The real reasons why law students struggle with corporate law
#1 - Corporate law is abstract and not relatable
Think about an area of law that you are interested in. It may be criminal law, family law or constitutional law, public international law, or another subject.
Now, recall how you developed interest in this subject.
Usually it is because of one or more of the following reasons:
- You can relate to the subject, and understand the motives of the parties involved. Case laws are readable and understandable. For example, It is understandable if someone is going through a divorce, or being arrested for something.
- You may have read deeply about the subject, maybe for a moot court competition, or for a conference, or published an article, which made you understand it more deeply, and even develop interest in it.
- You may have been appreciated for by your peer group. For example, when you represented your college in a moot court competition, and maybe your team performed well. You may have experienced a sense of camaraderie with your team.
It is not so easy to relate to corporate law, or to understand it.
For example, how should one comprehend a cross-border M&A transaction?
What is the purpose of regulating an IPO?
Why do lawyers need to undertake diligence?
How does working on a multi-million dollar loan make a difference in the grand scheme of things?
If you cannot relate to it, you will not be interested in it.
You will not be able to pursue it deeply.
You will struggle to excel.
#2 - Company law textbooks do not explain the work performed by lawyers in law firms and companies
Companies Act textbooks and case laws do not examine and explain commercial deals and transactions, or the motivations of different parties.
Instead, they explain the provisions of the Act and how they were interpreted, without really explaining the context. They do not explain the work performed by corporate lawyers everyday.
That is why despite a lot of hard work and sincere efforts, thousands of dedicated law students are unable to make progress by reading corporate law textbooks.
#3 - There is insufficient guidance from seniors and faculty related to law firm jobs and internships
Our law school faculty has the mandate of teaching us the subject - not professionally coaching and mentoring us to get law firm or corporate jobs.
If you are fortunate, you may find excellent faculty for teaching you Companies Act, Banking Regulation Act, the SEBI Act, or Arbitration and Conciliation Act.
Unfortunately, study of the statutes and case law is quite different from everyday work.
Now, it will be unfair to expect your law school faculty to teach you how to perform the work in a law firm or in a company.
The college syllabus does not require that.
In fact, such teaching may even deviate from your college syllabus.
Every law student does not take up law to work in a law firm or a company, either.
Some colleges organize guest lectures with practitioners. Often, interactions are usually too limited and unstructured to learn the requisite number of necessary skills.
#4 - Those who succeed attribute their success to vague reasons such as ‘common sense’, ‘hard work’, ‘internships’ or moots which do not offer you concrete action plans for your life
When you ask your seniors about how they cracked law firm internships or secured law firm jobs or advice on interview preparation, they may attribute their success to one or more of the following factors:
- Hard work
- Participation in a lot of moots
- A ‘good’ CV
- Good seniors
- Common sense
- Some luck
You might hear an excellent narrative from a senior, but does it provide you the direction or a roadmap necessary to apply to your life?
By the way, an astounding number of law students do not get access to law firm jobs and internship opportunities, despite ALL the above accomplishments!
You will be surprised to know that none of the following reasons can damage your prospects...
- If you are not from an NLU
- If you are a first generation lawyer
- If you have not studied company law in college, or if you couldn't understand it or found it boring
- If you studied arts or science in Class XII and not commerce
- If you do not understand accounts, or if you were petrified of maths in school
- If you have not pursued a corporate internship so far
- If you are not a batch topper
If you are a law student and you follow the 6 steps below, you can significantly increase your preparedness and progress towards a corporate internship or law firm job in a practice area of your interest, which offers recognition, growth opportunities and a good salary.
Our 6-step method to identify your interest and prepare for a corporate career
The first step is to understand the work performed by different departments of a law firm. What is the daily work in each practice area? What does a client want from the law firm?
What if you could learn about at least one or two kinds of transactions performed by four different practice areas of a law firm?
This step builds understanding and relatability with the subject, and also makes it relevant. You will learn about these through four live classes, study materials, templates and exercises.
What is a client’s commercial intent with the other parties involved in the transaction? How does a corporate lawyer take care of it?
What are the activities that must be performed to serve the client? What does the corporate lawyer’s output to the client look like?
