General transferable skills: reactions of recent graduates

(Transcript of a section of the General transferable skills report, 1998)

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Having drawn up a list of general transferable skills the project sought to identify the importance for recent graduates, both in the legal profession and outside. Were such skills relevant to practice in law? How had the students acquired them? How far were law degrees helpful in developing them?

Two strands of activity were taken. A first strand consisted of small focus group discussions with a common structured agenda, with trainees in law firms. Such groups would contain both law graduates and non law graduates.

The second strand was to send a questionnaire to Leeds LLB graduates of 1992 and to identify from them the skills they now needed and how far their LLB education had assisted in developing these skills or the awareness of them. We chose those who had graduated in 1992, as it provided a five year period in which the group would have settled into a career.

The focus groups

Four focus groups were held with trainee solicitors and newly qualified solicitors based in large commercial firms from Leeds, Sheffield and London. Two participants were on a placement from their undergraduate programmes, which offers the opportunity of a sandwich year. All participants were trainees with the larger firms.

The majority of students had taken the traditional route of law degree, Legal Practice Course LPC) and training contract.

	Leeds	Sheffield	London Firm A	London firm B
Law	5	4	2	5
Non-law	2	2	4	2

Trainees were also asked to state the university in which they had studied their undergraduate degree.

Oxbridge	Other University	New University	Overseas
4	15	4	1

Law	Non-law
15	8

Importance of general transferable skills

All participants agreed that the skills were broad enough to be considered transferable and relevant to a number of professions and occupations including law. These skills were judged to be necessary for the work that they as trainees undertake. Those they considered necessary were intellectual skills, communication, teamwork, personal skills and problem solving.

Some participants placed more emphasis on intellectual and problem-solving skills. However, ten participants said that numeracy was neither necessary or not necessary, eight said the same for IT skills, preferring these skills to be viewed as useful rather than necessary. One participant observed,

“IT and numeracy are not really relevant to the legal profession (or rather not vital).”

Often the necessity of the skill depended very much on the work that they practised. One participant was involved in private client work, which meant dealing with client accounts, and therefore felt that a good understanding of numeracy was important for her work.

Teamwork again was said only to be necessary if you are working in a team. Several participants did identify the importance of teamwork in relation to the people they work with – people around them in the office.

All participants agreed that the skills we had listed were important, some more than others, to their work, but were of the opinion that these skills are developed through life and are developed all the time. These, they said, are the skills that everybody has and has the potential to develop. The important feature is whether and when you realise what these skills are.

Several participants mentioned that learning general transferable skills in context is one of the objectives of the LPC rather than the undergraduate degree. They saw the law degree as academic and not vocational (ie not solely preparing them for a career in law). But there was some debate as to how useful the LPC had been in creating situations which support the development of skills required for employment, even given the amount of time that is dedicated to the skills element on the LPC.

Undergraduate or postgraduate skills development

Both groups tended to identify any skills training (specifically rather than through life experience) that they had developed as part of the Legal Practice Course. While the participants were aware of presentations they may have done in their undergraduate degree, they suggested that the opportunity to learn and develop skills at undergraduate level seemed non-existent or were not identifiable.

They saw the degree as the academic or intellectual knowledge based side of legal training while the LPC provided the practical. The training contract then provides the opportunity to apply these skills. This was the view mainly of the law graduates. This contrasted with civil engineers, who learned or were given the opportunity to practice all these skills at undergraduate level.

Overcoming the artificiality of skills training on the LPC

One participant suggested that the LPC course was not practical enough in terms of the skills learned. Artificial situations were created, which was sometimes met by an artificial and prepared response in the skills assessment. They were aware of the difficulty and or feasibility of providing real situations and did to some extent see the course for what it is – preparation. The LPC, like the law degree, was just part of the progression process throughout education that leads ultimately to the work environment. One participant suggested that, while the exercises were thought to be artificial, they did make you think about what you do and the skills you use. For example, one participant questioned the usefulness of the negotiation assessment.

