The Hong Kong legal market looks set to get even more competitive following the latest legal careers fair. Each year, aspiring lawyers visit the Melbourne University Hong Kong Law Careers Fair in the hopes of picking up insights into life in an international commercial law firm. The three major Hong Kong universities for law also attend and offer advice to both citizens wishing to return home to qualify and foreign students. “US, UK and Australian firms with Hong Kong offices attend the fair, and they are all the international commercial firms, so we would actively encourage those interested in commercial areas to come but for anyone looking to get into areas like family, criminal or government law, they should contact local firms direct as the fair is really about driving home the finer points on how it is to work in a commercial law firm. It is also strictly the international firms at the moment who are involved,” said Angela Edwards, associate director of the careers office at Melbourne Law School.
The university is currently experiencing strong demand from students who are keen for an international career, according to Edwards. Exact numbers of attendees at the fair were unavailable, however international firms including Baker & McKenzie, Latham & Watkins, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, Davis Polk & Wardwell, Reed Smith and Deacons as well as others were there. Edwards also said that other events for the industry and for graduates may have been in decline since the start of the GFC, the careers fair has remained consistently popular and considered useful by students.
The fair can be the first step towards a full time job for some, she added: “Anecdotally, we do hear a lot from students that through the presentations offered by firms, through meeting firms’ representatives at the fair and applying for a vacation scheme or clerkship, that the next year those students have since had job offers and have launched their career.”
One student who is hoping to hear that they have won a place on a clerkship is Yi Xian Tan, a final year law student and vice president of the Global Law Student Association at Melbourne University. Tan is in the process of sending applications to a couple of major firms in Hong Kong and is waiting to hear back within a few weeks.
Attending the fair and interacting with representatives was also one of the ways that Tan is informing herself as she tries to decide between practicing in Singapore or Hong Kong. “Because I am originally from Singapore I have friends there who have done internships, so I can talk to them about what it is like there, but speaking with those firms at the fair, especially the Hong Kong managing partner of Davis Polk & Wardwell, has really helped give me an idea of what life is like in Hong Kong. I already know that when I graduate I want to go in to corporate finance in either Hong Kong or Singapore, so the choice for me is about location. I’ve also been taking note of where the various firms’ offices are, and considering alternative pathways into different firms,” she said.