Originally published in Student Lawyer magazine, January 2005 (Vol. 33, No. 5). All rights reserved.

Jobs

Writing samples are a crucial part of your job search

by David C. James

Many of the writing samples I read leave a lot to be desired. Either the students who submitted them didn’t understand what makes a writing sample good, or they didn’t think writing samples matter. Sometimes when unsuccessful job candidates have asked me for feedback, I told them their writing samples let them down, that they weren’t up to standard. Many of the disappointed candidates were surprised that their writing samples played a decisive role.

We have lawyers working at my office who, without the boost they received from an outstanding writing sample, wouldn’t have ranked high enough to receive a job offer. Because they turned out to be some of the best lawyers we have, I know we make good hiring decisions by evaluating writing samples.

Employers treat your writing sample as an example of your best work. Don’t quit refining it until it meets that standard. No rule says you have to give an employer a writing sample with the same errors or problems it had when you turned it in to your professor or supervising lawyer.

Just because your writing sample should be your own work doesn’t mean you can’t ask for a critique. If you have established some rapport with a legal writing instructor, he or she may be a good person to ask to look over your writing sample. If you have been fortunate enough to clerk for a skilled and approachable practitioner, you might ask that person to review it as well.

Having someone review your work doesn’t mean he or she should rewrite it. The purpose is to point out where your writing sample could be better. You should make the improvements.

When refining your writing sample, consider several factors. First, your writing sample should be in plain English. Second, it should have a sound, economical, and well-organized analysis. Third, it should be free of misspellings, typos, and grammatical errors. Certain kinds of writing samples serve the purpose much better than others. In discussing writing samples with other employers, I find consensus on the following guidelines:

Provide legal writing. This may seem obvious, but I have had applicants give me work they wrote before law school. That’s not legal writing. Nor is an opinion piece you wrote for the student newspaper.

Provide persuasive writing. Persuasive writing allows employers to evaluate your advocacy skills. Good choices include a memorandum of points and authorities or a brief. Some kinds of analytical (as opposed to persuasive) writing also are fine. For example, a bench memorandum for a judge puts a premium on practical research and writing skills. Writing that doesn’t involve research, or that is scholarly but not practical, is less satisfactory.

Provide something from a legal setting. Except for positions in academia, employers want something you wrote as a law clerk or extern, or a school assignment that simulates such a product. Law review and other scholarly writings do not serve this need. Because they are polished to the nth degree, the amount of time spent on them far exceeds the time available in practice. And law review articles raise the question of whether editors blended in their work.

Provide a writing sample the employer can readily understand. The subject and type of work product should be familiar to the reader. As a job applicant, your task is to convince an employer you can do the kind of work their lawyers do. Pick writing samples with that in mind. The best writing samples match the work products written by the employer’s lawyers. If you have a writing sample that deals with an arcane subject, give it only to employers who will understand it. If you cut your writing sample to make it a reasonable length, make sure you don’t delete necessary context. Annotate shortened documents with explanations, such as “I have omitted Arguments III and IV.” Put such annotations on a cover page, which also should include your name and an explanation of when and for whom you wrote the product.

Provide something recent. Your legal skills should improve with experience. When you give employers a two-year-old writing sample, you might as well tell them your skills haven’t improved in two years. Employers treat writing samples as measures of applicants’ current skill levels.

Provide at least 10 double-spaced (or five single-spaced) pages. Err on the side of providing something too long rather than too short. Employers who find your sample is longer than they need to read can stop reading. But when employers find your sample is too short, it’s a problem. I’ve had candidates give me page-and-a-half client letters. That’s long enough for me to discern weak writing, but not long enough for me to rank it reliably among strong writing samples. Writing samples that are too short don’t get the benefit of any doubts.

Provide your own work. Employers want to rate you. When your writing sample appears to be someone else’s work—for example, it’s a memorandum of points and authorities or an appellate brief signed by a supervising lawyer—explain in your cover page your part and the lawyer’s part in drafting it. If you started with a boilerplate shell, indicate what’s boilerplate and what’s your original work. From different candidates, I’ve received writing samples with entire sections in common because the candidates worked for the same agency and used a common shell.

Cross out parts you didn’t write. If you don’t, it’s easy for readers to mistake someone else’s work for yours. If you’ve ever handed in a writing sample during an interview and had to point out what you did and didn’t write, you wasted the employer’s time and appeared unprepared. If you need to explain anything about your writing sample, do it on a cover page.

Delete confidential or sensitive information. Some applicants thoughtlessly breach confidentiality. If you fail to excise confidential information, you taint your application. If your writing sample has material you need to excise, do it with a word processor. It will look more professional if you delete the confidential information and insert obviously fictitious material that shows you have maintained confidentiality. If you must resort to blacking out names with a marker, make sure you obliterate the names fully and don’t just highlight them. When you successfully obliterate names, however, you still have a problem. Your text now has gaps, which will slow down and frustrate your reader. That’s why it’s better to use a word processor to delete confidential or sensitive information.

Avoid lurid subject matter. Some applicants submit writing samples concerning heinous crimes and lurid facts. They are remembered for the wrong reason. If your writing sample discusses matters that shock the sensibilities of most people, choose a different one.

Don’t use binders. You don’t gain an edge with fluff. Documents like appellate briefs that customarily are bound are fine, but when you stick your cover letters, résumés, and writing samples in binders just to dress them up, you create two problems. One, binders take up room, and someone has to strip the writing sample from its binder before putting it into the file. Two, once employers strip writing samples, they have to do something with the binders. I have received binders so expensive that I felt obliged to return them.

Provide your writing sample when the employer asks for it. If you haven’t submitted a writing sample beforehand, take one to your interview in case the interviewer asks for it. Although employers will accept whatever you have, you’ll be a stronger candidate if you take pains to prepare your best possible writing sample.

David C. James (dave.james@abanet.org) is the hiring lawyer for the office of the San Diego city attorney. This column is reprinted with revisions from one he wrote for Student Lawyer in 2001.

For more career and job search guidance, visit the ABA Career Counsel at www.abanet.org/careercounsel/students.html.

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