What Does a Legal Career Coach Do? with Irina Mui

Hello everybody. Welcome to another episode of Studying Law Around the World. Today I have the, the great satisfaction and opportunity to be interviewing Irina Mui. She's a career consultant, a legal recruiter, and she will be speaking with us a little more about careers. We'll be talking about, you know, the legal scenario employability-wise, and also we'll touch on a few things specifically thinking about internationally trained lawyers in Canada. Thank you so much for joining us today, Irina. It's great to have you here. Oh, thank you for having me, Claudio. Thank you so much. And to start our podcast today, I'd love for our listeners to hear a little bit about who you are and especially about the work you're doing right now. So, Can you, can you do an introduction for us, please? Sure. So I'm Irina and I'm a career coach. So basically I specialize in helping internationally trained lawyers, local lawyers, law students in Canada, or someone who wants to build their legal career in Canada. So I help them to secure jobs that align to their goals and figure out their career path, especially when they're so confused in how to proceed. To have a fulfilling career in the legal industry. Yeah, so a bit of my background. I have been in the legal industry for quite some time. So I did my undergraduate in Canada at York University, and after that I went back to Hong Kong and I did the external LLB through the University of London. Yeah, so that was a 3-year program, and I was supposed to apply for something called the PCLL. So it's sort of like a licensing program and the seats are very limited in Hong Kong. Yeah. So I applied for all law schools in Hong Kong and I got rejected every year for 3 consecutive years. So during that time, I secured a job at a law firm as a litigation paralegal. So that really set me up. for the Osgoode LLM because after 3 years, I received an offer from Osgoode for the Canadian Common Law LLM. And if I haven't got that work experience, I don't think I would get an offer. I don't think I would get a chance to study at Osgoode. So yeah, so I flew back to Toronto and that was 2016. Yes. So I've I finished the first LLM, that's the Canadian Common Law LLM, and because the NCA required me to do 2 LLMs, so I did another LLM, which is the International Business Law. It was a lovely program. Whoever considers going to Osgoode for the LLM, I highly recommend it. And so after that, I started my licensing journey in Ontario. I took the bar exam. I took it 5 times. So if you fail the exam, don't worry, you'll be on the other side. And I was called to the bar in 2021. So I practiced for a little bit, but at that time, because COVID hit, and I was thinking that I wanted to really help lawyers, because as long as you have been in the industry for a while, you'll probably meet someone who is not happy at work, who might have been suffering from addiction or depression. Yeah, and it could create some really bad health consequences. It's not just affecting the lawyer themselves, it's also affecting their loved ones, and it's not good for the clients. Basically, it's not good for the whole legal industry, and I think there should be a change. So COVID at the time, and there was the Great Resignation. which really inspired me to pivot my career into something that I could really help lawyers and really understand the legal profession in a broader sense. And eventually I pivoted into legal recruitment, and that really opened my eyes in, yeah, getting to know different practices, getting to talk to a lot of lawyers and helping them to find a fulfilling job. And I did enjoy my work as a legal legal recruiter. However, I also see that, yeah, working with the clients is really nice, but there is a real— there's a lack of support on the candidate side, especially for internationally trained lawyers and practicing lawyers, because there's not that much career support out there. So I decided to pivot again to become a career coach. And now I work with candidates to support them in their career. Amazing. No, that's so incredible. What a journey you've gone through. And I love how international it is as well. Um, and, and you know what, I'd love to hear a little more about how does that work? Thinking of somebody who's just finishing up law school, we know there's basically 2 different kinds of timelines, right? For people who are doing an LLM as an internationally trained lawyers, they'll usually apply for a 2L summer or straight into articling. Or both. And then if you're in the regular JD program, you'd apply for that. But I know this is not the only option. There is a lot of things happening, right? There's a lot of a market that doesn't get as much of an attention, I would say, like a secondary market to some extent, or just those who are not in the regulated recruit. So I'd love to hear a little more about, you know, how do you guide your clients to first, you know, kind of choose their area of practice or choose what kind of jobs that interest them? Um, do you usually take an approach that, that it's aligned with their preferences or it's also so interesting for them to have exposure to different things? What, what does that look like when you're career coaching? Sure. I like to, first of all, get to know their profile because like, it's like you, when you're tackling a case, it's so important to understand the case first. So that's why I wanted— I usually ask them, tell me about your journey, your career journey. How did you start it? And