How to make your legal CV and covering letter effective

The more you know about the firm, the more easily you can convince recruiters that you are the best candidate for a training contract or vacation placement.

Covering letters for solicitors' jobs

The covering letter is an essential part of your application, with recruiters placing as much emphasis on it as your CV. It is a means of introducing yourself and the perfect opportunity to show off your written communication skills.

Covering letters should fit an A4 page comfortably and it’s best if you break it down into short, concise paragraphs. If you’re sending out a batch of applications, make sure you tailor each to a specific position and check that you have the right details for the right organisation. 

Assess your achievements for law career success

The first and most important step to take before writing an application or CV is getting to know yourself. Your life so far has been a series of events and from each event you can learn something new about yourself. The best way to explore this is to sit down with a large sheet of paper and decide on some major headings. For example:

• academic life
• work experience
• travel
• leisure/voluntary and extra-curricular activities.

Think about what you contributed, learned and what skills you developed. This will give you a huge database of application-friendly skills and achievements ready to use for all future applications and CVs.

Graduate CV styles that showcase your strengths

• The traditional CV format has personal details followed by education and work experience (usually in reverse chronological order), followed by achievements, interests and referees.
• An alternative to the traditional, chronological CV is the skills-based CV. Here the focus is on the key skills required for the job, with evidence of how you have demonstrated each of them. Unsurprisingly, it usually features a list of key achievements and often includes a personal statement or career objective near the beginning.
• A hybrid CV includes elements of both traditional (chronological) and skills-based types. 

Gaps in a CV are conspicuous. Detail what you did in them rather than leave it to the recruiter’s imagination. Avoid large paragraphs of unbroken text. Choose a font style that’s neat and a point size that’s not too small. 

It's a good idea to adapt your CV to reflect the specific job you have in mind. If you're unclear about which kind of CV is best for you, visit the 'applications and CVs' area of this website for more specific guidance, and download a CV template from the job hunting tools section.

Final legal CV checks

Once you’ve put your CV and covering letter together, don’t be tempted to rush it off. Around 80 per cent of candidates never get past the paper application stage so you need to make sure you don’t fall at the first hurdle unnecessarily due to grammatical or spelling errors. Get either a family member or university careers adviser to check over your CV and covering letter before sending it off – an extra pair of eyes is invaluable. Keep a note of dates and make a polite follow-up by telephone or letter if no reply is received after two weeks.