lawyer

#What else can I do with a law degree?

If you’re a law student or graduate and you’re having second thoughts about whether you want to work as a solicitor or barrister there are plenty of career paths open to you.

Whether you re interested in a career that will make direct use of your legal knowledge or want to change direction and work in a different industry then this guide is for you.

It should help you think about the skills you have, the jobs they can be applied to, and the options available.

Some of the other skills you will have picked up include:

• communication skills
• ability to state a case (orally as well as in writing)
• good analytical skills
• problem solving skills
• ability to see the bigger picture
• assimilation of facts
• self-management
• precise expression (especially in writing)

One obvious career option is to seek work as a legal executive - often seen as inferior to solicitors, but with increasingly similar roles. You should also be well placed to get into graduate schemes at auditing employers.

Some jobs you could go on to do include:

• advice worker
• bank manager
• Civil Service administrator
• customs officer
• lecturer
• insurance claims inspector
• insurance underwriter
• legal clerk
• legal secretary
• local government administrator
• police officer
• probation officer
• trading standards officer

But if none of those career paths are for you, don t worry. Think about what the world might have lost if these people had gone down the path of their graduate degree:

• John Cleese
• Fidel Castro
• Paul Robeson
• John Grisham
• Gerard Butler
• Henri Matisse

Find out more about careers that suit you using our career planning tool.