Once you've decided you've got the basic ingredients to make it as a lawyer, the question is whether you want to apply your talent and ambition, your personality and your ethical sense, to a career in the law in particular.
Whether drafting a will, defending someone accused of a crime, or delving into the mysteries of environmental regulation, all lawyers play a number of roles in achieving their goals--that is, serving their clients’ legal needs as well as developing professionally.
To answer that, you need to make two inquiries: Whether you can do and would enjoy the kinds of things lawyers do, and whether you are interested in the work lawyers do.
Paul Brest, Dean of Stanford Law School, recently outlined a cross-disciplinary approach to teaching law which his school is developing. In doing so, he identifies certain roles which lawyers must master to succeed. Given Stanford’s leading role in legal education, there’s no reason not to at least adapt Dean Brest’s analysis to our discussion.
Some of the basic roles of a lawyer are as follows. (All are listed, and discussed in more detail, in the text.)
Though you’ll learn lots of rules while in law school (and probably even more while studying for the bar exam), the learning never stops. You learn more in active practice through legal research, the mechanics of which are taught during the first year of law school. Legal research applies the analytical skills you learned in law school and builds on the basic doctrines in the areas of law you’ve studied--such as the law of contracts, of torts (non-contractual, non-criminal injuries), or of property. Then you apply what you’ve learned to a specific situation.
All but the most cynical lawyer will agree that, all things being equal (no, they hardly every are equal, but still), it is the facts that win the case. That is: Did he really hit that guard rail? Was the light really green? How fast was the driver of the other car going? Having the "right" facts is what makes a "good case"; having the "wrong" facts makes it a "hard" (never say "bad") case.
The idea of counseling echoes throughout law parlance: At trial lawyers sit at the "counsel table," and attorneys are frequently referred to as "counsellor" or "counsel"; and, of course, there’s that old favorite, "On the advice of counsel, I decline to answer that question on the grounds that it may tend to incriminate me." That means someone’s giving good counsel--and someone really needs it.Thus several skills are called upon here:The ability to listen, skills related to the non-legal advice, and good judgment.
Sometimes lawyers get help in fact-gathering from paralegals and investigators. But it is the lawyer who knows which facts matter. She understands how the legal issues come into play depending on the facts. A good lawyer knows how to get to the bottom of it all, and is prepared to roll up her sleeves when necessary to get there herself.
Good judgment isn’t born, it’s made. (Some people, it’s true, make it a lot faster than others.) It is perhaps the single most important quality a lawyer can bring to her practice.
You may already possess the kind of judgment asked of a lawyer, especially if you are older than a recent or soon-to-be college graduate, or you’ve had important non-academic responsibility or life experience.
To some extent, law school and the "legal analytic" method sharpen judgment. In the main, however, good judgment is developed along with practical experience, and is honed by the diamond point of responsibility.
It is a truism that all substantive decisions in a legal representation are to be made by the client: Should the settlement offer be accepted? Is this a sufficient price for the stock buyout? Is bankruptcy the right course to take? Like most truisms, this one is hung up on the wall and given due deference, but it largely obscures the truth. Faced with the questions above, all but the most sophisticated or headstrong clients simply bounce them back and ask, "Well, what do you think?"
You’re being paid to counsel, so counsel. You can just insist that you’re laying out all the options. But ultimately the client is going to insist on knowing what you would do if you were he. He is entitled to know.