lawyer MNers ... help please

[roosmoo]

apologies if this has been done before, but are any MNers or MNer partners in the legal field??
just wondered if anyone could give me an inside view of the profession - do you enjoy it, would you recommend it to someone else etc...?

i'm currently on mat leave from a phd (literature), due to start back in the new year, but not entirely sure whether i really want to....so am considering other career ideas.

any help/advice of any sort happily received!

I've been readign this thread with great interest and growing concern! I've jsut completed the second year of an OU law degree, and was thinking about becoming a solicitor. I was already concerned that finding a position on the strength of an OU degree mgiht be difficult. Now I am concerned about the long hours etc. I have four children, so juggling them and logn hour and travel would be pretty much impossible. I'm not looking for a huge salary or high flyign career, but just a reasonably paid job. Am I doing hte wrong thing considering trainign as a solicitor? What else could I be considering with a law degree. Any help would be very much appreciated, I don't know where else to get advice.

Hi Roosmoo, have you thought about doind something other than law/teaching?

My DH did law at uni and decided it wasn't what he wanted. He went into management consultancy. He worked in Leeds then Manchester and never needed to trot down to London for the money. At the moment he's contacting (never out of work in 5yrs) and he earns £600 per day. If he was to go back into consultancy, his level of salary would be about £60k so not as good as contracting but not bad. There are graduates of every disipline in his job too.

Of course, when he was working for that well known consultancy who had to change their name, it wasn't at all family friendly but smaller consultancies or contracting is so much better.

Just to put in into context for you, a teacher who's been teaching more than five years and has a responsibility point earns about £31k but then you can also apply to go through threshold. I have to say, I find it to be very family friendly and it was easy to go part time. Not great money if you're on your own and need a mortgage but as a second income that fits in well with motherhood, you can't fault it.

This is for Kelly too BTW.

Sorry to ramble, hope it's of some help

discipline

Kelly, I've also just sent you a CAT about places to live near Camberley. I promise I'm not stalking you!

Hi Roosmoo,

Having been cited in this thread and having lurked in the shadows for some considerable time, I thought I should add my thoughts on something I feel very passionate about.

I would urge you to at least complete your phd, a fantastic achievement in itself and something no doubt you have invested much of yourself in.

As ever with MN, I see that you have been provided with excellent advice and pointers and you will have noted the significant number of lawyers with families who are doing a superlative job.

I am a great believer in people realising their potential especially as someone who feels they have thrown theirs away. All I would say is that embarking on a legal career involves a huge investment in terms of time, money and commitment.

Many people in your position do embark on a legal career, and by the time you have completed the academic stage your maturity could stand you in good stead (I have seen many a fresh faced graduate who couldn't cope with the realities of office life). It is achievable provided you choose both your firm and specialism wisely.

I am still essentially in 'mourning' for a career I enjoyed at a firm I loved and am sometimes seized with panic at what I have relinquished. I worked incredibly hard to get where I did with plenty of knocks along the way. I believe (and was often told) that I had a brilliant future ahead of me. I wanted to return to my firm but their inflexibility and my husband's drive for partnership at his own firm being absent for huge tracts of time left me little choice than to throw my hands up as I couldn't bear to put my ds in childcare 24/7.

As a result, I love my ds to pieces and am very lucky to have the option of spending time with him but I have become quite depressed and resent my dh who has achieved his partnership and whose life has not changed in contrast to mine.

Follow your dreams and go for them but above all, be realistic and be prepared. I wish you lots of luck. Lots of women succeed in this field with a family and I am sure you can too.

Muffinchops - what a very generous and gracious post

muffin,

thanks so much for your message, & for being so honest with a stranger! i (skim) read the thread about your work dilemma & it's interesting to see how things have turned out - but so sorry to hear you're not 100% happy with it. couldn't you return to work when ds is a bit older maybe?
fwiw, i think my thoughts of switching to law were a bit random maybe, & fuelled by nervousness about getting back into my phd, which i WILL be doing in the new year (tremble!).
it is really what i want to do, even tho i'm fairly sure i could 'do' law, it doesn't fire my imagination like the academic stuff does...
so that's decision made

thanks again for being so honest about something that must feel difficult for you, i really appreciate it. you've def contributed to my feeling that i have to at least try & finish my studies - i really never want to regret not making the effort or resenting myself/my family & wondering whether things might've been different.
really hope things work out for you, however best they can!

Thakn you to everyone on this thread. I am considering retraining as well. I received terrible careers advice at school and had paretns (both teachers) who tried to push me into teaching as well. I have undertaken P testing and believe that retraining as a barrister would suit my perosnailty and skills perfectly. I am thinking of public sector work and it is good ot get some 'inside' storied of what it can be like. I work 40-50 hr weeks including weekends for £20k now and DH works 50hr weeks for £36k so I am prepared to work hard and I'm not expecting big bucks for not alot of work.

