Becoming a lawyer is a common goal for many people. However, not everyone is equipped with the right tools and personality traits that make some of the best lawyers successful. Despite this fact, it’s possible for aspiring attorneys to learn about these traits to incorporate them into their work. For instance, lawyers need to have good judgment and strong writing abilities in order to be able to defend their clients properly in court and on paper.
Here are other personal qualities that you will need to become a lawyer.
Compassion for Clients
One of the first things you’ll need to have is compassion for your clients due to the level of sensitivity of each of their cases. Remember, you won’t be dealing with objects or animals—you will be dealing with people who may have fallen victim to others. Without compassion, an attorney will never reach their true professional potential. This is because people like to be treated well no matter if they’re the victim or the perpetrator.
A great example of this would be Malliha Wilson. Malliha Wilson is widely known for being the first minority to be appointed as the Assistant Deputy Attorney General of the Government of Ontario from April 2008 to Nov. 2016. She’s originally from Sri Lanka and has dedicated her life to defending her people’s human rights. She also specializes in indigenous, constitutional, corporate, and labor law, along with other complex litigation. She was also the former special legal advisor at the Investment Management Corporation of Ontario or IMCO and is currently serving as a senior counsel at her law firm, Nava Wilson LLP, in Toronto, Ontario.
Communication Skills
Additionally, attorneys need to be excellent communicators. This is because they need to transform ideas into formal legal writing, emails, phone conversations, and private conversations. Aspiring lawyers should always look for opportunities to improve their communication skills in order to attract and retain their clients. Take the drug injury attorney law firm Heninger Garrison Davis, LLC, as an example. Attorneys at this law firm need to communicate effectively with people who have fallen victim to defective drugs. They will need to properly record the physical and mental damages victims have suffered due to the defective prescription drug they have taken and provide that information to their insurance company in a legal claim or in court in front of a judge.
Creativity
Moreover, if you’re an aspiring lawyer, you’ll need a lot of creativity in order to handle each of your clients with unique sets of concerns, goals, and objectives. Thinking outside the box will help you craft a set of solutions that the client had not been aware of before. You will need to be able to tailor your creativity to suit each of your cases with an open mind.
Perseverance
Furthermore, it’s a common fact that law is a tough industry, so any aspiring lawyer will need to have a lot of perseverance. As with any other profession, you will need to put in a lot of effort to get through the many obstacles that will come your way in order to get to the other side successfully. You will have a lot of hard days in which you may even need counseling, however, by training your perseverance skills, you can exceed your clients’ expectations and provide them with an excellent service.
A Dose of Skepticism
Lastly, every lawyer in practice is known for having some level of skepticism to stay aware of the many sides of a story. They need to make sure to get the whole picture and find a way to discover verified information about each case in order to properly defend their client.
These skills will help you follow your career goal of becoming a lawyer.