“It was interesting to see how negotiations work, but it does not actually mean that you are going to go into a meeting and be able to negotiate. I still do not feel that I could conduct a negotiation confidently.”

However, in response another participant identified the underlying skills of being able to put forward your propositions in a coherent manner and argue your case. The situations do allow you to talk and present in front of others irrespective of the artificiality of the setting. It also provides you with a springboard and a certain degree of confidence which can only be developed through gaining knowledge and experience, which they perceived to be the role of the training contract.

The LPC course was generally considered to make students more aware and alert as to the use of these skills. It provides a structure, and several participants said that they referred to their checklists and so on that they learnt on the LPC.

A couple of participants who had work experience prior to their law studies found that the skills element of the LPC was, for them, a waste of time, although they were quick to realise that many students will not have had the opportunity to develop such skills and it is therefore beneficial.

Recognising the skills

Students tended to become aware of their skills when they applied for jobs. Although they considered the skills were developed throughout life, the process of having to articulate them made them aware that they actually had such skills and that these are relevant for work.

“What addressed my mind to skills is when I came to write my CV…when writing your CV you realise that you need to try do something that justifies the skills you are putting down on your CV. When writing your CV you think – [they] say I need to have these skills now, so how am I going to show that I have got those skills? Maybe I had better join this that or the other to acquire those skills. You tend to need to justify everything you say about yourself.”

Adaptability and flexibility were important in ensuring that the skills developed through life were learned and used in whichever context they needed to be applied. Adaptability, flexibility, enthusiasm, motivation, common sense, attention to detail, and patience were all mentioned as extra skills.

Time management was particularly mentioned as an important skill. One participant pointed to the research exercises on the LPC which helped to develop her time management skills. Another suggested that time management was a necessity on the LPC due to the demands of the whole course. Having to be in every day and completing work in a work environment made this skill essential in the workplace. Commercial awareness was also mentioned as being important by the majority of the participants.

A number of participants agreed that you need to recognise these skills as important before you make the decision to go into the law itself. You could go to any job and these skills would be necessary. If someone who had done a degree was working and not using any of these skills, then they would not enjoy the work. The skills are applicable to any profession anywhere.

Assessment of skills

Trainees were critical of feedback and assessment of skills on the LPC and generally on undergraduate programmes. One participant commented on the experience of those who are actually assessing a particular skill. This is probably more relevant to skills teaching on the undergraduate degree, but the question that he seemed to be raising was to what extent have the assessors themselves got the skills in the context of which they are to be applied and assessed?

This led on to concern over the actual assessment criteria and understanding the interpretation of the assessor as compared with the student. One student said that she was left wondering why one person had passed and one had failed for no obvious failure in the listed assessment criteria that they were provided with.

The London-based trainees did not see the assessment criteria as a problem, although a number of participants agreed that the threshold is so low that it is easy to pass, and so it is presumably difficult to provide constructive feedback to students on how to improve.

One participant felt that LPC skills assessments were flawed in the sense that students were in the position to prepare and to confer with other students before the assessment took place. You knew what you were going to say and how you were going to say it, which is not a life like situation.

Skills you are expected to have

There are certain skills that you are expected to have before entering workplace, but they are not unreasonable. For example, more procedural knowledge was expected, and you need to be up to date and knowledgeable about the current law and have a certain standard of communication skills and intellectual capacity, as well as the ability to act in a professional manner.

Skills development within the firm

There tends to be a safety net in the large firms which may not exist in the smaller firms – more may be expected of you in a smaller firm. Learning by observation is important. As one participant pointed out, watching and learning from partners is probably the best way of developing skills.

The LPC provides a structure which the students do not always use in practice, but they do use it as a starting point and adapt by watching how solicitors in their firm work. For example, their manner in dealing with clients. However, a partner’s enthusiasm and support varies. Whilst some are so clever that they do not want to know, others are more enthusiastic and will take trainees with them at every opportunity.

