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Today’s Legal Market and Your Job Search By Joshua Nave Looking for a new job in the legal industry? Despite the tough job market, the pace of lateral hiring is picking up this year. Large firms still have work to do and they’re looking to lower risk by bringing in experienced attorneys, especially those with a portable book of business.
Right now, it’s all about the value you can add to a firm. The competition for these positions is tough and some firms have started renegotiating deals with recruiters, refusing to pay the market rate in a job market where they can have their pick of candidates. Other firms are paying recruiters less for placing associates that have been recently laid off, according to this article from The American Lawyer. So how can you maximize your chances of finding one of these positions? If you’re going it alone, looking for a new position without the help of a headhunter, you want to make sure your resume is as strong as possible. Consider having it edited by a professional resume writer, like the staff of Attorney Resume. At the very least tweak it to emphasize the value you can add to a firm or organization and ask friends or colleagues to look it over. Keep an eye on the legal industry as a whole. Some firms are cutting back while others are expanding. The same is true of
practice areas - are you in a practice area that is experiencing growth or in a decline? Can you easily move to a specialty that is expanding? The more you know about the job market, the better able you will be to position yourself for a growth position. One good source of information is JDJournal. Don’t stick to just one method for your job search. Job boards like LawCrossing are a good place to start, but don’t stop there. The people at Legal Authority use a direct mailing campaign to put your resume and other documents directly into the hands of hundreds of firms or other legal organizations that fit your job needs. Whether you use their help or do it on your own, the direct approach is a very effective way of finding unadvertised positions. The job market may be extremely competitive at the moment, but there are thousands of opportunities out there for lawyers, paralegals and others in the legal industry that know how to position themselves. Using these tips and others found on this site, you can maximize your own chances for success.
EmploymentCrossing is the largest collection of active jobs in the world. We continuously monitor the hiring needs of more than 250,000 employers, including virtually every corporation and organization in the United States. We do not charge employers to post their jobs and we aggressively contact and investigate thousands of employers each day to learn of new positions. No one works harder than EmploymentCrossing. Let EmploymentCrossing go to work for you.
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