I know that especially for internationally trained lawyers, they kind of think that their international work experience is not worth to mention. However, these are really valuable experiences. So I would dig deep into understanding their whole profile. What are their strengths? What are they lacking of? And also ask them their goal, their ultimate goal, especially not just the career goal, it's also life goal as well. Eventually, are they planning to have kids? What type of lifestyle they want to have? Because different practices do have different lifestyle. And yeah, how much money they want to earn. Moving back from the ultimate goal, so I first asked them, How do you see your future practice ultimately? And then move back the step to help them to plan their journey because there's a lot of different routes, as you said, and JD students, even internationally trained lawyers have many different kinds of routes as well. So I think it's important to know their ultimate goal first and move back for the planning each step that they have to take to reach that goal. That's incredible. That's incredible. And if I may ask on a high-level general idea here, what options are available out there? What's the market like nowadays in Toronto? I know that, you know, every couple of years we have differences and maybe from year to year we have a lot of differences, a lot of things that have to do, you know, with economy, with all these factors that maybe are not in the control of a candidate that is trying to apply for job interviews. Or for jobs in general. What is the market like now? Sure. And I know this is a question that a lot of lawyers, a lot of candidates, they worry about, they care about, especially now the market in general is not doing so good. The economy is not doing so good. That affects law firms and companies to being tight budget, that kind of thing. However, from my own experience and the people that I have helped from their experience The market is not the major thing, I would say, because unless so bad that no law firm is hiring, then that's a different story. However, because market goes ups and downs, it's like the stock market, and it's just in a wave pattern. And from my experience and the others' experience, we can tackle the market in different kinds of ways. There are For example, yeah, how the techniques when you use to apply for jobs, how well you structure your application package and utilizing your network, all these things would set you up for success in any market, I would say. So I do think that market is a secondary thing. And yeah, so these days, this market compared to last year, maybe I do think that this market is— this year's market is more active than last year. It's a very complicated question, and the waves, it depends on whether your time frame is. That's great. It's nice to hear that there is activity going on, that people are being hired and all of that. That's just a good sign overall, right? And if I may ask, you mentioned about, you know, being strategic, having those clear goals basically of where you want your practice to go, what you want your life goals to be ultimately. And I don't think we get told that enough, you know, in any kind of education, right? We often will say, oh, I wish I had learned how to file my own taxes when I was in high school, or I just had a podcast about financial literacy and how much, you know, we need to learn more about these things. So having this background, having this information you just said about how a career coach can help you to navigate different scenarios, understand how to navigate the whole application process for different interviews and all of that, I wonder if there is, you know, is there, you would say, oh, there's this one thing that most people get wrong or There's this one thing that most people struggle with. Is there such a thing as like a common denominator that you see that a lot of the internationally trained lawyers or a lot of the clients that you work with may struggle with? Yes, that's a very good question. And I can feel that myself. Yeah, we never taught about the goal setting. We just talk about all the technical things, like in law school, they teach us law, like how to practice the law. But they never teach us how to plan our legal career. And that's the thing, because it's so important. And as you said, that's one common theme that I think a lot of people are lacking. It does take practice as well, which is the mindset. I do think mindset is so important, and I've seen a lot of examples of like my clients, myself. my previous candidates, those who are like, of course, they put in the hard work, they employ good strategy, and they have a great mindset, which I mean is an abundant mindset. When they have all these things, I have never seen any of those candidates who cannot secure a job that aligns with their goal. So I think besides the strategic part, mindset is so important because it affects everything. Imagine when you go into court and you just feel like, oh, I'm going to lose this case. It totally affects all the subconscious mind, like all these subtle, um, yeah, like, like how you behave in court, like how do you, how your voice sounds like. It affects all your performance. And that's the same with applying for jobs. If you are having a scarcity mindset that I think there's a very limited job and I Yeah, and I don't think I could secure something that I want. You won't secure a job that aligns with your goal, and that would hurt your resume because maybe you get an offer and you'd