One participant suggested that appraisals were not done rigidly enough at the training stage. Those who had recently qualified did feel the benefit of formal appraisals, and although not articulated in the way in which we have presented them these skills are probably covered in that appraisal.

Using legal qualifications for other occupations and careers

The participants agreed that the skills are transferable but questioned whether they would be thought of as relevant by non-legal employers.

“Other organisations may just think you are a failed solicitor if not practicing after gaining legal qualifications.”

However participants generally agreed that the skills identified by the project are used in everyday life. You don’t think that you have them, but you find out that you do and you find that out when you come to apply them in the context of work.

Generally the law degree students had not really considered using their legal qualifications for anything other than to enter the profession, whilst the non law degree students had obviously considered alternative careers and were continuing to think about how they could use their qualifications in the future.

“Application is important if you do qualify as a solicitor. Then you have probably proved yourself to be a relatively intelligent person and quite versatile and have all those transferable skills. So applying those skills to another profession with the right education should not be amazingly difficult.”

CPE and LLB

A couple of participants who had taken the CPE route said they felt a certain degree of vulnerability in terms of legal knowledge that they thought they would be expected to have.

A personal skills certificate

The Sheffield group commented on the idea of a personal skills certificate obtained at undergraduate level. To a certain extent you can develop skills through the degree, but some skills you just have and you naturally develop them. Something like the personal skills certificate is a certificate granted for students exercising these skills in an artificial context. The certificate would have to be a nationally recognised to be useful.

They asked whether the institutions are really going to fail their students on their performance of skills. If so what will happen – it will reflect badly on the institution if they do. How do they assess and who assesses you? The participants seemed to be questioning the credibility of the assessors. If the lecturers/tutors are assessing you to what extent have they themselves acquired this particular skill.

While this is probably more relevant for the degree, the credibility of the assessors was also mentioned in terms of the LPC. Trainees wanted to know the justification for failing/passing. Such assessments require detailed feedback – or involvement in the assessment process so that they are fully aware of why they have passed where someone has failed.

Sandwich courses and work experience

The two participants that were on a sandwich course and were currently working in a firm on their year out were very positive of such a structure for the law degree. Work experience is more useful rather than the artificial situations created in the law school.

The knowledge factor

While the participants were aware that this was an issue for law firms they did not think that it was actually a problem. The Sheffield trainees who had done a non-law degree did feel a certain amount vulnerability, questioning whether they had enough knowledge, but this was not a problem for similar trainees at Leeds.

The questionnaire

146 questionnaires were sent to students who had graduated from Leeds University in 1991/1992. We received 49 responses, a 34% response rate. The majority of respondents had found employment in the legal profession as a solicitor or barrister. The majority had completed the Legal Practice Course (LPC) as soon as they left university and gone on to qualify.

One of the respondents who did not qualify as a solicitor or barrister but an accountant was fairly critical of the legal education she had received.

“None of the skills acquired during my course have proved beneficial. There was a complete absence of real world skills training and a complete absence of the concept of the real world. I learnt all these skills during my employment and not on my undergraduate degree.”

However this respondent had pursued a successful career as an accountant. She may have experienced certain skills on the law degree, but was not made aware as to what those skills were.

To what extent do you think these skills are necessary for your current career?

	Very Necessary	Necessary	Neither	Not At All
Communication	94% (46)	6% (3)	–	–
Teamwork	31% (15)	49% (24)	16% (8)	4% (2)
Intellectual Skills	53% (26)	34% (17)	10% (5)	2% (1)
Problem Solving	59% (29)	33% (16)	6% (3)	2% (1)
Professional Responsibility	65% (31)	35% (17)	–	–
Personal Skills	70% (33)	30% (14)	–	–
Information Technology	22% (11)	39% (19)	35% (17)	4% (2)
Numeracy	16% (8)	53% (26)	22% (11)	8% (4)

When did you acquire the following skills?

