"Please indicate your expected salary"

My slow and steady completion of Training Contract applications is going well and the majority of the process is fairly similar for each firm. 

Yesterday I was coming to the end of a shorter TC application when I saw the question in the title of this blog.

"Please indicate your expected salary"

This posed a bit of a conundrum for me. My inner Mr Burns (a little The Simpsons reference for you there) started goading me to type "£30,000!", exclamation mark and all. But I suppose that wouldn't really be my "expected" salary. I asked myself, what is a trainee's expected salary? 

I am due to complete the LPC in 2014. We all know that with the abolition of the SRA's minimum trainee salary in August 2014, the new absolute minimum would be National Minimum Wage (currently £6.19 ph and due to rise to £6.31 in October 2013, making your yearly salary a mere £12,305). For a maximum I looked at the Magic Circle firms: Linklaters at a whopping £39,500 in the first year of training, Slaughter and May at £39,000 and Clifford Chance and Allen and Overy at £38,000. It is yet to be seen whether firms will actually hire trainees at NMW but that could mean a difference of just over £27,000.

So where do you place your own expectations. There isn't a correct formula. The key is to assess the firm you are applying to and be flexible. This means that, although my inner Mr Burns was shouting at me to type £30,000, that figure is probably not realistic for a smaller firm situated outside of a city and with a handful of staff. Look at the firm's profile, look at similar firm's profiles. 

I also had to be realistic about myself. Academically, I am not a star candidate. I didn't achieve a first and I don't possess all As at A-level. Although I am very proud of my 2:1 from a fairly well respected university, it still has the potential to prevent me accessing those Magic Circle firms. In terms of work experience, I have some strong vacation schemes and placements which somewhat redeems me. I  hope that this means I have a good shot at some of the smaller regional firms. For these reasons, I know that my expected salary is probably around the middle to lower end of the scale. 

It is quite an interesting question for firms to ask and I do wonder what the implications of your answer might be. Pin your expectations too high- application binned, there are plenty of applicants who will expect lower. Pin your expectations too low- thousands of pounds of student debt all to work for little more than a waitress. The abolition of minimum wage coinciding with the serious lack of available TCs just screams a potential for exploitation to me. 

A good friend of mine started work in a bank a few years ago and the advertisement for the position stated that the salary was between £12 and £14k pa. At interview he was asked what he expected in terms of wages and he replied £13k- opting for a safe, middle of the road amount and knowing that it was within what they were expecting to pay. 4 months after he started working as a cashier the bank hired another cashier. They got chatting and he was gutted to find out that she had negotiated a £15k salary. 6 months later he was offered a promotion and an increase in salary of, you guessed it, £2000pa. That was the moment he knew he had to leave. How could he take on more responsibility and hours and yet still be earning the same as a cashier. It was the final straw. The moral of the story: don't sell yourself short, because it WILL matter. 

Tread carefully with the "expected salary" question.

BLP Results

Business Law and Practice results are in. I am disappointed to announce that I got a 67. Although this is much higher than the 55 I predicted myself, I was always going to be disappointed because I felt that I should have got a distinction. Realistically, I knew straight after the exam that it was not going to happen. This time around, I didn't earn it... but to get a distinction in the mock makes the grade that much more difficult to swallow.

There is little time for dwelling though. We are fast approaching the end of our electives and the beginning of the next round of exams. I was a bit of a nerd yesterday and stayed late to do some extra work- I am putting all my efforts into getting a distinction for my Employment exam! I must say that I am absolutely loving the Employment elective- wrongful dismissal, unfair dismissal, discrimination, TUPE- so much to get your teeth into. I  have always been a big fan of employment law though so I guess it's possible that I am a little biased.

RESULTS PREDICTIONS AND ACTUAL RESULTS

So I thought it would be good for me to reflect on my results and how well I actually did in comparison to what I thought:

BLP            55     67

Wills           70     100

PLR            C       C

Quite a difference. Maybe in future I won't be so hard on myself.

I hope you all did well in your exams :) and good luck with the upcoming ones. 