No amount of studying and reading case laws or advice from seniors can explain this.
You will need to go through the ride, to be able to grasp this aspect.
Attempting 8 practical exercises in a month will give you an experience of what serving a corporate client feels like.
How is this different from what you have already been doing?
This method is very different from an approach of reading or analysis of case law. This is a problem solving approach.
Because it is extremely difficult to imagine these situations on one’s own and try solving them.
In fact, it can take a few months or even years in law school to learn what you can learn in a month.
You must be wondering whether you can learn this in internships?
Rarely.
The real problem statements faced by partners and associates seldom trickle down to the intern. You get to work on a minuscule portion of the problem.
We curate the situations and training to give you an experience of the most important skills, and that is why you are able to quickly make progress.
Feedback is the most important aspect to improve performance. However, it is rarely provided in our education system.
While you obtain marks after passing an exam, or submitting a moot court memorial, there are limited opportunities to identify where and how you can improve.
Where it is available, feedback is extremely generic, and you may not receive concrete action points and corrections.
What if someone took the trouble to read your draft in detail and give you in-line coaching in writing on how to improve?
What if they were willing to discuss any doubts you face while attempting the problem or questions on the feedback that you have received?
Would that enhance your learning?
Would that prepare you better for an internship, or an interview, or a job?
This step is a huge differentiator. It enables you to quickly make progress and march ahead of those who have been reaching and studying for months or even a few years.
After you have an exposure of the work performed in different practice areas, you are finally in a position to make an informed decision about whether corporate law interests you or not, or which area to specialize in, based on your interest.
Guess what? It will take you only one month to arrive at this point.
From here onward, you can identify the top few players in that area, and as you acquire more skillsets, you can build a portfolio of work, publish articles and apply to them for opportunities over a period of time.
This step will ensure that your preparation is very focussed. Every step that you take will make you progress by leaps and bounds, in comparison to others in your peer group, simply because of conscious and focussed effort.
Those who are interested will also have the opportunity to pursue in-depth learning in their chosen field of interest through our Executive Certificate and Diploma courses and build further expertise.
Every week, we will also guide you on how to share your learnings in your professional network, and how to reach out to seniors and mentors.
This will expand your professional network and also increase your credibility.
Many of our students have been able to secure work or internship and job opportunities because of persistent outreach efforts.
Once you have done some focussed skill-acquisition on corporate law, it is time to seek out opportunities!
You will have access to placement assistance from our placement cell for obtaining internships. They had successfully guided 50 law students in securing internships in under two months of lockdown!
Please note that we are offering support from our placement cell. Actual internships and placements are not guaranteed, and a lot depends upon your own effort.
You will need to complete all the course work to be eligible for support from our placement cell. You may be asked to acquire additional expertise as well on a subject, or expand your portfolio of work, to ensure that your applications are appropriately customized for the firms that you want to work at.
In some cases, the placement cell may advise you to improve upon basics, such as written English or grammar.
Money-back guarantee
If you take this course, follow it diligently for a month, do all the exercises on time but still do not find value in it we will refund the entire course fee to you. Please refer to our refund policy for more details.
Note: This is an introductory course, meant for law students who want to get started with basics.
Lawyers and other advanced learners are recommended to refer to our more advanced Diplomas or Executive Certificate courses (listed here) pertaining to their area of interest.
class
Class 1: Introduction to M&A Work
Types of M&A transactions
Investment work
Exercises:
Identify key commercials from a term sheet
Review a scheme of amalgamation
Draft an application to NCLT for approval of an existing scheme
Class 2: How to raise capital for a company
Exercise:
Identify type of securities to be issued based on the promoter’s objectives and method of issue
Identify steps for a private placement for a private company & for a listed company
Class 3: How to raise debt finance
Exercise:
Review a loan agreement from a lender’s perspective
Identify the corporate compliances (filings, approvals and resolutions) for perfection of security (to help lenders)
Advise creditors on recovery strategies in the case of a default
Class 4: How to handle FDI transactions
Exercise:
Advise on FDI
Advise on FDI in e-commerce sector, single brand and multi-brand retail
Class 5 [BONUS]: Competition law work in a law firm
Exercise (in-class)
Drafting of Information
Drafting of interim relief application
