The Rankings
What
Law Firms Want
In New Recruits
Business acumen, a greater focus on global issues,
management skills and the ability to write well.
What Frims Want
ABY KATY MONTGOMERY
AND NEDA KHATAMEE
s law firms struggle to survive the
economic downturn, most are rethinking the way they
do business. After all, as Plato put it so many years ago,
KATY MONTGOMERY is a managing director in the Washington,
D.C. office of Major, Lindsey & Africa, and NEDA KHATAMEE is
a managing director in MLA’s New York City office.
necessity is the mother
of invention. One of
the things managers are
discovering as they restructure and prioritize
is that new attorneys
are missing some fairly
basic skills, prohibiting
the extent to which they
can contribute to their
firms.
“The current economic
conditions don’t change
what we want to see from
recent law graduates,
but they do make it more
imperative that new associates hit the ground
running, and operate efficiently and effectively
from day one,” explained
the hiring partner of an
AmLaw 100 firm.
What exactly do law
firms want in their new
hires? What would enable
them to be more productive from day one? To
find out, we surveyed
practice chairs, hiring
partners and recruiters about the things law
schools could do to better
prepare students for law
firm life.
Business 101
One of the questions we
asked was: “Do you think
courses, workshops or
seminars should be offered in the following
areas?” We then provided
12 options. Not surprisingly, the only option that
received a “yes” from every single respondent was
“Business 101.”
“Students need to
understand that they »
