Intern to Associate: Life After Law Boot Camp

What outcomes you can expect at McLaughlin & Associates

At McLaughlin & Associates, we’ve been operating a very successful internship program for many years and we’re especially proud of the outcomes we have achieved, especially for our interns.

Much of this success we attribute to the formal, standardised format of our program which we have developed with the fundamental underlying theme – to get interns to start thinking and acting like a valuable contributing member of a team.

We want to get them ready for their working life and to give them a competitive edge over other graduates when vying for a job in what is a very tough market.  We like to think of it as a boot camp for law students.

Life as an Intern

The first premise of our program is the fact that most law students have never set foot inside a legal office and have no idea how an office functions and how they are supposed to act and operate within it.

So the first things we teach them are, the:

• responsibilities and obligations of being part of a team
• need for punctuality
• need for courtesy and respect to others
• need for honesty and ensuring every task assigned to them is done correctly and to the best of their ability.

They are made well aware that others in the team will rely on them to play their part and to do their job to the best of their ability and by failing to do this, they are letting down the other members of the team.

They are taught to be responsible for their actions and how to interact with others.  They learn the shattering truth that getting a Law Degree is only a very, very small part of actually being a lawyer.

Armed with the skills acquired during their internship program, interns leave us and go forth to grab with both hands the opportunities which await them.

One of the great things about our internship program at McLaughlin & Associates Lawyers is that interns tend to stay in touch and remain friends of the firm forever and we are always very interested in their progress and achievements.

By John McLaughlin
Principal, McLaughlin & Associates Lawyers