The former is a story for another day, but the latter, was because I deliberately wanted to be exposed to different areas of law and experience different areas of practice.
I also wanted to lay a solid foundation for my career, in the sense that I can run any files that come into the firm (or my firm one day).
Moreover, I did not have a particularly passionate area of law, and frankly am interested in all of them. So why not just look around as I search for the one?
I don’t regret my choice at all, even to date. However, there are shortcomings to that strategy that must be acknowledged. Amongst them are:
- It’s not easy to be remembered, because you’re not known for any particular area of practice. When people face a certain problem, you’d not be the first to come across their mind.
- It’s hard to charge a premium for your services. Because a) you’re not a “specialist” by perception, and b) you’re not the “specialist” by substance i.e. you don’t necessarily know things that other lawyers don’t know.
- Mastery is hard, the upward cycle where you have a constant feedback loop is hard to create. This is not the same for lawyers who specialise. For example, Intellectual property lawyer → does IP work → gets asked IP questions → improves knowledge on IP → gets interviewed on IP→ improves knowledge on IP → gives good IP answers and advice → gets more IP work → improves knowledge on IP → gets known for IP work → gets more interviews and questions on IP → improves knowledge on IP → gets more IP work, and the positive cycle repeats.
- You become too expensive for what you can offer,thus making you less employable. For example, when you want to join another firm in your 4th year, while you may be a decent lawyer, you don’t have any particular expertise to offer to a new firm; you can do anything but you’re not a master in anything. So why should the new law firm hire you instead of grooming their own pupil or 2nd-year associate? On the other hand, we often see a 3rd year or 4th year associate who is specialised in an area of law, i.e. banking litigation leaving his firm, to join another firm as their junior partner/head of banking litigation. This associate has a unique skill set to offer to a firm, and which will widen the practice of the firm.
- You can’t leverage on your partners If everyone in your law firm does general litigation, everyone is in effect competing against each other, let alone cross-selling and cross-referring of work. On the other hand, if you’re a specialist in a big law firm, and your 5 other partners are also specialists, each of you can refer to your partner a file that you have no expertise but your partner does. This means if that 5 of you have 100 loyal clients each, you’re looking not at 100 but 500 potential clients as a result of cross-referral.
I’m sure there are other advantages but let’s digest these for now.
Of course, this is not to say that having a general practice is bound to fail, of course not. There are so many successful and respectable general practitioners out there. In fact, many top counsel of the country do not specialise in an area of law.
These points are just for your consideration, particularly if you’re a pupil / young lawyer, who feel you’re at a crossroad in need of some guidance.
However, these are the reasons, amongst others, that I begin to believe in specialisation, and thus my focus on Employment and Industrial Relations Law. To know my areas of practice, please visit Areas of Practice.