This article has been written by Pranav. He is an advocate and practices around corporate advisory, drafting commercial agreements and civil and criminal litigation.
‘You can’t know how a work is done, unless you do it yourself’.
Everyday on social media platforms, especially LinkedIn, we see law students screaming about not being paid in their internships or getting a remuneration even less than that of an unskilled labour. A report by the Bar Council of India states that every year more than 60000 students take admissions in law schools.
Technology sector can employ any number of engineers these days but can we say the same for the legal sector. Do we have enough work and resources to employ each one of us. Whereas, students in tier -3 or tier -4 law schools generally opt for litigation at the courts of India, students in tier -1 and tier – 2 prefer doing a corporate job instead of litigation. It is common unfortunate knowledge that we are not at all prepared to perform practical work during our college period.
The question which then arises is do we need to wait for our time to come and then start working or is our time now!!
Most of us think that there are only two fields to have a career in the legal field i.e. litigation or working with a corporate firm. However it is not true at all especially in today’s modern technology world where you can even work for a person sitting in a different country than where you’re. In this article, we intend to discuss various other domains where you could start working today and establish your law career without depending on anyone.
- Content Writing : The easiest way to start your career is by writing and posting legal content. There are always readers out there looking for legal knowledge.
Pro tip : Always start with easy theoretical legal topics and gradually increase your performance.
You have two options to go with : either you can write on a blog run by an institution which already has a good number of visitors or you can start your own blog or a website or a magazine. The basic difference between the two above-noted situations is your approach towards the field. If you want to make a career around content writing, it is always better to be your own boss and target your audience the way you want. Otherwise, you can choose to write for a platform and make them the ultimate beneficiary to it along with you getting the credits for your publication.. Never forget that an article you publish is there to stay forever. Decide if you want to publish 100 articles by your name on your personal website or a website run by others.
Some of the websites where you can post your blogs and earn are ‘ipleaders blog, damemagazine.com, medium.com’. Also, every news website these days are looking out for legal articles including ‘ndtv.com, thewire.in, aajtak.in, businessinsider.in’ etc. You can also connect with your local newspapers and ask them to publish your legal content every single day or once a week, however you like. Always stay updated about the new platforms which come into being as they obviously will be looking for good content and good writers.
You can also write an e-book or a paperbook on a particular subject and publish it.
- Freelancing : A freelancer is a free soul. He works on his own terms and conditions. As a legal freelancer, there is a lot of work around various domains of law such as contract drafting, intellectual property, content writing, business structuring, advisory work etc.
You may work for any number of hours in a day and any field of your interest. You can do it alongside your studies also. Platforms like ‘freelancer.com, upwork.com, fiverr.com’ have at least 20-30 opportunities listed for a law student per website everyday across the globe.
For you to do this work, you need to be skilled enough to get regular work. You need to have knowledge of the domain of work you’re looking for, and you also have to meet the deadlines agreed upon.
- Case manager or neutral : ‘Online Dispute Resolution (ODR)’ is a boon to the people of our country. Where we have more than 3 crore cases pending before our Hon’ble Courts, ODR serves as an effective remedy for common people in terms of being easy, economical and speedy. Platforms like ‘sama.live’ and ‘www.peopleclaim.com’ are always looking out for skilled law students and lawyers as case-managers and neutrals (like an arbitrator or mediator etc.) to work for them.
A case manager is basically a person who is helping and assisting a neutral with the details of the parties, the necessary documents required to be submitted from both the parties, setting the timelines and connecting with them. Once you get experience around your work as a case manager, these platforms hire you as a neutral. You can work from wherever you are, just with a laptop or a mobile phone in hand.
- Startups : Startups and law students make a great pair. As most of the startups lack funds to hire and serve a legal team for their business, law students also do not expect a hefty remuneration for the work. It’s a win-win for everyone in this case. Nonetheless, the only problem that arises in this case is startups don’t know that they require legal help at all points of it. Therefore, there is a greater need to educate them first regarding the same.
You can get to know about registered startups in your nearby cities just by scrolling through the ‘www.startupindia.gov.in’ website. You can connect with them by searching them on platforms like LinkedIn. You can always talk to them and educate them about their legal requirements. Always remember you can’t solicit work as a law student or a lawyer as it is prohibited under the Bar Council of India rules. However, when you’re educating someone with some specific knowledge, they themselves are most likely to give you work.
The ultimate benefit you can get by working with startups is that you get to know and understand how a business is formed and built from scratch. You get to understand how the processes take place, how the organisation works collectively, what is their mindset and how do they approach various things etc.
- Internships : The usual way to secure an internship is to apply 3-6 months in advance to a corporate firm or a senior advocate and then wait for their reply. Still, you can’t be sure to secure an opportunity. If someone wants to work in a corporate law firm, it is highly advisable to do your internships in law firms only. But if your goals are different, say, you want to work for people living in the countryside, or micro and small businesses in the country, then you don’t need to work under a senior counsel. You just require basic knowledge and look for opportunities.
Along with looking for opportunities at legal websites, use platforms like ‘internshala.com’ where there are a lot of opportunities posted every day.
- Designs programs for edtech law institutes : Edtech sector saw an amazing boom after COVID crisis hit the world. In India, there are a lot of legal edtech institutions now which are providing theoretical and practical courses to law students. These institutions are always looking out for skilled law students to design their work and take classes for them. If teaching interests you, you can prepare your own courses or work with platforms offering such courses. Some of the leading edtech institutes offering legal courses are ‘lawctopus.com, lawsikho.com, enhelion.com’ etc.
- Advisory work : Businesses are not aware of the legal stuff and the legal requirements. Right from choosing a structure for their business to registering it and having a co-founders agreement in place to getting investments, at every stage, they require legal advisory. You may choose to develop your practise around it.
Advisory work would include stuff around business structuring, registration, preparing documents like MOA and AOA, recording their minutes of meetings, drafting various agreements, having privacy policy and terms of use for their websites, registering their intellectual property, creating awareness about POSH, MSME license etc.
POSH is required in every department and business where there are more than ten working employees. For a district, the District Collector is the head of implementing POSH in every government department. You may contact the local authorities and ask them for free trainings around POSH in government departments. This way you will get exposure and networking.
This article would be incomplete if we don’t discuss a very prominent approach every law student needs to perform which is ‘Networking’. Just try and think why large businesses always spend a good amount of their revenues on advertisements. What if they don’t reach out to the people of the country and we have no knowledge about their products. Will we still be knowing about their products? The answer is no. The same applies to every field. How will people know about you unless you are reaching out to them. Do you wish to spend 10-15 years in your legal practice for people to know about your work or you want to start today. If the answer is the latter one, start connecting with people. Analyse their problems and write about their solutions. As lawyers you are not allowed to solicit or ask for work, but there is no stopping you from educating people.
Connecting with people is the key.
For queries and feedback relating to this article, feel free to reach out to the author at whatsapp on 9991189110 or you can also connect with him on LinkedIn at Pranav J | LinkedIn.