Somehting I'd liek to add on the teaching side of htings, I taught for a year and as I said boht my paretns teach, depsite the almost obligitary moans about pay teachers are actually pertty well paid! On average based on my experience (including colleagues) most teachers work 8.30-4 5 days a week plus a couple of evenings marking. That makes a 35-40 hr week - pretty standard. And then you get 13 weeks holidays - and ignore any teacher who says htey spend their whoel holdiay makring etc, you simply don't! I reckoned I spent about a half day a week on shcool prep during each holiday. So allowing for thta you sitll get 12 weeks holidays. So oyu are in relaity getting paid say £25k for a ten month working year! so if oyu multiplied it up youd' be on £30k. Plus you don't have to apply for new contracts/new fudning every year. You have a secure system of pensions, career progression etc and if you have children of your own your childcare bill is massivly reduced becasue you are off when they are off school.

Riab, as I said, 31k is not a bad salary. And the hols are nice too. I certainy don't spend all the hols marking but always spend most of Oct half term in school working.

The hours aren't bad either but when f/t I did resent having to spend 3hours every Sunday doing planning. Not sure if you were also in primary but at schools I've taught in, we had to submit 3 sheets of A3 every Monday. One for literacy, one for numeracy and the other everything else combined. Having to find countless resources and work out how to differentiate a learning goal 5 ways.

Most f/t teachers I know really resent not being able to give the w/e over to their kids.

muffinchops

Roosmoo, haven't read all of this thread but I'm afraid I am another to add negative thoughts. DH is a solicitor (insolvency) and the hours he works are crazy (earliest he is ever home is 8pm (more often than not its 10-11 with a reasonable amount of earlier hours of the morning or allnighters). Not a lot of consideration is given to the fact that you may have a family at home, so as a woman you would need to have very flexible childcare or an understanding dh/dp.

I'm a legal aid lawyer and so a world away from being considered "city". I've managed to get a job which is really flexible to working Mum's. I can work what days I like within reason, they are amenable to me leaving early to picking up ds1 and 2. I think this area of law might be easier than corporate although the on-call stuff sucks.

Muffinchops - just felt for you, really. Wanted to say that from what you say I feel you have already achieved a great deal and fulfilled your potential, and you will find another way to feel personally fulfilled once the time is right.

I retrained, hoping to be a solicitor, and actually got a distinction in my LPC, but for reasons around DH's long hours and difficult children didn't feel able to commit to a training contract.

I finished LPC in 2000(since had another baby)and have had real issues with feeling I have chucked my career away, wasted my potential,and so on. But to be honest, if I had the same decisions to make again I'd make them the same way. Sometimes it is very hard to have it all, all at the same time. Some people do manage it but we all have to do what's right for us. I am just, after 5 years, beginning to accept that I am not a failure for not completing my training and getting qualified and that I will use this experience profitably in the future. All the best.

roosmoo,

Even though I don't know you,I can't begin to tell you how thrilled I am for you that you have made the decision to continue with your Phd and see it through. Just arriving at a decision in itself will hopefully provide you with some welcome relief!

Put it this way, if you do decide to try the legal route, wouldn't it be nice to be able to remind yourself that you have achieved your Phd AS WELL AS qualifying as a solicitor or whatever, and it will probably render you infinitely more interesting (as I am sure you are anyway) than someone who has lived and breathed law from the womb.

However, let me add, should circumstances change and you don't complete your Phd, at least you can say you have given it weighty consideration and tried your damndest.

You are going on to hopefully gain your Phd (a MAJOR achievement) and I have no doubt that you could 'do' law. Above all, don't rule anything out and where you can, try and follow your passions and don't forget you are only a click away from the wonderful network of MN. Good luck roosmoo and let us know how you are faring.

Littleshebear, thank you for your lovely message; I hope you do find an outlet for your obvious skills.

Hi Rosmoo - I nearly abandoned academic stuff because just getting the bloody PhD done nearly killed me, but something to bear in mind is that once you're through the endurance test, academia can be wonderfully family-friendly (if you can stick the accompanying pressures of a) rubbish pay b)there always being something else you should be reading/reviewing/writing). If you've got AHRB cash you're obviously doing brilliantly and are in the fast stream, but you can have an academic career without having to compete with the rabid theory boys and backstab on the conference circuit. Not all departments are RAE-obsessed idea factories and hopefully you'll find somewhere you can plug away quietly at your projects, enjoy your teaching and still have a family life.

sorry: "Hi Roosmoo". Observe my scholarly precision.

Hi
As a Parent and Kids Coach I work with a lot of Mums wrestling with the decision to return to work after having their children. I find it's helpful to free your mind up from "What I SHOULD do" to "What I would love to do in a perfect world." This gets the mind focused on options and choices and helps you to think creatively outside of the box. Jot down on some paper what else you could do if you didn't have to explain what you were doing or be answerable to anybody. What is your passion where you don't realise time is passing? What could you do if money was unlimited? Then write down your top 10 values in your life - things like honesty,integrity, loving your child unconditionally, keeping your word etc and put them in order - the most important first. Look at them and think if anything is missing in your life at the moment and slot it in. This helps you decide what things are important in your life and how you can match up looking after your children to the best of your ability but also not losing yourself along the way. It gives you more flexibilty and hopefully takes away some of the guilt all Mums seem to feel!!

I've writen a free report called "7 Key Skills To Raising Happy, Confident Well-Balanced Children" and I'm happy to share it with any parents who are interested. Please e-mail me on [email protected] for a copy.