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Alumni Profile - James Greenland
Published on 07 November 2016
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As a graduate of the College’s Profs Programme, can you comment on how you found the programme?
After several years of theory and ‘academic’ training at Law School, the College of Law’s Professional Legal Studies course was a welcome introduction to the actual practice of law. Legal practise is not much like studying law, and there is a lot to learn before students/graduates are able to legitimately call themselves ‘lawyers’. The College of Law begins you on that journey toward Practise proper. Applying all of the skills and knowledge gained during years of university study, ‘Profs’ gives aspiring lawyers a practical understanding of what day-to-day lawyering looks and feels like, while also providing an unrivalled networking and continuing-education platform – the value of which can’t be understated for budding members of New Zealand’s close and collegial legal profession.
Were the lecturers helpful?
I found College of Law lecturers to be both helpful – in the education-sense – and entertaining. Many lecturers are legal practitioners themselves, more than willing to share anecdotal insights and lessons about what a life and career in law can be. Particularly memorable for me were anecdotes shared by Wellington barrister and College lecturer Matthew Sherwood-King, who epitomises the professional, personable and in-many-ways larger than life character that sets some lawyers, particularly litigators, aside. “Being a lawyer is the best job in the world,” he says proudly and loudly and without a hint of doubt.
Was the progamme useful and have applied your learning since?
Absolutely. Only after ‘Profs’ did I feel nearly confident enough to field ‘law’ or ‘law-related’ questions from friends and family, who themselves thought I was a ‘lawyer’ from pretty much day one of law school! Now, I am pretty confident in giving non-specific legal advice – about things like witnessing documents, drafting affidavits, and addressing the Court – to anyone who asks (with the important caveat, that I’m still not a practising lawyer ) . Especially useful, I’ve found, were the contract negotiation role-plays – as offer, acceptance, and consideration are truly the glue that holds the commercial world together, and you can’t get far in life or business without being able to hold your own and negotiate the odd contractual term or two.
Since then, where has your career taken you? (In other words, what roles and route did you take to go from College of Law to your current role?)
I studied ‘Profs’ while working as a journalist and communications advisor for the New Zealand Law Society – the regulator and professional representative of NZ’s legal profession. Fortunately, with an understanding manager and the College of Law’s flexible course options, I was able to continue working full-time whilst completing the course and eventually being admitted in the High Court. After one year with the NZLS I was asked by global professional recruitment company Robert Walters to join their Wellington office as a specialist legal recruitment consultant. Being ‘headhunted’ to join Robert Walters myself gave me invaluable insight into the recruitment process, and what it takes to succeed in such a highly-commercial, highly-competitive industry. Without knowing what lawyers do day-in-day-out – much of which I learned at the College of Law – I wouldn’t be able to conduct the often highly-technical consultations I have with either my clients (who generally seek lawyers as employees) or candidates (who seek employment as lawyers).
In your current role, what would you regard as a highlight? What’s the most challenging aspect?
Consulting with highly-skilled and experienced professionals about their specific legal work has to be the greatest challenge of legal recruitment. Not just talking with, but adding-value to clients and candidates is what recruitment is all about – and that means understanding the ins-and-outs of all facets of legal practice is essential. Whilst challenging, this aspect is also probably the most enjoyable (having to learn screeds of banking and finance law acronyms aside). It can be good fun, and certainly confidence boosting, to discuss legal issues and commercial needs with senior and powerful members of the profession – usually as an ‘equal’ expected to provide a quality service. I’m also grateful to meet so many fascinating lawyers in the course of my job, from family and Trust law private practice solicitors through to high-end commercial oil and gas and banking and finance counsel. No two days are the same.
What advice would you give for new and aspiring lawyers inspired by your role and achievements?
Keep an open mind, about where your legal qualifications can take you. There are probably a thousand different ways to use your law degree and ‘Profs’ certificate that you haven’t even heard of. Law ‘touches on’ every aspect of society and individuals’ lives, and there are doors open everywhere through which young lawyers might walk and forge a career path they’d never even considered. That said, I recommend you begin to think about which areas of law interest and excite you, as early as you can. It can never hurt to make contacts, ask questions, volunteer and chase opportunities, in the legal practice areas you think best suit you – the worst that might happen is you realise you weren’t on the ‘right track’, in which case you’re better off anyway to change tack early, toward something that suits. The best that might happen is you find and forge a path toward your successful future in the law.