Careers In House
Attorneys working "in house" or as corporate counsel can have a variety of practice specialties - employment, patent/intellectual property, tax, corporate/business law - and serve as the legal advisors to the companies or organization employing them. Often they contract law firms to handle matters such as complex litigation or other specialized legal work.
Typically lawyers work for a few years before becoming corporate counsel, both to gain practice expertise and to bring their connections within their field. Corporate legal departments usually are not large enough or structured to provide training to new lawyers or to classes of summer law students. On occasion students may be able to obtain work via corporate externships or general corporate summer programs with a rotation in the legal department.
It is never too early to begin meeting lawyers who work as general counsel, since they provide a valuable network as potential clients, valuable mentors and possible future employers.
Explore Corporate Counsel careers:
- ACC: The Association of Corporate Counsel is the inhouse counsel bar association, and their website provides information on programs, jobs, blogs and articles about practicing in house
- ABA Corporate Counsel Committee: The American Bar Association's Corporate Counsel Committee has newsletters, meetings, student memberships and publications
- Georgia Corporate Counsel Law Section: The State Bar of Georgia has a Corporate Counsel Law Section, which hosts an annual two-day institute and provides connections with inhouse counsel throughout the state
- Atlanta Corporate Counsel Section: The Atlanta Bar Association's Corporate Counsel Section provides many programs and benefits for its members; student Bar memberships are available.
- Law.com: The Corporate Counsel section on Law.com provides articles, category blogs and more
- CorporateCounsel.net: CorporateCounsel.net provides blogs and advice on careers inhouse
- Business Law & Ethics Program: The School of Law's celebrated Business Law & Ethics Program provides students the opportunity to polish transactional law skills and to work in corporate externships
For additional resources and articles, be sure to check out Law Dawg Dash.