How to use Extra-Curricular Activities to Secure Vacation Schemes — Dragonfly HK

Whilst academic competence is often a bench-mark to demonstrate a sufficient understanding of the law, at the end of the day, grades are… well… only grades.

In an increasingly competitive market, more is often needed for students to differentiate themselves. Indeed, when we take a look at the core traits that firms are looking for — such as leadership, teamwork, resilience, integrity and communication — these traits are often independent from your academic ability. So, during an interview, when you are asked to give an example of someone difficult you had to work with, or how you led your team to overcome a challenging situation, your accomplishments beyond academics is what it comes down to and will often determine whether you can secure the vacation scheme.

For this article, we have spoken to students who have secured multiple offers from US, UK and PRC firms and asked them how their ECA had assisted them. As the focus of the article is to facilitate prospective students with obtaining a vacation scheme, the focus of the article will solely be on how our ECA has facilitated the interview process.

Entrepreneurship

Demonstrating an ability to innovate, handle problems and most importantly, the willingness to take initiative, entrepreneurship is one of the most coveted trait that many law firms are looking for.

…when you join certain societies, you often have a very defined framework as to what you are trying to achieve, how the group had done it in the past, and perhaps even some internal contact that can facilitate the process. But the thing with entrepreneurship is that it requires students to operate in an undefined framework. I think this is what deters a lot of students from pursuing the same despite having the competence to do so — they don’t know where to begin.

With that said, a lot of times entrepreneurship does not have to be something that’s highly technical or complicated. During the first law webinar by Dragonfly, I think they gave an example of running a lemonade stand and donating the money to a charity that the entrepreneur had a strong connection with. This is definitely something that is doable by anyone who has made it into law school and can easily demonstrate passion and initiative. So it’s understandable why law firms would be very interested in her profile.

In my case, I had produced a play to raise money for people with mental health issues. The idea began in my freshman year when I joined the theatre club. This gave me the opportunity to perform in various plays and connect with others that are similarly passionate about the dramatic arts. It was then a “small” step for me to take during my sophomore year where I produced a play with the aim of raising money for a charity that assists mental health issues.

Honestly, this was something that I was very proud about, so I had naturally brought this up during my interview. And very naturally, my interviewer would pick this up and continue to ask me questions about the play. I can then easily talk about how this demonstrates my willingness to take initiative, teamwork, leadership, time management, creativity, conflict management…etc. It was also something that I find easy to speak about since at the end of the day, I am just discussing something that I am proud and passionate about. I think this gave me an edge over others who attempts to spin their experiences to demonstrate certain traits.

To keep this short, I think the difficulty of entrepreneurship is precisely what makes it so valuable. Because of how challenging it is, it really gives you an opportunity to shine and it makes your experience very unique.

Moot court and law society

Moots are often the highlight of every student’s law school journey. Indeed, mooting experiences are one of the easiest to come by when most law school societies offer various mooting competitions. The downside is that many, if not most, law students have some sort of mooting experience. How can you leverage your mooting experience to stand out of the crowd?

To do that, we need to identify the transferable skills developed from mooting, and clearly link those to the skills required to be a successful lawyer. First and foremost, everyone will talk about public speaking and confidence — that’s too obvious. Instead, think about a moot you did where you had to grasp complex facts, and summarise them in a few sentences for your written/ oral submissions. Your ability to grasp and explain complex facts (perhaps involving technical terms in a construction project) in simple languages is crucial to becoming a successful lawyers. Clients want an easy, digestible summary of the facts pertaining to a particular transaction. Second, mooting also develops your creativity.

Often moot problems are hypotheticals that have no directly applicable precedent. It tests whether you can come up with arguments constructed around precedents that resembles the problem. The reason clients are paying a premium for your advice is often because it’s a new legal problem: can COVID related issue trigger a Material Adverse Change (MAC) Clause in a M&A deal; does COVID count as force majeure? You will need to be creative in making your legal arguments in those situations. To give you a final example, mooting can also sharpen your ability to deal with unexpected turn of events, your agility of mind — something valuable for a lawyer. For instance, in one of my moots, my co-counsel pulled a no-show on the oral submission, so I had to quickly read over my co-counsel’s notes and made submissions on both issues. As a trainee you will be dealing with many expected turn of events, your ability to think on your feet is indispensable.

