Hogan Lovells app to Birmingham

[S87]

Guys, can I ask you how would you approach these two questions?

We set our standards high, and we trust our people to hold themselves accountable for meeting other people’s expectations. Describe a time when you had to drop everything and really “raise your game” in order to keep a promise you had made to someone else. How did you manage both this and your other commitments?

Sustaining a successful and profitable practice requires both commercial awareness and innovative thinking. Tell us about something that you have done that shows you have a strong innovative or entrepreneurial spirit. Max 250 words

Thank you very much

 

[Jaysen]

Do you have any thoughts on how you'd approach them so far? Or anything you're finding tricky?

 

[S87]

This would be my approach for the two questions:

1) I think that I can use an example that is not law related. I could refer to the relationship that I have with my cousin who is 15 years younger than me and what I did in a particular case to show her that she could trust me. Nonetheless, I could also refer to a situation from one of my legal work experiences.

2)Second question is the one that I am struggling with the most. i was thinking to write about that time when I was working on a case, not much money and needed to find an expert and negotiate the rate by offering alternative options and so on...

What do you think?

 

[Jaysen]

This would be my approach for the two questions:

1) I think that I can use an example that is not law related. I could refer to the relationship that I have with my cousin who is 15 years younger than me and what I did in a particular case to show her that she could trust me. Nonetheless, I could also refer to a situation from one of my legal work experiences.

2)Second question is the one that I am struggling with the most. i was thinking to write about that time when I was working on a case, not much money and needed to find an expert and negotiate the rate by offering alternative options and so on...

What do you think?

1) Either is fine. I do like the idea of choosing evidence outside of your legal experiences if you have already talked about them elsewhere. If it helps, I'd just break down the question:

• Why/how did you drop everything?
• How did you raise your game to keep a promise?
• How did you manage this with your other commitments?

In your answer, try to make sure you cover all of these points. Keep in mind the first sentence of the question: why was it important to you to meet expectations?

2) Do you think you had to be entrepreneurial to get yourself out of that situation? Or did you have to think innovatively to negotiate the rates? As long as you're focusing on those points, that example should be fine.

 

[S87]

Thanks

 

[Maccie]

I should add that, while you may have already considered this, it could be wise to use the STAR technique (situation, task, action, results) with a strong emphasis on the action and results as the first question is really asking you 3 questions in one (why did you have to drop everything in that context and how did you arrange that? how did you 'raise your game'? and how did you manage this with other commitments?). The same goes for the second question, STAR is particularly relevant.

Both your examples sound perfectly adequate: what matters is how you're able to use them to make the point you're trying to get across

 

[S87]

Thank you @Maccie

 

[nat237]

I have a question regarding the first question:

We set our standards high, and we trust our people to hold themselves accountable for meeting other people’s expectations. Describe a time when you had to drop everything and really “raise your game” in order to keep a promise you had made to someone else. How did you manage both this and your other commitments? (250)

I also couldnt seem to find a perfect answer for this. I have come up with an example where a client reached out to me (when i worked as a paralegal) with stress and frustration because her query wasnt being answered by the fee earners. I then went out of my way to research and contact local authorities to find this out for her and got back to her with my updates. She was extremely happy. In order to complete my tasks for the day I stayed after hours and did various things to manage my time. The importance of this meant that later on in the month this client came back to us with new legal cases and had her wills done with our firm.

But I am wondering do I need to go into detail about the query she had? It wasnt a majorly hard question that she had but I was new to the role and it took me longer to find out. What do you think is this okay of an example?

 

[Jaysen]

I have a question regarding the first question:

We set our standards high, and we trust our people to hold themselves accountable for meeting other people’s expectations. Describe a time when you had to drop everything and really “raise your game” in order to keep a promise you had made to someone else. How did you manage both this and your other commitments? (250)

I also couldnt seem to find a perfect answer for this. I have come up with an example where a client reached out to me (when i worked as a paralegal) with stress and frustration because her query wasnt being answered by the fee earners. I then went out of my way to research and contact local authorities to find this out for her and got back to her with my updates. She was extremely happy. In order to complete my tasks for the day I stayed after hours and did various things to manage my time. The importance of this meant that later on in the month this client came back to us with new legal cases and had her wills done with our firm.

But I am wondering do I need to go into detail about the query she had? It wasnt a majorly hard question that she had but I was new to the role and it took me longer to find out. What do you think is this okay of an example?

Example sounds great. No need to go into much detail about her query, I'd focus on detailing what you actions you took to help the client.