be had, and at LawCrossing we want
Online legal publishers also employ attorneys in their customer service departments. The customers in these cases are attorneys 99% of the time, as very few other people have the need to look up tort provisions, for example. Paying customers often need help finding particular laws or amendments, and the customer service departments’ attorneys are there to help. Paid subscriptions to these sites can be extremely expensive; for that kind of money, customers expect top-notch customer service, and talking to a machine is not an option. Online legal publishers know what they’re doing. They bait you in law school to use their product for your research for free, knowing full well you’ll be a slave to that site by the time you get out of school. At which time you or your employer will have to pay for it. For this reason, legal online publishers
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to help you find them.