Last year, we hosted a roundtable with senior academics, practising lawyers and HR Directors to discuss whether the traditional law degree is helping or hindering graduates for law in the digital age. An interesting take-out that came from the conversation was the fact that High Distinction marks are no longer required for securing a job. Rather, there is more focus on broad experience and passion and whether the candidate is a good cultural fit.
Bearing all of this in mind, we wanted to flip the coin and scope out the other side of story; students. We recently sat down with current law students and recent graduates to ask them whether they felt their degrees adequately prepared them for a successful career in the digital age. Here’s what we found:
Rise in hybrid lawyers
It has become obvious that the role of the lawyer has changed significantly for graduates, with participants all agreeing on there not being a single role for lawyers in the future. They believe they need to be what we coined as a ‘lawyer-plus’ – lawyer and project manager, lawyer and data analyst, lawyer and marketer and so on. While graduates and workplaces are adhering to these changes, our legal students unanimously agreed that the education system has not, therefore exemplifying the need for greater collaboration between academia and the workplace.
While employers felt that double degrees weren’t necessary, most students claimed to want to demonstrate diversity through double, and sometimes triple degrees. While traditionally, an Arts/Law degree has been the double degree of choice, the new degree that graduates feel is in most demand is Law/Technology.
With regards to how the role of the lawyer will change, there has been widespread industry discussion about lawyers learning to code and understand new tools like electronic contracts, however graduates are taking this one step further and feeling under pressure to bring something additional to the table either through a double degree or learnings from part-time work to add value in the role and during recruitment.
Are universities failing to prepare graduates?
Employers are having to invest a lot in training around admin, search, technology and practice management. While that isn’t an issue for employers, graduates admitted to feeling like they start work already behind.
Apart from one student, the graduates felt that academia had not prepared them well for work with its focus on developing analytical thinking rather than on practical skills, and long deadlines and work presentation methods not resembling the workplace.
Incorporating technology use into the educational curriculum doesn’t necessarily require large investment. However, involving more practical assignments in real-time or developing strong work experience opportunities from the first year of study would see students better prepared for employment post-graduation.
Where to from here?
Both employers and graduates agreed that there is a technology gap as graduates enter the workforce. While employers have said they are happy to train graduates, the graduates felt that they could begin work and study better with more access to legal focused technology.
This is where technology providers can help bridge that gap by working closely with Universities and business to provide access and training to technology suitable to students and entry-level graduates.
If you’re interested in reading more about our legal student’s roundtable, download the eBook today.