• communication – 45% (n=21) of respondents stated that they had acquired their skills through their employment. 11% (n=5) stated that they had acquired the skills at undergraduate level and 17% (n=8) said that it was a combination of both.
• teamwork – the overwhelming majority (79%, n=37) of respondents said that their teamwork skills had been acquired through their employment.
• intellectual skills -46% (n=22) said that they had acquired these skills at undergraduate level but 12% (n=6) said that it was a combination of their undergraduate degree and employment.
• problem-solving skills – 21% (n=10) said that they had acquired these skills at undergraduate level, 30% (n=14) through their employment and 14% (n=6) through a combination of both.
• professional responsibility – the majority of respondents stated that they had acquired these skills through their work (63%, n=29).
• personal skills – 51% (n=23) of respondents said that these skills had been acquired through their work whilst 13% (n=6) said that they had been acquired through their undergraduate degree.
• information technology – 72% (n=31) stated that IT skills had been acquired through employment while 12% (n=5) said that the skills had been acquired through their undergraduate degree.
• numeracy – of those who recognised that they had acquired the skill it was a combination of acquiring the skill prior to university, through their degree programme and subsequent training.

At what stage did you first appreciate the need for these skills?

	Undergraduate	Postgraduate (Academic)	Postgraduate (Professional)	Employment
Communication	51% (23)	11% (5)	16% (7)	22% (9)
Teamwork	32% (14)	7% (3)	9% (4)	52% (23)
Intellectual Skills	91% (41)	2% (2)	–	7% (3)
Problem Solving	68% (30)	7% (3)	5% (2)	21% (9)
Professional Responsibility	25% (10)	7% (3)	22% (9)	44% (18)
Personal Skills	44% (19)	2% (1)	7% (3)	46% (28)
Information Technology	21% (9)	7% (3)	2% (1)	70% (30)
Numeracy	21% (8)	13% (5)	26% (10)	40% (15)

Conclusions

The students are an agreement that general transferable skills as identified by the project are important, but it is important to get the terminology right in expressing the teaching of these skills whether on the law degree, CPE or LPC/BVC.

Students should be aware that they are being given the opportunity to prepare for the work environment by practicing these skills, rather than that they are fully acquiring these skills.

The skills training part of the LPC should be used for students to practise and prepare, to enable students to have a base from which to develop once they get into practice or other work environment, through a combination of the lecturers facilitating learning and by individual students self awareness and self development. To some extent some participants recognised this, and suggested that these skills were developed throughout their life and it is difficult to determine at what point these skills are actually acquired. The fact that you have acquired these skills is something you become aware of when you are working or have to articulate in a CV or job application.

While one problem with the skills on the LPC was the artificial setting in which they did them, trainees generally looked beyond that at the skills they were developing as part of learning that particular legal skill. A sandwich course, offering a years work experience was generally welcomed to overcome this artificiality in the degree.

Overcoming artificiality in the LPC seems difficult unless its format was altered to include direct work experience. Nothing can fully prepare you for the work environment, but sandwich courses are appreciated by those who do them, as it places the skills in a real rather than artificial context that more fully prepares them for the transition to the work environment on completing their studies. It also helps the student/graduate to articulate more fully the skills they have used and can transfer to whatever environment that they eventually decide to work.

The importance of not allowing descriptions of skills to become too prescriptive results in part from the need to be aware of the cultural influences on the interpretation and application of these skills – including the students. There needs to be a certain degree of autonomy between the institutions, assessors, the assessed and ultimately the employers. The nature of the skill required may change with the environment in which you find yourself but the skills of adaptability, flexibility and application remain constant requirements of which the trainees were aware.

While the purpose of the student questionnaire was to obtain the views of those who had graduated in law and pursued other careers, respondents tended to be those who had successfully entered the legal profession. A couple of respondents including one who is pursuing a career as an accountant was extremely critical of the lack of skills they had learnt on the law degree and wished they had been given a broader range of skills as in other degrees of which they were aware.

Last Modified: 30 June 2010