Legal research and writing offers exciting career opportunities
A search for ‘legal research jobs’ on Google shows hundreds of results on Naukri and LinkedIn. Take a look at the screenshots below:
Here’s a quick overview of the types of opportunities available:
Legal journalism
When I graduated in 2011, LegallyIndia was the only big legal news site, and a few newspapers like Economic Times had a legal beat. The world is very different today. Livelaw, Bar & Bench, Money Control, The Print, The Ken, and several mainstream newspapers hire hundreds of lawyers for their legal beat.
Opportunities with research organizations think tanks and universities
Research and writing skills are very important for research-based and advocacy organizations, such as Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy, PRS Legislative Research, Internet Freedom Foundation, Centre for Civil Society, Centre for Policy Research, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, Center on Death Penalty (NLUD), Centre for WTO Studies, IIFT, Centre for Legislative Research & Advocacy, Human Rights Law and Network and the Public Interest Legal Support and Research Centre (PILSARC), Centre for International Law Research and Policy (CILRAP) and Centre for Environmental Law (CEL). Similarly, High Courts and law schools also release positions for research assistants/ associates from time to time.
Working with publishers
Major law book publishers such as Eastern Book Company, Wolters Kluwer, Thomson Reuters, Manupatra, LexisNexis, Taxmann, Delhi Law House, Eastern Book Company, SCC Online, etc. require lawyers in editing positions for book publication, headnote preparation, writing legal updates, editing and selection of articles, etc.
Law firms, Big Four Accounting Firms and Management Consultancy Firms: for their knowledge management, business development, PR and strategy teams
All major Indian and global law firms have created dedicated teams to plan their long-term growth, business development and internal training of their lawyers.
10 years back, national-level firms would have one or two people in the knowledge management initiative.
Today, firms such as Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas, Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas, Khaitan, JSA, Trilegal, DSK Legal, HSA, BMR, Hariani & Co. etc., have full-blown knowledge management teams, which include junior and senior-level lawyers.
Apart from that, international firms such as Dezan Shira & Associates are hiring lawyers to conduct legal research and write articles in connection with the legal and regulatory environment in several countries.
An example of such a job posting is below:
Knowledge management teams are no longer restricted to tier 1 firms alone - every innovative firm has a focus on this area.
Apart from knowledge management, lawyers are also required to be involved in other work such as business development, public relations, strategy, knowledge management, learning and development, etc.
Big Four Accounting Firms such as Deloitte and management consultancy firms such as Boston Consulting Group (BCG) also hire lawyers skilled in research and writing for their knowledge management and research roles.
Legal, professional or other online education companies
Online education has grown significantly over the years. After the COVID-19 lockdown, there is a clear understanding that this is the future. Accordingly, online education companies in the professional space (whether for law, test prep, CA, CS or other disciplines) are creating more sophisticated content, and need writers and teachers to prepare engaging and original content. Examples of these companies are Upgrad, Unacademy, Lawsikho, Lawctopus and there are several others. These companies lookout for lawyers who possess expertise in writing for such positions.
5 misconceptions about learning legal writing
Legal writing does not have enough career opportunities which are financially lucrative.
Search for ‘legal research jobs’ on Google, and you will find a lot of active positions in the market. In big law firms, there are director or general-manager level positions for knowledge management, content and strategy teams.
In fact, during the lockdown, legal writing internships have been easier to secure for law students as compared to regular internships.
Legal writing is a full-time career now, and jobs in research and writing are financially lucrative. You can be assured of a long-term career in legal research in various kinds of organizations. Lawyers find research and writing-oriented jobs to be more fulfilling, as they involve a lot of learning, and usually offer a better work-life balance, in comparison to transactional work or litigation.
Legal writing work also works as a gateway to secure traditional litigation or law firm jobs. For example, assisting senior lawyers or law firms with research and blog writing work is a great way to build fruitful professional relationships.
You can later ask seniors who find your work useful for help with referrals, paid internships, PPOs and jobs.