Of course, you may think that mooting experience may readily demonstrate your ambition and passion for practice areas like litigation and trial. And that may well be the case, nevertheless there are a few things you should be mindful of. First, do not make litigation/ arbitration the be-all and end-all of your application (unless you are applying to litigation boutique firms). Your application has to demonstrate a wide range of interests in practice areas they offer. Second, unlike the Bar, you will most likely not do any form of oral advocacy in your junior years, so don’t make oral advocacy a big part of your application either. Third, be mindful that firms may be alerted by your numerous mooting and mini-pupillage experiences. They are very suspicious of bar-hopefuls who apply for a TC as a “backup”, so if your application has strong mooting and bar experience, be ready to answer questions on why you want to be a solicitor over a barrister in your interview stage.

Volunteer experiences

Commercial law firms are looking for applicants with a diverse skills set. This includes more than legal skills — that is a given for law students. More, they are looking for applicants with excellent communication, leadership, resilience, agility, problem solving skills, just to name a few.

There is reason why volunteering experiences are crucial. Pro bono work is taken very seriously by commercial law firms (bigger ones anyway). There are a few reasons for this. Most importantly, firms care about their public image and awards like the Law Society Pro Bono and Community Work Awards are looked at highly by big firms (in 2019 firms winning the Gold Award include CC, DP, Hogan, Kirkland, Latham, Skadden — you get the picture). If a law firm is advising its clients on ESG issues, but have a poor pro bono record, how would the client think?

Having said all of that, the question remains how you can leverage your volunteering experience to your advantage. In written applications, most law firms ask you to answer questions covering: (i) why law; (ii) why X firm; (iii) why you — in one form or another. Surprise (or not), your volunteer experiences can be relevant to ALL of these questions. Here are a few examples:

Why do you want to be a commercial lawyer? (Why law?)

• The key here is to link the volunteering experience with some aspects of commercial law. For instance, when I was volunteering with an international charity, I had to liase and work together with colleagues in other jurisdictions. I found this aspect very challenging (e.g. adjusting to their time zone, being culturally mindful etc.) yet very exciting, so I want to do more of this by becoming a commercial lawyer.
• Another example would be working with a NGO that advocates for refugee rights. For instance, you have been involved in drafting a leaflet raising awareness of lack of refugee protection. You may find it very fulfilling to be involved in social/ legal change. Being a commercial lawyer will often expose you to opportunities to be involved in social/ legal change. For instance, your client (an oil and energy) company has become very aware of ESG issues, and how that may impact their future profitability. You may be advising them on acquiring more green energy companies. You will be involved in the change to green energy — something that may be very fulfilling to you.

Why are you applying to X Firm over other firms? (Why us?)

• Here you can talk about a particular pro-bono project of the firm and why that matters to you. For instance, I talked about a firm I applied to being heavily involved in an education charity, and that matches my own volunteering experiences. In this way, it shows that you have done good research of the firm.
• Perhaps you can also talk about a firm’s pro bono policy: is it treated the same as client work (i.e. billable).
• The key is to avoid simply saying the firm is known for doing pro bono — all major international law firms do that. Give specific examples of the pro bono work, and link that up to your own volunteering experiences.

What transferable skills can you bring to the job? (Why you?)

• When it comes to discussing transferable skills developed in volunteering work, the method and approach is the same as when doing it for your work experiences: using the STAR technique.
• To give one example, John organised a local food bank donation run. To do this, John had to liase with shops and restaurants that are willing to donate food to John’s cause. The first transferable skill is ability to persuade and communicate effectively with the restaurants/ shops so they will sign up to the delivery. The second transferable skill may be that John has strong project management skills. John had to made sure other volunteers are at the right shop at the right time, and brings all the supplies back to the right place.

Fantastic, you are at the interview stage, how do you impress your interviewers with your volunteering experience?

The approach is the same. Remember to use the STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Result) technique throughout your interview. It is CRUCIAL you provide structure and clear answers in an interview. The worse answers are the ones that only covers your experience and has no direct link to the question whatsoever. If there is one thing you take away from this is that the quality of your answer matters more than the quantity of volunteering experiences you have. Pick a few volunteering experiences in different areas and think about what answers you can give based on them. Your answers will always have to directly link up your volunteering experiences with the question asked.

Conclusion

Ultimately — whilst we appreciate this can be quite ambiguous — it appears that law firms are looking for individuals who can stand out from the rest beyond a purely academic capacity.

From our interviews, this appears to be achieved by people who can demonstrate: competence by overcoming difficult tasks (i.e. entrepreneurship); passion for the law (i.e. mooting experience); or strong culture fit (i.e. volunteer experience paralleling the firm’s pro bono objectives).

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/dragonflyhk/
Website: https://www.dragonflyhk.org

Originally published on Nov. 28, 2020.
https://www.dragonflyhk.org/breaking-law/using-ecas-to-secure-vac-scheme