Roadmap: Roadmap: The Law Student's Guide to Meaningful Employment, Third Edition

by Neil W. Hamilton

Overview

What do you say when a potential employer asks, "Tell me about a project that you have managed and what you learned from that experience; tell me specifically about how you handled a difficult team member in implementing the project?" If you are like most law students, the slightest mention of "project management" or "difficult team member" makes you cringe, evoking painful memories of free-riding classmates. Once your discomfort passes, you either struggle to come up with a meaningful answer or fail to think of an experience demonstrating your project management and teamwork competencies. Would it surprise you to know that was supposed to be an easy question? What happens when you get a tricky question, such as, "What value do you bring beyond just technical legal skills to help our clients be successful?"

The Roadmap process transforms this type of challenging question into an opportunity to differentiate yourself from other students. You will not need to wait for a specific question about the value you bring beyond technical legal skills to help legal employers and clients. Instead, you will understand what skills legal employers and clients need and will be able to explain how your strongest skills can help them succeed. You will be prepared with your best stories to demonstrate persuasive evidence of your strongest skills.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781639053322
Publisher:	American Bar Association
Publication date:	08/15/2023
Pages:	82
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Neil W. Hamilton is professor of law and director of the Holloran Center for Ethical Leadership in the Professions at the University of St. Thomas School of Law (MN) since 2001. He served as interim dean in 2012 and associate dean for Academic Affairs twice at St. Thomas. He served from 1980-2001 as trustees professor of regulatory policy at William Mitchell College of Law. He has taught both the required course in Professional Responsibility and an ethics seminar for 30 years. He is the author of three books, over seventy longer law journal articles and over 100 shorter articles as a bi-monthly columnist on professionalism and ethics for the Minnesota Lawyer from 1999-2012. Two of the books and twenty of the articles are on the tradition and ethics of the academic profession. Mr. Hamilton's research focus is on the professional formation of new entrants into the ethics of the peer review professions including the legal and academic professions. In 2002 the Minnesota Lawyer selected him as one of the recipients of its Lawyer of the Year awards and in 2003 he received the Hennepin County (Minneapolis) Professionalism Award. In 2004, the Minnesota State Bar Association presented him its highest award, the Professional Excellence Award, given to recognize and encourage professionalism among lawyers. He received the University of St. Thomas Presidential Award for Excellence as a Teacher and Scholar in 2009. In 2012, Minnesota Lawyer honored him again for outstanding service to the profession and placed him in its Circle of Merit for those who have been honored more than once. Neil currently lives in Minneapolis, MN.

Read an Excerpt

Do you hope to find post-graduation employment that fits your passion, interests, and strengths? If meaningful employment with the potential for career advancement is your goal, this book is your roadmap to develop and implement a written professional development plan to achieve your goal.

To reach your goal, you need to understand your passion and motivating interests with respect to your work, your current strengths, and your future development with respect to all of the capacities and skills that employers and clients want. You must take ownership to build on your existing strengths and skills while learning how to communicate to employers (and eventually clients) how those strengths and skills will bring value to their team. Ultimately, this comes in the form of a persuasive story when answering the question “Why should we hire you?” Envision the development of your most persuasive story essentially as lawyering for yourself to influence a target audience of your most promising employers.

Table of Contents

Contents

Acknowledgments vi

Chapter 1 Introduction to the Roadmap Steps... 1

Chapter 2 Completing the Online Roadmap Template... 31

Chapter 3 Your Timeline for the Roadmap Process... 39

Chapter 4 Building a Tent of Relationships with Professionals Who Both Support You and Trust You to Do the Work of a Lawyer... 51

Chapter 5 Completing the Online Template for Building a Tent of Professional Relationships... 69

Editorial Reviews

. . . an amazing resource that enables young lawyers to get onto a successful career path. . . . The ROADMAP is, I think, a breakthrough. . . . It is the first book that integrates professional development in a manner that could be used in a for-credit course rather than a career-services add-on.”

—William Henderson, University of Indiana Law Professor and National Jurist’s most influential person on legal education

“With legal services in a time of disruption, it is more important than ever that law students develop effective, proactive strategies for meaningful employment that provide what the public needs. The ROADMAP provides a unique, tested approach to enabling every student to take the initiative in becoming a resilient, responsible professional through law school and into practice.”

—William Sullivan, Co-director of the Five Carnegie Foundation Studies on Educating for the Professions and co-author of Educating Lawyers

“Neil Hamilton is in the vanguard of professors who see that law school should be about the full development of students as professionals. His ROADMAP is a rich resource for every law student and law school—a work of passion that is packed with insight and real practical guidance.”

—Louis Bilionus, University of Cincinnati College of Law Former Dean

From the Publisher