Lonely at the Top

*Warning: this is a distinctly "moany" post. Proceed with caution*

As another of my friends gleefully announces that he/she is moving to Thailand/having a baby/getting married I can't help but wonder why I feel like my life is at a stand still. I am a 23 year old woman, succeeding at most of the things I am putting my efforts into, and yet I still can't help but feel like I am stagnating. 

It made me wonder whether this could be one of the big downfalls of pursuing a career in law. After all, even if you don't take a year out, you study everything full time, and begin your TC immediately after you have completed the LPC- you still have 4 years of study before any sort of gainful employment. As most of you will know, I have had a year out AND I am studying the LPC part time so for me that has been extended by 2 years.

On top of that, of my lovely friends from school only 1 of them decided to go to university. So among the 11 of them that I still regularly see, I often feel like the odd one out *cue teeny tiny violins*. They all have 5 years of career-ladder climbing, house-buying and relationship-progressing on me. 

When one of them announces the next big event in their lives we all "ooh" and "ahh"- clearly understanding the importance and magnitude of these huge life milestones. But their days of exams and lessons and late night cramming are all but a distant memory so that when I proudly announce I passed the latest round of hellish examinations, they congratulate but can't really understand what it means. When I moan about TC applications, work experience and the neverending pile of work to be done- they all nod in agreement but can never turn around and say "ohhh I know- what a nightmare!"

At university, I had distinctly separate groups of friends. Uni friends. School friends. It worked out perfectly. Now that my uni friends have all graduated and sadly gone back to their original homes, I am left with a group of friends in which my role is "The Student". 

And the LPC has not yet helped to fill this void. Being part time, the vast majority of us commute and have jobs sandwiching our 1 day per week in attendance. We text, email, FaceBook- all the usual long distance forms of communication, but I still miss the regular face-to-face contact with students! 

With the LPC having most of it's study outside of the classroom, I spend a good 20 hours per week alone, in silence, reading and taking notes. With breaks this can amount to almost 3 working days!! I am genuinely worried for my future sanity.

I wondered if any one else studying law feels/has felt like this? Where the only thing that seems to be progressing in your life is the LLB or LPC? And if so, is law a lonely pursuit? 

To sum up todays moan:

• I have been studying for almost 5 years and am utterly fed up
• I have been perpetually 'broke' for almost 5 years and am utterly fed up
• My contact with real life human beings has been so reduced that sometimes, after a particularly long and lonely studying session, I can be found checking BBC News for word that the apocalypse is upon us... and I am utterly fed up.
• The thought of marriage and babies right now makes me want to run screaming for the hills... but  if I have to be bridesmaid/godmother one more time.... you get the picture. I am fed up. 

Bring on the glorious 9-5 working week I say.

Interviewing and Advising Mock

I did say I would do a teeny post after the mock so here it is. 

If you have been keeping up with my blogs you will not be surprised to learn that I was just a tad nervous about today. 

On the day of the exam you get to receive your "instructions" as a trainee up to 35 minutes before the start of your interview. You can then use your materials to prepare some questions/law that you think might be relevant. I turned up in my lovely new suit (courtesy of Barclaycard...woops) but was so busy faffing about and getting flustered that I lost 5 of those precious 35 minutes prep time. No matter, there really isn't a lot you can do with the minimal information you are provided: client name and details, one or two lines on why they are visiting, conduct issues (none in my case), your fees and supervisor name. So I busied myself with finding the most relevant of my 3 prep sheets, 1 of which can be taken in, ("leaving a partnership" in my case) and then tailoring it as much as I could to suit what I knew about my client. 

I got to the room on time and was relieved to find that the assessment is conducted by just one person, who also acts as your client. 

The assessor leaves the room and tells you to come and get your "client" when you are ready. I was pretty nervous so treated it like a band-aid and got straight into it. I have heard that a few lingered to review notes but I can only imagine this increases the nerves.

I managed to remember to shake her hand, introduce myself, invite her in and SIT DOWN LAST! I also remembered the pesky small talk. However, after this well rehearsed routine (I practised it over and over in the days leading up) I suddenly had an extremely dry mouth and blank mind... 

