Best Amazon Prime Day deals: Mumsnet favourites

Best Amazon Prime Day deals:
Mumsnet favourites

Shop now

Please or to access all these features

Chat

Join the discussion and chat with other Mumsnetters about everyday life, relationships and parenting.

Teaching to law career change

30 replies

Lilllypad11 · 18/04/2024 22:40

So, I’m looking to potentially change career. I’ve been teaching for 4/5 years can’t fully remember. I do love it. But it’s tiring and the money is only getting worse.

my original passion was always law. I said I’d go into teaching to gain some experience but then leave when I feel I’ve got enough and explore law again.

Im very torn between climbing the ranks in teaching or just giving up and becoming a trainee solicitor. We’ve had a new member of staff who is an ex solicitor in a silver circle law firm, she said she knows a few people. I’m sort of interested but sort of unsure.

what do I do?

OP posts:
Vinvertebrate · 11/09/2024 16:20

I have been a solicitor for 25 years, currently in-house but formerly a partner is a large international practice. I was also recruitment partner.

I would strongly advise against jumping ship from teaching to law. It's a totally saturated profession with universities and law schools churning out many stellar graduates who have little or no chance of finding employment as anything north of a paralegal. (I currently employ a paralegal with a first class law degree who has been trying for years to secure a TC: she is competing with newly-minted graduates whose numbers are ever-growing).

The money is not all its cracked up to be unless you sell your soul to a large firm (and if you do, you are unlikely ever to have an uninterrupted holiday and will be under constant billing pressure). I left private practice and am happy with my current role, but earn less than 50% of my DH's salary as a doctor (and they are not exactly known for being well-paid!)

Also agree with PP that firms haven't exactly embraced the SQE route so far.

It's also one of the more vulnerable professions to the growth of AI, and the firms I instruct have already reduced their trainee intake as a result.

Sorry to be so negative, but there's a reason that a jump from law to teaching is a much more common route, particularly for women.

Howdoesitworkagain · 11/09/2024 16:20

If you find teaching tiring and stressful and move to law to get away from that, you might be in for a nasty surprise…

Laughingoverspiltmilk · 13/09/2024 04:41

As others have said - be careful about thinking the move to SQE has changed anything. The system is new, but the reports are it is very difficult to get a job without having done a training contract. There are are lot of NQ lawyers chasing not many jobs (particularly this year as a lot of firms are struggling) and people who have qualified via the two year Qualifying Work (QWE) Experience route rather than a training contract are at a disadvantage. Early days but I'm commonly seeing recommendations to paralegals with work experience not go down the QWE qualification route until they have exhausted all options for a training contract.

Please also do not enter law thinking of going inhouse because it will be easier and less stress. Most people advising this have not worked in house or only have experience of a very limited range of inhouse roles. Some inhouse jobs are less stress than private practice but this is only a comparison that can be made by comparing specific areas of law, private practice firms and company roles and it depends what causes you stress, which is an individual thing. My stress levels have increased moving inhouse (although I prefer the job/work). Hours are lower but I was working not far off US law firm hours before so the fact I only work past midnight once or twice a month and my standard leave time from the office is 8/9pm counts as a working hours improvement. I still work worse hours than every teacher I know, and have less holiday time (and yes I know teachers work more than 9-3 and have to do work during school breaks). I am paid (much) more, but I have worked my arse off to get where I am and I am paid much more than the average for a lawyer (far less than US firm corporate I hasten to add!).

The disparity here can be shown by @Vinvertebrate 's post - I suspect we were in private practice at similar firms - have half her PQE and was never partner and it would be a push to move back to PP at partner now (more likely Legal Director). Based on a rough estimate of consultant salaries, I likely paid 3-4x her. This isn't because I'm better (or even have worked harder) but because we've gone down different paths and I suspect she probably enjoys her life a lot more!

Law is a great job and I am a career changer so I have experienced lots of different jobs. I would choose being a lawyer over being a teacher every day of the week (my teaching experience is limited and not recent but from what I hear it is only worse now). But if your motivation for a career change is a job that is less tiring and pays more, law is not the right way to go.

I'd focus more on whether you would enjoy the job more because ultimately what you do every day and the skill sets used are fundamentally different. There are transferrable skills between the two of course, but no more than between other job types, and a lot fewer than some.

Do you enjoy the admin (including lesson prepping) side of teaching? Most lawyers spend the majority of their days sat behind a screen/in meetings/on calls. Are you looking for a desk job that requires sustained focus on one task for long periods of time? How are you with being held personally accountable to targets? [I know that you are in teaching, but in law you will actually have timers on your computers you use to record what you are doing all day in six minute increments and get called to account (and not make bonus/promotion/be retained) if you are not recording enough time that can be charged to the client. I acknowledge this is a private practice point but moving inhouse just means a change in the KPI you need to achieve!]

There is no real equivalent as a lawyer to the actual teaching part of teaching - sure you have to explain stuff to clients, and sometimes you have to train clients, but it's a small part of the role. There's no equivalent to the classroom, moving around and needing to work to ensure that individual students are engaged and motivated. Law is a much less physically active job - my sister is in higher education (so not exactly the same) and hits her 10k step count a day without thinking about it - to get mine above 5k I have to be consciously building walks into my day. My sister loves actually teaching (and hates the admin/targets/focus on KPIs side of the job) - she would hate being a lawyer, even though she fantasizes about days dealing with adults only and being able to go to the toilet and take breaks at times of her own choice. It's the same way I fantasize about a 6 week break over the summer :)

Interested in this thread?

Then you might like threads about this subject:

Laughingoverspiltmilk · 13/09/2024 04:54

[Still have typos and can't edit again - this is not a reflection of how I draft contracts. Well maybe after 3 hours sleep like today!]

Laughingoverspiltmilk · 13/09/2024 04:58

Final point - there are lawyers who don't spend the majority of their days behind a desk (or at least spend much less time at their desks) although in reality desk work ramps up as you move through the ranks (true for teaching as well of course). Criminal defence is an area that immediately jumps to mind for this. Paid pretty shit though (you can make good money if you are very driven, work hard, have a business/financial focus and run your own firm but for the vast majority pay is shit).

New posts on this thread. Refresh page
Swipe left for the next trending thread