Recruiters prefer working with juniors who have performed research work with them earlier successfully, in comparison to giving opportunities to new applicants.
This reason is simple - in the case of new applicants, there is always some level of risk involved with respect to their work quality. It is also difficult to understand whether the applicant has a long-term interest in working in the job or not.
These attributes are much easier to understand with respect to applicants who have already worked earlier with the recruiters.
I have already written projects or papers in law school - therefore, I don’t need to learn anything new about legal writing.
Legal writing work is very different from the project-writing work in law school projects. There is little guidance on improvement of your structure, writing style, identification of conclusions, etc. The focus is on an academic thesis which you must ‘defend’.
The purpose of each kind of legal writing varies - for example, a blog for a lawyer’s website, or a handbook on employment laws, or a newsletter, is very different from an academic research article.
If you learn how to produce different kinds of writing work, you can improve your eligibility for being hired for legal writing positions.
I can learn writing and research in a law firm or other internship - my seniors will teach me how to write.
When you intern with a law firm or a litigator, preparation of a research note for your senior is one of the most basic and frequently given assignments.
For most law interns, the struggle in a law firm is not knowing the practical aspects of the practice area, the commercial intent of clients, and the way in which the legal services industry operates.
Seniors expect you to have developed legal writing skills in college. They recognize that law school may not teach you practical skills, and therefore, they identify whom to call back for subsequent internships or for an interview based on ‘who writes better’ (yes, unlike old times, writing well is a parameter for recruitment these days).
Now, writing is not a natural skill. Anyone can write better, through training and practice.
I know how to use Manupatra, or Lexis or Westlaw to find case laws and articles - I don’t need anything else to build a career in legal writing.
Knowing how to use a research tool is very different from effective legal writing. We come across thousands of law students who are excellent with research and can comprehend what they have researched, but they struggle with writing what they have understood. This is a major obstacle to securing the career opportunities that they want.
Apart from research, one needs to develop the skills to create a structure, identify a hypothesis, write original content, use research to corroborate/ differentiate your hypothesis and present your findings in a way that a stakeholder (who may not be a non-lawyer) can make sense of it.
Legal writing is relevant for law students in their first or second year of law school only, and not after that.
If you think that your legal writing journey is completed within the early years of law school, you are really missing out on a lot of opportunity in your life.
There is always scope for a lawyer to improve one’s legal writing skills. I graduated in 2011 from a top national law school and worked at one of India’s best corporate law firms, yet there are many areas on which I still continuously work on.
For example, writing an email to our readers, writing a chapter for a course, or the preparation of a free downloadable e-book, all require a diverse set of skills.
Do you know how you can recognize whether there is scope for improvement of your legal writing skills?
If you experience boredom and monotony in your legal career, that is an indicator. You are restricting yourself to a few types of writing only, which you have a grip over, but not exploring other objectives through your legal writing.
For example, you may have written a lot of research notes for seniors at your internship, or legal opinions for your clients, but you might struggle to prepare a handbook, or write a blog post, or in preparing an industry guide or writing an opinion piece for a newspaper or a magazine.
That is where you can improve your writing skills, which you can explore in this course.
Four elements required for professional success in legal writing careers
The key to professionally succeed at any job which involves a legal writing skill set is to frequently come up with new themes, produce writing consistently and within deadlines.
Here are the 4 steps you can follow to achieve that.
In law school, young lawyers estimate their expertise based on the number of publications, but they do not get trained in writing for different purposes.
To be an effective professional writer, you are no longer going to write merely to ‘improve’ your CV, or to fill it up with a lot of articles to ‘show off'.
You must learn how to write in a way that serves a specific purpose.
The common forms of legal writing required by the industry are:
- Research notes
- Articles for journals
- Blogs and guest blogs
- Newsletters for lawyers, law firms and knowledge management teams
- Stories or opinion pieces for news publishers (e.g. see the Print or the Ken)
- Brochures for a law practice
- Handbooks (for X category of people on Y type of issue)
- White paper on legal issues in a specific area of law
- Book or an e-book
Each of these serves different purposes. For example, a handbook on RERA for builders will have to be written very differently from a blog post on what homebuyers should do if they do not get possession of their flats on time.
