So, you have been presented to a prospective employer, and have been invited to interview.  Now what?  A simple question, right?  The answer is both yes and no.  Having worked as a legal recruiter for 15+ years, I never assume anything when it comes to preparing a candidate for an interview.  It is folly to assume that even the most experienced professional will interview well, without proper “woodshedding” beforehand.  Perhaps self-servingly, I would submit that interview preparation is one of the many benefits of working with an experienced legal recruiting professional, as the old maxim applies here, “the lawyer who represents himself has a fool for a client”.  In the course of this two-part article, I will share with you some anecdotes over the years which underscore this fact and give you tips on how to ace your screening interview.

Let’s start with the phone screen, our focus for Part One of this article.  Increasingly, in this fluid legal market, where clients are searching out of city or state for highly credentialed candidates, we see the use of phone screens in advance of an in-person interview.  At this point, you are probably thinking, “what could be so difficult about a 30 minute phone screen?”  In theory, that is true.  However, like an in-person interview, the success of this phone call will depend as much on how you connect with the interviewer on a personal level, as with your substantive abilities.  There is a presumption that you are substantively sound, as you have been selected for the interview based on the skills, experience and academics contained in your resume.  Of course, the lead work, timing and manner in which your candidacy is presented, something Kinney Recruiting excels at, is a tremendous advantage as well.  But that’s an article of its own, for another day (more…)