Ethics in Employment: Tips for Law Students

 

Portions of this article reprinted with permission of NALP ©2007. For the full version of NALP’s publication Ethics and Employment — A Guide for Law Students, please click on the title of the article to link to it.

 

As the fall approaches and with it, on-campus interviews and job offers, now is a good time to talk about what is expected of you ethically as a law student. The points covered in this article apply to both new and continuing law students.

 

Lawyers are held to the highest moral and ethical standards, which take effect the moment you enter law school. As a law student, you are expected to stand by your word and the decisions you make now will affect your legal career. This is especially true when seeking legal employment.

 

A few tips:

 

 

Law students who falsify or misrepresent their credentials may be denied or delayed membership to the bar during the character and fitness investigation for the bar exam. Bottom line, do not lie. You were talented enough and smart enough to get into law school. Let your achievements and experiences thus far and your dreams for the future be what sells you to potential employers.

 

From NALP’s publication Ethics and Employment — A Guide for Law Students:

Resume and Cover Letter

First impressions count - and in legal recruiting, your resume, cover letter, transcript and writing samples are your tools for being counted.

·       All information provided in your resume and cover letter must be accurate. Distortion, misrepresentation, exaggeration, or intention to include inaccurate information in your resume or cover letter is unethical and inexcusable. You should be willing and able to discuss everything listed on your resume.

·       Represent your grades and/or class rank accurately. You should not "round up" your grades (from a 2.5 to a 3.0, for example), or round down your class rank (from top 22% to top 20%).

·       Include bar status on your resume once you have taken the bar examination. Be sure to include the date you sat for the examination, the state in which you took it, and when the results are expected. Upon passing the examination, indicate the month and year of your admission.

·       You should supply employers with the most current transcript available. If you have received grades that the law school registrar has not recorded, you may attach a separate listing of the courses taken and grades received.

·       Writing samples should be your own unedited work. If the writing sample has been edited, state this fact clearly. You may also explain the extent of the editing by others. If your writing sample was prepared for a previous employer, you must obtain permission from that employer and take any necessary steps to protect the confidentiality of the client.

Interviewing

General and On-Campus Interviewing

·       Be honest. As important as it is to "sell yourself," it is always better to sell the true you and not simply a role you are playing during the interview.

·       Recognize illegal or insensitive questions and be prepared to respond appropriately. Report any inappropriate questions to your career services office.

Flyback/Travel

·       Understand the organization's travel reimbursement policies before you make plans. Know what expenses are considered reasonable and reimbursable. Keep receipts and submit requests for reimbursement promptly. If interviewing with more than one organization on a single trip, establish who is reimbursing what portion before traveling. Do not use this as an opportunity to entertain friends or charge expensive dinners, and make certain that all requested reimbursements are appropriate.

 

Please see the NALP website for the full version of this guide.

 

Holding Offers Open

For fall recruitment, the NALP Guidelines are very specific. After September 15, a student should not hold open more than five offers of employment simultaneously; after October 1 a student should not hold open more than four offers simultaneously; and after October 15 a student should not hold open more than three offers simultaneously. Offers of employment include those received as a result of previous summer employment. For each offer received that places a student over the limit, the student should, within one week of receipt of the excess offer, release an offer.

 

Second and third year students may, with the consent of the employer, extend one offer beyond December 1.

 

A student who holds open too many offers creates a hardship for both the employer and fellow students. An employer may not know how many offers to make and fellow students may be waiting to receive offers that are not accepted. The NALP Guidelines are intended to prevent this hardship from occurring.

 

Rescinding an Accepted Offer

One thing that is never okay is telling an employer verbally or in writing that you accept their offer only to have a “better” offer come along and accept that one, too. The UW College of Law and the UW Law Career Services Office does not condone rescinding an accepted offer. While we cannot prevent you from doing so, know that you may burn some bridges along the way with this type of behavior, especially in smaller legal communities in places such as Wyoming and Montana.

 

What about that in-between stage where the employer has made an offer, but you have not yet responded? NALP Guidelines say that a law student must provide the employer with reaffirmation of their continued interest in an offer within 30 days from the date of the offer letter. It is always best to communicate with the employer up front as to what is expected.

 

Elizabeth Gagen with the Wyoming Attorney General’s Office says that it makes a difference whether the offer is for a summer position or for permanent employment after graduation. “Summer internships are time-limited positions and given the time frames probably need to be accepted within a relatively short period of time. A permanent position for after graduation is a more life changing experience and more time may be needed for a student to make a decision.”

 

Accepting an offer, especially for permanent employment is an important decision. Take your time in doing so but not so much time as to be unfair to the employer and to your fellow classmates who may be vying for the same position.