If you already know what area of law you want to practice: -

Some ways to find relevant senior lawyers/law firms

• Bar Council Committees: made up of lawyers who are especially active in their industry, may
be more willing to mentor or provide opportunities to learn.
• Malaysian Bar website’s “find a lawyer” tool: type in relevant keywords -
https://legaldirectory.malaysianbar.org.my/
• Go through landmark cases from your field(s) of interest (Law Reports) and see who argued
those cases – this may also come in handy during interviews as it will demonstrate you know
what’s expected of the job.
• LinkedIn

If you don’t yet know what area of law you want to practice, focus on firms with a number of
practice areas that also incorporate a rotation system for their pupillages. This may be prudent even
if you think you know what area of law you want to practice – plenty of young lawyers have gone
into practice thinking they want to practice A, only to end up wanting to practice B.

If you are retained you will probably be placed in the department you chose. Once you start
amassing experience in one area it can be difficult to switch to another area some years later
without starting from scratch, so take your time to explore the different practice areas and choose
wisely.

Additional factors to bear in mind:

• Size of the firm

• The individuals there
• The work culture – check websites like Glassdoor to ensure you’re not going to be making
coffee, or heaven forbid, getting verbally abused or harassed for the duration of your time
there.

Finally, don’t let your perception of your abilities or experience stop you from applying to firms
you’re interested in! Just try for it and do your due diligence – the worse thing that can happen is
that they say “no”. They could also say “yes”, but you won’t know until you try.