Similarly, an article on how the Supreme Court has interpreted the RERA over the past 2 years will be written very differently from the handbook or the blog post mentioned above.
A purpose-driven approach enables you to keep focus and not get distracted during the process of research.
In this introductory course, you will train yourself for 3 types of writing to develop an approach for 3 different purposes:
- A ‘how-to’ article - for readers to directly understand how to obtain a certain outcome
- A regulatory update or a newsletter - to educate readers about different types of domestic and international regulatory developments in a particular industry, and to explain the implications of these developments
- A handbook on a particular topic - to educate readers comprehensively about the legal issues relevant to them and how to navigate them
Traditional legal writing is uni-dimensional - the writer takes up a topic on which there is pre-existing material, studies the statutes, regulations and case laws, and writes down what ‘exists’.
It restricts itself to the identification of the ratio decidendi of court judgments, or what the law is.
This form of writing does not address industry trends and developments. It does not explore nuanced implications for the industry.
Therefore, it benefits a limited audience, usually lawyers who want to know about the issue.
Other stakeholders, such as clients, or even policymakers and legislators, are not able to benefit from it.
How can you make your writing relevant to such stakeholders?
Coverage of industry developments, trends and pain points is important. Let us take a few examples.
Which challenges do Indian technology companies face when they sell software to foreign clients?
What are the regulatory and contractual challenges that drone companies face?
What challenges do Indian companies face while making outbound acquisitions?
In which areas will technology companies need legal help in future?
What are the challenges faced by contractors in construction arbitrations?
Let us take another example.
If you want to write about music law for a senior lawyer who wants to educate founders of OTT apps and independent music creators, would you write about Supreme Court judgements on music law? Do you think that would generate adequate interest?
What if you took a different approach and addressed the following questions:
- How to contractually allocate rights between the OTT app and music creators
- Challenges faced in contract negotiation for music licensing or a subscription model
- How to implement contracts with advertisers to increase monetization
- Emerging Trends in the international and Indian market
(You can add in a chapter on relevant Supreme Court judgments if it is necessary.)
I think you are getting a sense of what I am trying to say.
Now, compare the two writing approaches - which one do you believe will generate more interest from readers?
If you were writing a blog for a law firm or a senior lawyer, which one would obtain more readers?
If you were preparing a legal industry briefing on music law for a firm to educate its clientele, which writeup would be more effective?
If you were editing or writing a book for publishing, which approach would result in higher book sales?
If you wanted to work with a production house, or an OTT platform, which forms of writing would impress a recruiter?
In this course, apart from using legal research tools, you will learn how to identify industry problems and trends and focus your writing on those issues.
You will be able to shift your focus from ‘what the law is to the legal challenges faced by the industry today.
This will make your writing engaging for readers, and add originality.
Focus on industry problems is the initial step for producing original writing.
Next, there is difficulty in exploring territory that is not already written about. The questions faced by lawyers are:
- How to go beyond pre-existing research (so there is no scope to add value)?
- How to prevent mistakes, e.g. arriving at the wrong inference?
- How to arrive at an original inference?
- How to ensure that our work is believable and engaging?
These questions are relevant not just to law students who have started writing recently, but also to those who have successfully published multiple articles earlier.
Identification of a context is the heart of your writing. This context is not necessarily based on data, but indicative industry trends.
In the how-to articles, or the handbook or the regulatory update, you will be asked to pre-identify a hypothesis and write in a reader-friendly manner.
Your writing will be read by people who may not have as much knowledge of the subject as you have. They may not be experts. They may not be lawyers.
Therefore, writing in a way that such readers can understand your work is very important.
How do you identify and measure whether your work is reader-friendly?
The number of readers who visit your article or like your work does not indicate reader-friendliness. The number of articles you have written also does not indicate this.