... A quick glance at my prep sheet allowed me to ask an incredibly wide open question and gain 30 seconds of client talking time to compose myself. 

The rest went swimmingly, and you'll be pleased to hear I was found to be Competent. I am also proud to say that my section on Law/Advice received the top grade of "Good" throughout. I did, however, receive a few "Poor" grades - I didn't tell the client I was a trainee, I forgot to show the client out properly (opening and closing the door for them), and  I didn't adequately outline the costs of the interview. I received a grade of "Fair" on a few other things. The great thing about this assessment is that you receive your feedback immediately after and get a good 15 minutes to discuss your performance with the assessor, a great opportunity to iron out any issues and get some honest critique on your interviewing style. 

My interview lasted 16 minutes and I spent 10 minutes completing my notes sheet (which is also included in the assessment marks). We were advised in the workshops that anything below a 15 minute interview probably means you have missed some vital information so I was just within this section. After 30 minutes you must stop interviewing/writing.

Overall, most of my friends managed to pass the assessment with only 2 not achieving a Competent grade. Not too bad. 

Now for a celebratory cup of tea and a chocolate biscuit. And to ponder whether I will ever get the guts to watch the recording of the assessment... What a wild life I do lead!

Interviewing and Advising

Now that I have completed the Interviewing and Advising workshops I thought I would write a short post to mark the occasion. 

First, a little break down. Interviewing and Advising is, quite obviously, the skill of successfully interviewing and then advising your client. For some reason though a lot of non-LPC folk seem to think it's sessions to practice being interviewed (i.e. for a job) so I thought I had better clarify. You take 2 workshops and then a lovely mock exam. It's another Competent/Not Competent exam so 50% is all you need. The exam consists of interviewing and advising a client for up to 30 minutes. You need to make notes and they form part of your final mark. 

I went into Interviewing with a slight sense of dread. Having made friends with a few of the "18-monthers" I had been witness to their sheer panic at taking the Interviewing and Advising exam in December of last year. 

The groups of 12 are quite small, especially compared to BLP. You pair off and sit opposite one another on a desk and then act out role plays, alternating between client and trainee. You should feel totally comfortable, surrounded by your friends. But the mixture of acting, trying something new and being critiqued by your friends makes the workshops strangely nerve wracking. It's a steep learning curve and one that most get the hang of fairly quickly. The University of Law interviewing exam involves advising a client about a Partnership matter, covered in BLP, so there is also an element of revision too. 

I have interviewed clients before for the CAB but it was a much more relaxed affair. On the LPC, the interviews follow a basic structure which you are expected to keep to, and this is where I think it becomes complicated. For example, you must cover costs in your opening conversation. If you forget you can't just have a costs chat in the middle of discussing the clients problem - you have missed the boat (until the end, but you will lose out on marks). Other more trivial things to remember include making sure the client sits down before you and having "small talk"... *cringe*. In reality, small talk would be a natural part of an interview but it becomes so much more arduous when it's a necessity. 

All of these things to remember resulted in me not actually listening to the client and instead spending the time trying to figure out what I was meant to be doing next! This obviously becomes easier the more practice you do, so this weekend I am planning to find some willing (or unwilling!) test subjects.

A few little tips:

• Completely go for it. Make a fool of yourself now and avoid doing so in the exam.
• Do allllll the prep. There isn't a lot but do it all because you only get 2 sessions to practice this and you need to get the most out of them.
• Ask questions. This isn't an exam you can blag. With a written exam you get to plan, read through, add bits you forgot. You get one shot at interviewing so straighten out any queries. 
• You are allowed to take in 3 sheets of paper- one blank piece to make your notes, the mark scheme (with the handy interview structure on it) and a list of possible questions/law on Partnerships. Prepare your questions/relevant law sheet in advance!
• You have to dress smartly for the exams so do some practices in your suit. This will get you more accustomed to how it will feel on the day. 

My mock is on the 8th May so I will likely be doing a little blog then. If any of you are doing interviewing at the moment let me know how you are getting on with it. 

Wish me luck!