Macintosh + Law School

Here is the official list of states supporting the Mac version of ExamSoft’s test software: Alaska, Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut,  Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Ohio, Oregon,  Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Vermont, Utah, Washington and Wyoming.

Looks like most of the State Bar Examiners will allow the use of ExamSoft’s SofTest Mac.

Dear Administrator,

We’re very excited with the response we’ve received from Mac users at your school and we’d like to request your assistance in announcing to your graduating students that the State Bar exam will be allowing the use of SofTest Mac as well! No longer will Mac-owning students be required to use Boot Camp and install Windows just to take their Bar exam!

We have already received a number of calls and emails from students who are concerned about whether they can use their Macs for the bar exam, so we are asking for your help in spreading the word to your Mac users.  Like you, we want them to have the most current and accurate information.  We know many of your graduating students have grown accustomed to using our Mac solution and it would be a relief to them to know they can continue using SofTest Mac in July.

As always, we thank you for all that you do and we are always here for anything that you may need. We hope that we can begin to develop a closer partnership with you and your graduating classes to help prepare them for the most important exam of their future careers.

In 1996, Wired interviewed Steve Jobs. I gave that interview another look last night, and was startled (not for the first time) at how much he got right, and how much of the interview telegraphed things to come from Apple. “It’s wonderful to have a beginner’s mind” is on my other blog, Skin of a Living Thought.

The folks at ExamSoft tell me that since the September 1st release of a Mac-native version of SofTest, the software has been used to complete and upload approximately 65,000 exam files (as of December 31st).

ExamSoft is soliciting feedback and questions from students and IT administrators, so feel free contact them at mac@examsoft.com.

If you’re thinking a legal career may not be the thing for you, a career in business development might be worth investigating. It requires analytical thinking, excellent communications skills, and an eye for detail. You already possess these traits, and law school is honing them further.

First, what is business development? Ask any ten businesscritters and you’ll get ten different answers. Here’s my take: the person wearing the biz dev hat is concerned with making a business prosper.

This requires strategic analysis of a company and its competitors. Who are your competitors? What are they doing right, and what are they doing wrong? How can you learn from them and apply that knowledge to your company?

It also means you have to get into the weeds. Perhaps the CEO is saying one thing, the marketing folks are saying something else, and the people responsible for product development are charging off in their own direction. You get to be the unifier.

Usually business development handles partnerships with other companies. Hordes of biz dev people must be involved in arranging the music and movie distribution deals for iTunes. Partnerships frequently entail a lot of up-front homework, several “get to know you” discussions, and negotiations that can last for weeks or months. Initial drafting of terms are often handled by business development, and only passed off to the legal department (or hired counsel) for review.

If business development looks interesting, get thee to a company that has internships in their business development department. If they don’t have any internships, or if they don’t have a business development department (perhaps one of the VPs doubles as director of biz dev, or the head of sales also handles biz dev), create one. Find a company you really admire, tell them you want to help, and make something happen.

This may sound like a load of overly-optimistic nonsense, but I can tell you from personal experience that if you want to advance your career – any career – your relationships with people are more important than your skills, your degree, where you went to school, or anything else. If you can show off your talents, ask a lot of questions, and immerse yourself in your work, people will notice.

They’ll want you to work with them. Perhaps they won’t be able to hire you now, but they’ll refer you to their contacts. Your payoff might be immediate, and it might come in months or years, but there will be a payoff from putting yourself out there and having a good attitude.

If you think business development might be right for you, take all the business law classes you can find. Pay extra attention to contracts, and if you can, take a negotiation or leadership class. Create a version of your resume tailored for business development work, and start using Facebook and LinkedIn (if you’re not on LinkedIn, sign up now) to spread the word that you’re looking for a biz dev internship.