Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Ohh, law clerk interviews; fun...

I just met one of our candidates for a law clerk position a few minutes ago ... he's a cute young law school boy. Very nice. Kinda reminded me a little bit of former law clerk. I hope they offer him the job, and that he takes it ... it would be fun to have a cute new boy around the office again.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is that what it takes to be hired as a law clerk? I knew I was fucking it up somehow.

sadielady said...

Well, that's what I would probably think about if I were the one making the hiring decisions. Which is probably why it's good for our office [legally] that I don't get a say-so.

I don't think the cute guy made as good an impression on the others, darnit. They all pay attention to things like "grades" and "conversational skills during the interview" and "any previous work history" and stuff like that, and I think they're leaning towards a few girls who seem to be the ones who best meet all those requirements ... but come on, I'm sick of having so many females around the office. I want some eye candy!!!

Anonymous said...

I have the grades and the work experience, but I really struggle with the conversational skills, especially in 15 minute interviews. Give me an hour and I'm lights out, but short interviews? Yeesh. Different story completely.

Am I better off babbling on about stupid shit no one cares about? That's what the females I go to school with tend to do at the law firm mixers-- and I'm not knocking them, because they all have jobs.

Well, enough griping and back to the books.

P.S. I really enjoy your blog. Your phone sex story made me snort out loud in the middle of class.

sadielady said...

I know, I've always hated interviewing.

Well, based on conversations I've had with the people here who mostly handle law clerk interviews and hiring decisions, I know that they like people who, in their interviews, come across as interesting, energetic, and with a good head on their shoulders. They don't score people well who have very little to say and don't ask questions, who are quiet and don't come across as having much personality in interviews; on the other hand, they also don't score people well who, even though they may talk a lot, seem to be a bit naive/air-headed/lacking in common sense. They like people who show good conversational skills b/c they think it shows that they'll be good at interacting with other people in the office as well as clients when it comes to working on cases with us; and they like people who ask a lot of good questions and seem interested in what we do b/c they think those people are likely going to show interest in their work once they get here and be proactive / ask good questions about projects they're given to work on; and they like people who just come across as interesting overall ... a hard-to-describe quality, but say someone's had interesting previous work experience that's on their resume, or they joined the peace corps or did something interesting like that before going to law school, or they speak another language fluently, then the attorneys here are likely to ask them questions about that during the interview and get them talking about it, and sometimes just that "unique" factor boosts someone's scores too. So, as far as interview skills go, those are things that make people stand out to our interviewers here, things that they look for. And it can make a difference sometimes - - like, they interviewed someone who came across great on paper, had great grades, but was very quiet and didn't show much energy or anything in the interview, and that bumped that person down some on the list of candidates; and another person started off kind of down on the list b/c that person's grades weren't as good as other people's, but that person was so conversational and articulate and came across just as a bright person in the interview, and that pushed that person farther up on the list of candidates, after the round of interviews was finished. So, hope that helps give you some insight there.

And thanks for the ps, I'm always happy to hear that someone snorted with laughter reading something I wrote :)