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Well, here we are at the magnificent SAB Building in Swanston Street
and I'm with John Cain.
Great to see you, John.
Great to be here, Rob, in this very nice building.
John, so what students always want to know is
what makes a CV, particularly the JD students,
they send off a lot of applications to firms, like yours and other firms,
and they want to know what it is that makes their CV interesting
to people who are going to read it.
What are the three things, you reckon, makes a good CV?
Look, I think you've got to see the CV, not in isolation
but see it, the covering letter and the CV as one document
because a firm like ours would get about 700 to 800 applications each year
and we use electronic mechanisms like CV Mail but
somebody also reads each application.
So if you've got to read that many applications
something's got to jump out and hit you from the letter.
Right.
So you've got to make that letter interesting.
And the thing about CVs is that every student, generally, has good marks
or they've worked hard, they do interesting things and
they're quite balanced in their approach
but the critical thing is to try and pull one or two key things
out of them that are going to distinguish them from the crowd.
And students always worry about their marks, of course;
they're told they've got to work hard
and they've got to try and get straight-As.
Is that ever, or often, the determining factor
that gets students over the line
in relation to their CVs, or not?
When CVs are reviewed, they certainly look at marks
but you're not looking for a Distinction average for everybody;
if they've got reasonable marks and they've made a
reasonable effort at working at their degree
then that will get them through to the next step.
And then from there, that's when it's critical
that there's something interesting about them.
They've got to tell something about themselves,
something interesting they've done,
something that they know about the firm they're applying to.
The biggest mistake they can make is just produce
the stock-standard application letter and CV
that's identical for every firm
because you can spot them a mile away.
Sure and a lot of students volunteer these days,
we get a lot of students at the Centre for Innovative Justice.
Is volunteering work at a centre like ours
or a community legal centre
or Meals on Wheels or whatever,
do people who read CVs take that into account?
Certainly do and what we're looking for is
people that are balanced,
so you're looking for people that are going to fit well into the firm.
No wonder I couldn't get into a firm (chuckling).
(Chuckling) The holes in the sieve aren't quite that wide, Rob.
But they ... the key is to, when you're reading them, to identify people who are going to fit.
Law firms invest a lot of money in graduates,
they train them and they want them to stay on
so that whole issue around fit is important.
And the components of that are:
a good degree, so reasonable marks;
an interesting life outside of work;
and the CV's also got to tell people
or the application's got to tell people
that they've got a strong work ethic.
So they're probably the three components that I think are critical.
And what about the idea of just knocking cold on a law firm's doors,
particularly, in regional or rural Victoria, for instance,
is that a possibility for students?
It is and I think you've got to ...
there's a couple of pathways you can look at.
The ... getting a traineeship is clearly the best and preferred way.
But given there are limited places and an overwhelming number of applicants,
not everybody's going to get them,
so then you've got to look at what's the next step after that.
And it's critical to just get a way in and sometimes that is
doing a bit of work as a paralegal or a law clerk in a law firm
to gain some experience and often the only way you'll get that work
is to be quite determined and go and knock on doors.
But don't ... but be careful about it,
go and have a look and see, make sure the firm's got a prospect of engaging you.
But there are opportunities; there are lots of large litigation around
that ... class actions and cases like that,
that require paralegals to do a lot of the document work.
Don't frown on that sort of work, have a look at it
because it, at least, gives you some exposure to a law firm.
Chances are they might have a look at you, see the work that you do,
like what you do and offer you something else.
And the key thing is that you've got to get a start somewhere,
it doesn't really matter where you are.
Over the course of four or five years people come and people go,
opportunities arise and if you're persistent and resilient in the process
you'll get there in the end.
And a lot of our JD students ... they're all post-graduate students,
some are mature-aged students,
is that an advantage or a disadvantage as far as you're concerned?
It's a bit of a double-edged sword;
it's an advantage in that they have generally come from doing something else
so they're a bit more mature and
having decided to do a JD, they're pretty determined that they want to do law
and they're not going to do it for a short time and
then go and do something else.
So that's a positive.
The negative is though because they're often working
or it's quite an intense course,
they don't have as many opportunities to do the volunteering
or the extracurricular activities
so that can sometimes work against them.
So I think on balance, again, it depends on the individual,
it's about selling the key things that you've done in the past
that are going to set you aside from the crowd
and tell the law firm that you are somebody that
they should want to have on their team.
Okay, so obviously, marks are important but they're not the most
determinative thing in relation to a person's CV; something a bit innovative,
something that captures the imagination of the person reading the CV.
What about hobbies, John? We always get CVs where someone puts on there
as part of their background, oh, my hobbies are ...
Is that important? Does anyone care about that?
If they're interesting hobbies, yes (both chuckling).
So you've got to ... it's all about balance.
CVs are funny things; you know you get people that put in
what they did at school.
Well, I know they went to school, they got through VCE
and got an ENTER score so I know they've done that,
I don't need to know all that.
But if they're doing things that are a bit interesting, diverse,
then I do want to know about it
because it helps me work out where ... how they're going to fit into the firm.
So somebody that plays a lot of sport or is involved in music
or community activities, I'll be able to, when I read that,
think oh yeah, that person's going to go alright in this firm
because they've got interests that are similar to other people in the place.
The other tip, I think, is worth students thinking about
is know something about the firm, know a case that the firm was involved in,
know an area that a partner is particularly interested in.
Now it may surprise you, Rob, but lawyers have big egos.
(Chuckling)
And if you can in some way ...
Unlike academics, of course (chuckling).
Unlike academics and former politicians.
But if you can somehow play to that ego;
don't lay it on with a trowel, be measured about it,
but if you can do that then that is going to stand you out
so that's also important.
So research and something beyond just looking at the firm's website
is very important.
Well, thanks, John. That's fantastic advice
and I'm sure students will appreciate it.
And students, you've learnt, maybe, something new -
lawyers are real people and they're actually looking
for real people with diverse backgrounds.
Thanks very much for listening.
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