The Importance of a Legal Intern CV
The CV is often the first formal introduction a legal intern candidate has to a hiring firm and can be the key factor that entices that firm to bring you in for an interview, and possibly offer you an internship.
Put another way, your CV isn’t just a list of your activities and previous work experience or an ode to your skills and qualifications; it’s essentially your new employer’s first impression of you and we all know how important first impressions can be.
One of the most important functions of your CV is to create the basis for your interview. If your CV passes the assessment of your potential employer , it will serve as a point of preparation for your interviewer, based on the information you provide. So if you believe you are qualified for that internship, then sell yourself as such. Don’t be shy, but be honest.
Keep in mind that most law internships competition is fierce, and this also includes any in-house positions. It is worth investing the effort to evolve over time and produce the best CV possible, as a well-crafted CV can be the difference between securing the position of your dreams, and sitting around interns lacking any kind of position.
It is important to have a clear grasp of what a good CV looks like and the principal elements it generally contains:
Key Components of a Legal Intern CV
A legal intern CV should include all the standard parts of a CV, but these are especially important, and should not go missing:
Contact Information: Your name, phone number, email and address should be featured prominently at the top of your CV.
Summary Statement. This is a brief synopsis of your job history and your future aspirations. It will showcase your key skills, outline your experience and highlight your relevant training and education. This section is especially important because modern employers are short on time. A solid summary statement will catch their attention and encourage them to read on, even if they have no familiar context in which to place your CV.
Education. You have to be sure your education section is as strong as possible. If you have solid academic credentials, do not be shy about noting your GPA, using the 4.0 scale that most employers use. If your GPA is high (say, 3.5 or above), consider including an academic honors section as well.
Work Experience. This is the big one. Not only does it demonstrate what you can do for a potential employer, but it also shows them how long you were there, what you were making, what your responsibilities were, what exposure you may have had to the legal issues they face and what tasks you were assigned. This is also the best way to tailor your CV to a specific job opportunity. If you are a summer associate at a large firm, you may be able to draw from a wider range of experiences than if you were employed at a small firm or even on your campus newspaper.
Skills. This is the section where you list key skills that are competitive with those of other applicants, like language proficiency, software proficiency, licenses, bar associations, volunteer organizations, professional certifications, and other information that demonstrates that you will be able to fit into your new workplace. It may also be a good idea to showcase any unique skills you possess that you think would benefit your employer.
Extracurricular Activities. This is an optional section, and one that may end up being more impressive on paper than it would be in real life, depending on how much time you actually dedicated to that organization and how involved you were. It’s usually not a problem, however, to be able to note that you are involved in an organization that participated in a public service effort or that you are on the board of directors of a nonprofit organization or a local civic group, even if you have to work out any conflicts that may arise in your schedule.
Customizing Your CV for the Legal Field
Your CV should not just be a dry regurgitation of facts. It should be tailored to the field you are applying in, and nowhere more so than when applying for internships or trainee positions in the legal sector. Your law internship CV should reflect not only your expertise and experience, but also your understanding of the legal industry. For example, there are relatively few legal terms that are specific to internship CVs, but there are many that are specific to the legal industry. For example, all law students should be using terms like personal liability, common law and civil law, as well as terminology that relates specifically to their interests; if you were particularly focused on employment law, you should also be familiar with implied terms, tribunals and non-compete agreements, to name just a few. Your CV should reflect your understanding of the legal system in general, but also the specific aspects of it that you are interested in. Use the education section to highlight specific modules that you have covered throughout your LLB or Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL), focusing on those areas that are going to be most relevant to your future career. And be sure to highlight any legal work experience, especially if it seems relevant to the career path you have chosen. If your internships tailed off into non-legal work in other areas, simply omit your previous experience section from your CV, or highlight non-legal work experience separately; emphasizing the additional experience you have rather than trying to incorporate it into something you would rather keep out of the spotlight.
Showcasing Legal Skills and Qualifications
Consider listing key legal skills that would be of interest to potential employers, such as your ability to conduct legal research or your attention to detail and analytical thinking. You might like to mention the programs you are familiar with. If you have experience using Westlaw or LexisNexis, be sure to highlight this. This indicates that you are familiar with the tools needed to do your job as an articling student.
Choosing the Right Format for a Legal CV
A legal CV should consist of 1 sheet in size A4 or letter; if you have too much information, a second page can be added but just use more concise formatting. In terms of font size, use a maximum of 12 for the font size for content. When you bold a heading, use a maximum of 14 point in size. Use bullet points instead of long sentences , and organize the document into logical paragraphs and sections, separating each section and paragraph by a space to ensure that the layout looks better.
The information in your legal CV should be:
It is not about the length of your CV, it is about being concise and including the right information in your CV, in a presentable format.
Common Pitfalls to Avoid in Legal Intern CVs
These mistakes are by no means limited to law student candidates, but your CV needs to pass muster with a high volume of aptitudes, and applicants who don’t pay attention to detail could fall short in the legal field.
We’ve noted this in other posts as well, but it bears repeating: Keep your CV to no more than two pages. It’s rarely to an applicant’s advantage to go longer than this.
Typos and Other Grammatical Errors It doesn’t matter if you’re applying for a position with a non-profit organization or with the U.S. Supreme Court. Typos, grammatical errors, and lack of clarity will rapidly move your CV into the "no" pile.
Outdated Information Most CVs have time constraints around them, but it is still not a good idea to recycle the CV you used to apply for a summer internship in 2016. There are things you learned about from internships or in class that will be more relevant today than they were three years ago. Don’t use the same CV for multiple applications unless it’s still fresh, current, and specific to the position for which you are applying.
Vagueness or Wordiness We get it: You want to tell a potential employer about your previous experience, skills, and extra-curricular activities. Be careful about wordiness and claiming you have a "high attention to detail" without specifics to back up your claim. Use a CV sample as your guide in crafting clear and concise descriptions.
Optimizing Your CV with Keywords for ATS
Incorporating Relevant Keywords for ATS Optimization
An integral part of both resume and CV writing, especially in the job market these days, is the use of keywords. This is particularly true with the initial screening process used by many employers. Applicant tracking systems (ATS), the software program law firms now commonly use in recruiting legal assistants and attorneys, often eliminates your strong and powerful text if specific keywords are not included. Although it can be difficult at times to naturally find room for specific keywords, it is important to realize that this type of robot search is often set up in conjunction with keyword searches used by Google, Bing, and other search engines. To enhance the chances of your CV passing through an ATS, text must be customized for the applicant tracking system used by the law firm for which you are applying. Applicant tracking systems often rank resumes and CVs by percentage; keyword hits divided by total words . For example, if the word "litigation" appears three times in a legal assistant CV of 500 words, it will rate a 3/500 or .06. On the other hand, if the word "litigation" appears 20 times (or 4 percent) in a 1,000-word document, the applicant tracking system will rate that CV a 20/1000 or two percent match. This process of matching key words on a resume to key words in the job description now takes place during the first round selection. If there is not a match, the scanning process will divest the resume or CV. Therefore it is very important to use the same words included in the job description. This is also an area where networking can be especially useful. When preparing a CV or resume, ask someone you know at the specific firm about the type of key words used in its job description. You may want to contact several people at a firm to get a better sense of the key words they would use to search for a specific position.