be like, this one is good enough. Then you accept the offer and starting to feel like, no, this is not what I want. And you start searching. It actually hurts your resume because employers, they don't like people who are jumpy. So that's one thing. I think having an abundant mindset is so important, and it does take practice. Like, even for me, like, it takes a lot of practice to have this kind of mindset, but the earlier you practice, the better you become. So yeah, mindset would be one of the key things that I would say, and not just what I think. I talk to a lot of, like, talent acquisition managers, like recruiters, like as well. I asked them, what do you think, what's the biggest issue that you think that leads some, that leads a candidate to screw up an interview? And many of them told me that is their mindset because that affects, totally affects like their behaviors in the interview. Yeah. So I would say that mindset is so important. That's incredible. What a nice piece of advice it is. To make sure that we take care of that. And I'm thinking here too, another, another maybe point that can be brought up is that we make good decisions when we make informed decisions, I would say, right? So when we, when we know the possibilities, I feel that to some extent, a law degree is so awesome because you really can have so many different opportunities. There's so many different kinds of work that you can do, be it, you know, in-house. In a law firm, in a government organization, in an NGO, any kind of organization can have their in-house counsel. There's so much that you can, you know, look into. And also, of course, the jobs that you can do with a law degree without necessarily being a lawyer. But I'm just interested to hear a little more about, is there such a thing as, you know, a career path that will open the most possibilities? You just said that sometimes it's hard if you just, you know, take the first thing that shows up, that it doesn't align with what you want in the long term, if it doesn't align with your expectations of what good work feels like and all of that. But on the other hand, as you're exploring all of that, it may be, I'm not too sure if I'm, you know, made for this. It feels like it would be a good goal, but I don't have anybody in my family who can tell me for sure. And the few people I spoke to said it's good enough. So it's, it feels like it would be nice, but I'd love to experiment a little more. Is there a few different tracks that I could explore that would be in a way a little safer? Um, as to, you know, if you were to go very specific in a very niche area, could that, you know, kind of close, uh, um, your prospective jobs to some extent? Is there such a thing as like a career that you can start in that will open more doors than Is that just a myth? Is that possible? What's your view on that? Sure. So this is a wide question and, um, yeah, maybe I could start with JD students or, um, or someone who doesn't really have much legal experience. So they, they're not too, like, probably they don't really, um, know what practice area they want to go into. So for these people, yes, there are, I always suggest a path to these kind of like law students and lawyers because there is a path that could open much more doors. So I know a lot of lawyers, they want to go in-house and that's understandable because who likes billable hours? Like when I practice, I hate that. I hate that a lot. So in-house, it does have its perks and not all the in-house are like easy peasy. Many of them, they're also pretty, pretty intense as well. However, for junior lawyers, newly called lawyers, or like someone who practiced like 1 year, 2 years, or like internationally trained lawyers who are not sure what they practice, for these kind of like what I call more newly experienced lawyers, I do suggest them to practice, like remain in private practice for the first 3 years. And the reason why is that I have seen in-house counsel who has been practicing in-house for more than 10 years. Eventually they come to me and say, Irina, I don't really enjoy in-house. I just feel like as a lack of challenge, I'm doing the things I feel like there's not that much things for me to learn and I want something more challenging and I don't want to deal with HR. Yeah. So there, there is a, it is quite challenging for them to move back to private practice. It's not impossible, but it's quite challenging because on the private practice side, the employer would worry about, oh, this person has been in-house, like, like this person has been very accustomed to like the style of how in-house run. In private practice is so different, especially if that person practiced litigation, it's super different. So that's why I do suggest for those like newly experienced lawyers to stay in private practice. Like, first of all, is there is, they deal with a lot more law, like legal matters. It's very legal focused. They don't have to deal with HR, all these kinds of things. They don't have to deal with the CEO. And at the same time, they work with different clients. So there are like a wider variety of cases that they can handle. And then from private practice, move to in-house is not that difficult. As long as your skills align to what they look for. However, okay, so let's say if you have like 3 years of private practice experience, move to in-house, and maybe after 2 years you realize like, I want to go back to private practice. I love the challenges. It's easier to, pretty easy to move back to private practice because you have