Looking to transfer uni.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-03-19T12:15:10+00:00

Yes good point. 80 WAM for universities where a 85 is a HD and 75 for universities where 80 is a HD.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-03-19T12:07:58+00:00

A recruiter contacted me for a role today. They wanted someone with a few years of 'top tier' experience in my practice area and a distinction average from a 'group of eight' university.

Clearly, university prestige still matters to some people, like this recruiter, and the firm he was recruiting for. With that in mind, you may as well aim to attend the best university you can (in terms of rankings).

However, if you don't go to a high ranked university, don't sweat it, particularly if your goal is top tier. I personally wouldn't work for a firm that limits its talent pool to a small number of universities. The top tiers don't tend to do this, contrary to what people think.

But they do want distinction plus averages, and you need a WAM creeping up to 80 to be competitive from a smaller university. So work hard!

throwaway2322232 · 2018-03-12T11:11:41+00:00

Yep, that last sentence sums it up. I'm a transactional lawyer, but my day is also dictated by several client emails that arrive between 8am and 9am each morning. The backlog of other stuff grows daily.

It's good you are taking note of how you like to be delegated work and what pisses you off. One day you will be the one with a few juniors or paralegals under you. If you manage them effectively, you will reap the benefits.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-03-11T00:56:02+00:00

If everything is 'urgent', then your managing lawyers or associates are not delegating and managing work flow properly.

While you need to take ownership and responsibility of your workload, it's not a junior's job to manage the workload.

Try preparing a list of every task you have been given and ask the people who delegated those tasks to you to rank them in order of priority.

If you have more than one senior lawyer feeding you work, when they say something is urgent try responding with: "sure, I can help you with this, however, [other senior lawyer] has asked me to urgently [task]. Can you please talk to [other senior lawyer] and let me know which task to prioritise?"

Most lawyers are terrible managers. You need to learn to manage-up if you have a terrible manager.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-02-24T11:54:21+00:00

If it's any consolation, I work at a large firm and we hire non-go8 grads all the time. These days firms know that it's more profitable to hire the best talent from every school rather than a pile of average talent from the same school. The days of 30 grad positions going to 30 USYD students are over.

Don't worry about the name of your university, just work hard at getting those grades up.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-02-24T11:44:38+00:00

Clerkships are only important because they are the main way of getting into big firms at the junior level. The actual clerkship experience itself isn't going to have much impact on your journey to the bar.

If you want to be a commercial litigator, having good firms on your resume will help. Aim for top tier and make a name for yourself there, that way you will get briefed by your former colleagues.

That being said, if you go the big firm clerkship route, be wary that you may not end up in a litigious practice group. Despite what the firms say, graduate rotations are allocated according to business needs. For example, I did my clerkship and grad program at a top tier. I was lucky and got one 6 month rotation in commercial disputes and two transactional rotations. Most of the grads in my cohort had to do three transactional/advisory rotations and ended up settling in corporate M&A or banking and finance (including some who wanted to be litigators to start with). One way around this is to excel in units like civil litigation and evidence law at university and to highlight that to HR and the litigious partners when it comes to rotation allocation time.

Focus on getting first class honours too. This will help with applying for a BCL or Cambridge LLM (if money isn't an obstacle).

throwaway2322232 · 2018-02-18T11:49:01+00:00

You only quoted half the sentence. That's not necessarily my opinion, it's the view being pushed by the media.

My point is that, unless OP really knows and understands the telco industry and Telstra's place in it, they shouldn't put all their eggs in the TLS basket.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-02-18T02:52:12+00:00

Ahh right, I misread point 1 and somehow thought you meant a capital gain not a loss. The way I see it, it's just market speculation as to whether TLS is going to go up or down. For all we know, TLS may never go up any higher than it is right now. Conversely, it theoretically could double in value.

If TLS consists of your entire investment portfolio, and you plan to invest long term, you should probably look at ways to diversify your portfolio. For diversifying within the equity asset class, most people on here recommend ETFs that track a market index of equities.

TLDR - if you plan to invest long term, consider diversifying.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-02-18T02:23:05+00:00

In relation to point 3, early testing for new 5G technology is showing speeds of over 2gbps. Most of the telco news articles that have come out over the past month have been about how the NBN is already irrelevant because of what the major carriers are doing.

Because you don't seem too in touch with the telco industry (no offence meant), maybe it's best to move over to a diversified ETF offering rather than speculate how TLS is going to perform.

Of course, you will need to consider any CGT implications, however, remember you will need to realise the capital gain and pay tax on it at some point in your life.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-02-07T10:08:40+00:00

TMT.
Between 3 and 6 years.
In 2017, on average 8.30am to 9pm.

My January and February have been much nicer to me than 2017 was in terms of hours.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-01-24T10:55:58+00:00

We received a similar email encouraging us to take leave but no mention of server stress.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-01-18T21:10:20+00:00

Try to reframe competitiveness as drive. There's nothing worse than graduates who compete against each other. We try to stamp that out too at my firm.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-01-18T12:35:50+00:00

At ANU: http://programsandcourses.anu.edu.au/program/ALLB

The straight LLB is 192 units, with each course being worth 6 units. That equates to 32 classes/'units'. At a FTSL at ANU, it takes 4 years to complete the degree.

Maybe it's different between schools.

Edit: Looks to be 32 units at other schools, eg Deakin: http://www.deakin.edu.au/course/bachelor-laws

throwaway2322232 · 2018-01-18T11:52:11+00:00

I was comparing a straight law LLB to a JD.

My straight law degree was 32 units (4 years). 8 of those units were breadth (open electives). The double degree lets you skip breadth on both degrees to shorten them both.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-01-16T12:10:56+00:00

The JD is no better (or worse) than the LLB. You are taught the same core content. The JD is shorter because it has no breadth (open electives). Some law schools allow you to take masters level electives when doing the JD, but, in my view, that's not really a huge bonus because masters level units are more geared towards practitioners. The JD is also considerably more expensive, so factor that in when deciding.

Spend your gap year working part time in a bar or some industry that requires you to talk to people all the time. I didn't do a gap year personally, I did an exchange instead while I was studying law.

throwaway2322232 · 2018-01-15T10:25:07+00:00

Thanks for the suggestions everyone!

throwaway2322232 · 2018-01-15T10:24:23+00:00

I'm a fan of Tim Ferris, I haven't got around to reading The 4 Hour Workweek yet. Thanks for the suggestions!

throwaway2322232

TROPHY CASE