Instead, explore answers to the following questions:
- Did your readers complete reading your document (flow and engagement)?
- Did they take follow-up action, such as writing back to you, or express interest in exploring your product or service further?
If this happens, then your writing is serving its intended purpose.
If not, you may need to work on the following:
- How to ensure the relevance of your article
- How to prepare a structure and stick to it
- How to substantiate your findings
- How to maintain a flow between different paragraphs
Five ways to benefit from your legal writing skills
After you have developed your writing skills, it is time to reach out to lawyers, law firms, legal startups, and other institutions for internships.
During the lockdown, research internships were easier to obtain than regular internships because it was difficult for lawyers to share confidential client data remotely with interns.
Over time, you may also earn a stipend, as organizations rely on you more.
Also, helping senior lawyers with writing work is an excellent way to build lasting relationships.
Having a portfolio of published articles on a specific area helps in demonstrating high knowledge of the subject to recruiters for internships and job opportunities.
You can publish articles and guest posts on various kinds of websites, such as Indian Corporate Law, iPleaders blog, Quartz, Firstpost, The Print, etc., in your area of interest.
There are many ways to monetize your writing ability. For example, you can start a paid newsletter service for law firms or companies, or provide paid content-writing services to smaller law firms, assist senior lawyers with authoring books in their area of interest (for consideration), etc.
You can participate in our weekly blog competitions on iPleaders blog. For the past 10 months, we have been giving 5 top authors on iPleaders blog prize money of INR 2000 + INR 1000 in credits on any course of Lawsikho.com.
We have now rolled this out to 10 authors every week. A top author certificate will also be given. The winner of a top author prize for all 4 weeks will also secure INR 5000 of additional prize money over weekly rewards.
After you complete the course, you can reach out to our placement cell for different career opportunities.
They had successfully guided 50 law students in securing internships in under two months of lockdown!
Every week we have been successfully helping 10-20 students to secure jobs and internships.
Please note that support from our placement cell does not guarantee internships and jobs - a lot depends upon your own effort.
You may be asked to acquire additional expertise as well on a subject, or expand your portfolio of work, to ensure that your applications are appropriately customized for the firms you want to work at.
In some cases, the placement cell may advise you to improve upon basics, such as written English or grammar.
However, if you will obtain guidance from the placement cell and if you follow the inputs they provide, you are likely to get results.
Exercises
Class 1: How to write and publish articles at breakneck speed
Discussion on topic selection
Creation of a structure
The division into headings and subheadings
Research and writing
Maintenance of flow
Editing
Completion
Exercise: Write a ‘how to’ article
Topic & structure provided by Lawsikho team
Share it on your network and obtain feedback
Identify 5 other topics you can write on to demonstrate expertise
Publish on your LinkedIn Profile, iPleaders Blog or another blog
Class 2: How to prepare regulatory updates and newsletters for seniors/ knowledge management/ corporate clients
Identify the practice area
Identify industry problems
How to search for updates
Creation of a structure
Identification of implications for industry
Basic visual design-related aspects
How to ensure maximum circulation
Exercise: Prepare a 2-page regulatory update on a particular practice area covering the last week/ month’s developments
Class 3: How to prepare an actionable handbook
Selection of target audience
Selection of area
Identification of audience-specific problems
Research
Preparation of a structure
Writing, flow and editing
Formatting and production
Circulation
Exercise 3: Prepare a mini-handbook to educate prospective clients
Class 4: Doubt-clearing, completion and future pathways
Feedback and completion of previous assignments
Progress mapping: from Day 1 to the end of the program
How to achieve the next level of improvement in your writing skills
How to explore career benefits: Paid research internships, newsletter services, book writing, guest blogging
In-class exercise
Pitch a story to a media house and get your article published - The Ken, The Logical Indian, The Swaddle, The HuffPost, PARI Network, Vice Media, FirstPost, Inc42, Indian alternatively write a research paper for a Journal.
Students may be invited to additional optional coaching classes.
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