that private practice experience. that clear the concern from the employer that you don't understand private practice. So that's why, um, I think that would be one general suggestion that I give for a newly experienced lawyer. That's amazing. That's amazing. And I think that, as I said, having this kind of information is so rich. Uh, we chatted a little bit before starting recording and I said, uh, that, that something that I heard in the last episode was basically If you have a criminal law matter and you're a business lawyer, you just refer that people out, right? And sometimes when we are dealing with our own careers, personal finances, you know, all these things that we have to deal with, we don't always look for a professional in that area. That's why it's so interesting to get to speak with people who are working in careers every day. Irina, it's been so interesting to hear all that you have to share here with us. But as we go towards, you know, the end of this podcast today, I'd love to ask you if you were to give, you know, a few general pieces of advice to people who are looking into getting into the Canadian legal market, what are a few things that they have to keep in mind and they should be doing? What are some of your suggestions on that sense? What are things that you should keep in mind? Yes, so one thing is the abundant mindset. That one is so important. The second thing is ask for help. There, my understanding, my experience with the legal community, everyone is so helpful. And we do have this culture of like giving a helping hand to not just like for junior lawyers. I know some senior lawyers, they have a coach as a junior lawyer because they also offer special, like some fresh perspective to the senior lawyers. So I think asking for help is so important. There's a lot of associations that you could reach out to, and LinkedIn is easy to reach out to someone as well. And also, if you get like so confused on, like, for example, if I want to become an in-house counsel or I want to practice entertainment law and you don't know how to get into that. Yeah. So look for entertainment lawyers on online and LinkedIn, look for their career path, which is why I LinkedIn, because it shows every career move that that person have. And if you find that very inspiring, reach out to that person, have a coffee chat with them. Yeah, so that's one thing too that could help you to gain some clarity in your career path. And speaking about job searching, That one is also like a wave pattern, so that market goes ups and downs, but when you search for a job, you can't search it out of exhaustion. So like if you're dreading applying for jobs, or if you don't really enjoy reading your cover letter and resume, that wouldn't attract interviews because it bleeds Your intention bleeds into the application and the reader can feel it. Like, I have read a lot of this application and I already can feel like this person, there's heart in drafting that, but this person is probably struggling with drafting and is not like, not enjoying the drafting. So really enjoy the process. Trust that you would get there. Know what you want and ask for help. So that would be something that I would suggest. And if you're still confused, I'm here to help. as well, so feel free to contact me too. Fantastic. Is LinkedIn the easiest way to contact you? What would you recommend? Sure, yeah. So I'm very active on LinkedIn, and you could email me as well. So my email is irinam@muicoaching.com. And if you go online and just search Mu Coaching, you'll find my website, and my contact information are there as Amazing. Just as the final thing, I know you also have a very prominent group on LinkedIn. Can you tell our listeners about the group you made where you share career opportunities in Canada? Yes. Once I started the career coaching and the incentive for creating the group is because I try to understand the legal market and I was like, there should be a group out there that shares legal jobs. So I do see something that, yeah, that post legal job, but it's not geared towards Canada. And so I couldn't find anything that gears towards Canada, so I decided to create one. And I basically share job opportunities that are within Canada and that are legal job opportunities. Why I do that, because I have added quite a lot of people when I was doing recruitment and quite a bit of talent acquisition manager and firms as well. So I do see job opportunities popping up in my newsfeed, and I was like, yeah, if I couldn't find a useful resource that would help me to gain more insights in the Canadian legal job market, other people probably struggle with that as well. And that's why I created this group and share all the legal jobs in Canada. And I'm glad that I did it because when I go, when I do my market research, I looked at my group as well because the jobs are fresh. When you search it on Google or even LinkedIn, sometimes you'll find jobs that are a couple months ago, or even the market now, even like 2 weeks ago would consider as a little bit old. So that's the reason why I created this group, and I'm glad that I do hear a lot of feedback that people find it helpful, and that is what I, what I, what I like to do as well. Fantastic. So for those of us listening and interested, please go ahead, add Irina on LinkedIn and also make sure to join her group. Thank you so much once again for joining us today, Irina. Thank you guys so much for listening, and we'll see you on the next episode. Thank you, Claudio, for having me. I really enjoyed it.