Post LPC - Work experience

I'm actually just going to focus on point three because post LPC you should be now looking to get legal work, not experience.
People paralegal at different places to build up their reference portfolio and work history. Further to this firms often recruit paralegals on six month contracts to see how they fare. None of the positions in the city often lead to training contracts, instead if you paralegal at an MC firm or silver circle then it will help build your regional experience and make you stand out of the crowd for the regional TC's.

The reason why they are not getting TC's however is as discussed above, there no opportunities for paralegals to move up, secondly for a paralegal to move up they will often need to stay with a firm for at least a year. This incidentally is often how TCs are gained in regional practices.
Basically the aim is not to build up a list of work experience for you now, that time has passed. You should now be looking to get your foot in the door of a firm, get any post i.e paralegal, legal assistant ect and stay with the firm, it is in general the only way to convince them of hiring you. Moving around will arguably be a hinderance.

Thank you for your reply.
As I stated above, I do have legal work experience, but I do not see the point merely stating it on my CV, as I, myself know that that kind of experience despite being useful at that time provided me with very few (if any skills).
The reason why I am looking for work experince at this stage is to spend some time in an office environment, experience how some things (even very basic ones!) are done, so that when I actually move to a law firm where I'll be paid, I will not make a fool out of my self by not knowing how to do basic things and asking questions which could have been avoided.
Hence the reason I look for some work experience, if anything it's more for my own benefit and confidence, then to prove that I have some on my CV - which I already do.

"None of the positions in the city often lead to training contracts, instead if you paralegal at an MC firm or silver circle then it will help build your regional experience and make you stand out of the crowd for the regional TC's. "
I suppose I would have to dispute this finding, as there are some law firms in the city that promote that kind of 'organic growth' if you like.
With that being said, it's not the case that being a paralegal leads to a trainee position automatically, but it certainly helps in some, though not all law firms.
Why would you say that it would only enable me to stand out from the crowd for regional TCs? Obviously, if somebody has some experience as a paralegal at for instance A&O, it stands for something when applying for TCs in the City (though I am sure there will be more applicants having this or similar experience).

If you disagree go out and get a training contract then

That is exactly what I will do.

I recently did a vac scheme at a fairly large non-London law firm with someone who had paralegalled for a year at Pinsent Masons in London- I think it will impress a lot of the non-City firms, but then the onus would be on you to prove that you really wanted to work in Birmingham/ Bristol/ Sheffield etc. and weren't just going to head straight back to London as soon as you'd qualified.

In terms of paralegal jobs leading to TCs in the City I know most firms treat the recruitment strategy as completely separate and the experience would be more or less incidental, though by no means meaningless. It would certainly give you plenty talk about if it got to an interview and in the 'why us' section of the application form, but you'd still have to demonstrate a whole raft of other skills/ experience to be in with a shout.

One thing I will say having read your post, particularly regarding the working on Saturday point- don't see legal work experience as the be all and end all. By all means make that your number one priority but I'd have said it would aid your cause much more if you show that you are a balanced individual who demonstrates initiative/ imagination in your personal life as well as professionally. Of course, you may have all sorts of interesting stuff going on that you didn't mention in your post- but if not I'd urge you to make that a priority too.

Thank you very much for your reply.
I am well-aware of the fact that I would also have to show other qualities when applying for a TC.
May I ask you whether the person who had the paralegal experience, during the vac scheme would you say he/she was more self-confident in terms of work performed etc, in comparison to other vac schemers?

I think that you raised an important point regarding the week-ends, admittedly I have things to talk about on my CV, but you're right I shall reconsider how to use the weekend to do some other ECs maybe which I could add to my CV.
Would you have any ideas of what that might be?

1. I can't comment on how she performed in her department during the vac scheme, but in general yes she probably did come across as more confident and professional than the other vac schemers.

2. I know it might sound cliched, but perhaps some sort of voluntary work. There's usually stuff on Gumtree you can check out. Go for the ones that involve as much responsibility as possible. The benefit of getting involved in voluntary work is that you can often gain soft skills experience of project management/ teamwork etc. that you wouldn't gain access to in paid employment for years.

In fact a trainee I met recently got a TC on the back of doing almost exclusively charity/ voluntary work after finishing her law degree.

I wouldn't bother bulls**ting recruiters by saying you did it for the good of humanity, just say you recognised it was a good cause and wanted an opportunity to prove yourself in a position of responsibility.