{"id":4373,"date":"2022-03-16T13:45:05","date_gmt":"2022-03-16T13:45:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/?page_id=4373"},"modified":"2022-03-16T13:48:20","modified_gmt":"2022-03-16T13:48:20","slug":"researching-law-firms","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/how-to-2\/becoming-a-solicitor\/researching-law-firms\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8211; Research law firms"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Law firms expect you to understand who they are and what they do and this will be tested during the application process &#8211; via their application forms or your covering letter, during assessment centres and in interview.\u00a0 So, it&#8217;s absolutely crucial that you are able to articulate your knowledge of who they are and their position in the industry.<\/p>\n<p>But&#8230;what do you need to know and how do you do it?\u00a0 \u00a0Here&#8217;s some resources that will be useful for you:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><b>LawCareers.Net <\/b>have put together a great <strong>list of questions that you should answer<\/strong> see <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lawcareers.net\/Solicitors\/ResearchingFirms\">https:\/\/www.lawcareers.net\/Solicitors\/ResearchingFirms<\/a><\/li>\n<li><strong>LCN<\/strong> also has great podcast explaining why this research is so important and resources that you can use &#8211; there are also comments from law firms:- <a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/lawcareersnet\/episode-11-how-to-research-a-law-firm?_sm_au_=iVVSJS4Z16kWQrW5vMFckK0232C0F\">https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/lawcareersnet\/episode-11-how-to-research-a-law-firm?_sm_au_=iVVSJS4Z16kWQrW5vMFckK0232C0F<\/a><\/li>\n<li><b>Chambers Student<\/b> has a host of useful resources including:\n<ul>\n<li><a title=\"Law firms\" href=\"https:\/\/www.chambersstudent.co.uk\/law-firms\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>True Picture<\/strong><\/a><strong>&#8211;<\/strong> the information here is obtained by speaking with people who trained in a firm whether they stayed or left at the end.\u00a0 This way, they get a &#8216;true picture&#8217; of the good and bad during the training years.\u00a0 \u00a0The<strong>\u00a0Get Hired<\/strong>&#8216; article for each firm in the\u00a0<a style=\"background-color: #ffffff\" title=\"Law firms\" href=\"https:\/\/www.chambersstudent.co.uk\/law-firms\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">True Picture<\/a> details the application and selection process.<\/li>\n<li><a title=\"The Bar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.chambersstudent.co.uk\/the-bar\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Chambers Reports<\/strong><\/a>,<\/li>\n<li><a title=\"Practice areas\" href=\"https:\/\/www.chambersstudent.co.uk\/legal-practice-areas\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Solicitors\u2019 practice areas<\/strong><\/a>,<\/li>\n<li><a title=\"Practice areas\" href=\"https:\/\/www.chambersstudent.co.uk\/legal-practice-areas\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Practice areas at the Bar<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\n<li>Comparison tables of <a title=\"Application and selection criteria\" href=\"https:\/\/www.chambersstudent.co.uk\/law-firms\/getting-a-training-contract\/application-and-selection-criteria\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Application and selection criteria<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a title=\"Salaries and benefits compared\" href=\"https:\/\/www.chambersstudent.co.uk\/law-firms\/law-firm-salaries-compared\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>Salaries and benefits<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>The\u00a0<strong>legal press<\/strong>.\u00a0<a title=\"The Lawyer\" href=\"http:\/\/www.thelawyer.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>The Lawyer<\/em><\/a>,\u00a0<a title=\"Legal Week\" href=\"http:\/\/www.legalweek.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>Legal Week\u00a0<\/em><\/a>and the\u00a0<a title=\"The Law Society Gazette\" href=\"http:\/\/www.lawgazette.co.uk\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>Law Society Gazette<\/em><\/a>, as well as legal gossip websites, can all be of value. Things to look out for include information on firms&#8217; business strategies as well as case and deals highlights.<\/li>\n<li><b>Legal Cheek<\/b>\u00a0&#8211; the<a title=\"https:\/\/www.legalcheek.com\/the-firms-most-list\/\" href=\"https:\/\/www.legalcheek.com\/the-firms-most-list\/\">\u00a0Firms Most lists<\/a>\u00a0are great for comparisons of things such as working hours, salary, retention, diversity, international reach etc.<\/li>\n<li>The <b>firm&#8217;s blog<\/b>\u00a0pages &#8211; they often write about their cases; what they are working on or challenges to the industries they work with and how to manage them or challenges to the legal industry.\u00a0 \u00a0 Obviously, you won&#8217;t be able to read everything but look at the headlines to see if these are topics you find interesting; read a couple of articles to see if you like their style of communication; how does the firm present itself in these blogs &#8211; can you tell how it &#8216;sees&#8217; itself?<\/li>\n<li>Firm&#8217;s newsletters\/podcasts etc &#8211; many do regular updates.\u00a0 Follow them.<\/li>\n<li>Don&#8217;t overlook\u00a0<b>social media<\/b>\u00a0&#8211; check out their pages on Insta\/FB\/LinkedIn &#8211; how do these pages reflect the firm?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>This page is not a comprehensive list but the above are great starting points.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Law firms expect you to understand who they are and what they do and this will be tested during the application process &#8211; via their &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/how-to-2\/becoming-a-solicitor\/researching-law-firms\/\">Read&nbsp;more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34794,"featured_media":0,"parent":1574,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4373"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34794"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4373"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4373\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4376,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4373\/revisions\/4376"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1574"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/getintolaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4373"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}