Life as an apprentice & afterwards

jdscrubs

Hi. Just wondering have others, who are either in apprenticeships or have finished, had a crap apprenticeship & how did this affect them when they went to a new place?.

Nearly finished my apprenticeship. Have a few months left. While my boss is grand, the boss has not given me enough experience in anything. The boss thinks that they have but they have not. The work I get is what any lackey could do. Basically I think the boss only wants an apprentice in to do all the crap jobs. Thus I feel that when I finish up next year, I feel like I will not have the required experience expected of me.

For those of you who have had such an apprenticeship but managed to find jobs after they left, how did the lack of experience help or hinder you?. Was the new place understanding and willing to train you in areas that the boss should have done?.

For those of you who are in a similar situation in an apprenticeship now, what have you done to improve things?.

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

_JOE_

Can I ask what kind of work you are doing as an apprentice? Have you mentioned your concerns to him?

jdscrubs

_JOE_ wrote: »

Can I ask what kind of work you are doing as an apprentice? Have you mentioned your concerns to him?

Hey my boss mainly does conveyancing and Probate. Not much Litigation as my boss does not like. Re conveyancing, what the boss normally gives me to do is scanning, filling, writing letters to the council, going to revenue, reg of deeds, etc. Have only once done an investigation on title and have only attended at 3 closings with the boss with me. Dont really deal with the solicitors for the other side, be they the vendor or purchasers solicitors

Re probate, have not done a will yet nor do I sit in when the boss has the client in giving instructions. Again all I seem to do here is filling, scanning, going to the probate office, revenue, etc.

Havent mentioned anything to the boss but it should be very obvious to the boss, that the boss is not giving me the required training that the boss should be.

So what have others done in similar situations?. How have others gotten in when their apprenticeship is over and they are in a new place?.

Jev/N

jdscrubs wrote: »

Hey my boss mainly does conveyancing and Probate. Not much Litigation as my boss does not like. Re conveyancing, what the boss normally gives me to do is scanning, filling, writing letters to the council, going to revenue, reg of deeds, etc. Have only once done an investigation on title and have only attended at 3 closings with the boss with me. Dont really deal with the solicitors for the other side, be they the vendor or purchasers solicitors

Re probate, have not done a will yet nor do I sit in when the boss has the client in giving instructions. Again all I seem to do here is filling, scanning, going to the probate office, revenue, etc.

Havent mentioned anything to the boss but it should be very obvious to the boss, that the boss is not giving me the required training that the boss should be.

So what have others done in similar situations?. How have others gotten in when their apprenticeship is over and they are in a new place?.

Wow, that sounds like more of an internship!

maidhc

Solicitors are different, and situations are different.

I found myself running my own conveyancing files (including two housing estates) and managing a reasonable amount of litigation before the PPC2. However by the the first year qualified I was doing a lot of registrations, closing files and dealing with chestnuts... and appeared far less in court despite actually having a right of audience.

The reason was largely down to a big slowdown in work (the established solicitors took all the interesting stuff!) and a big increase in demands for title deeds from the banks. Eitherway, i left, but was lucky to have the option to do so.

Amazotheamazing

My advice would be to lie on your cv and have faith in yourself that you'll be able to do anything asked of you when the time comes and if you can't have the sense to either ask qualified mates or someone who works with you to help you.

Jev/N

Amazotheamazing wrote: »

My advice would be to lie on your cv

Eh yeah, great advice there!

Tell us what happens if, and when, you're found out....

dats_right

Jev/N wrote: »

Eh yeah, great advice there!

Tell us what happens if, and when, you're found out....

I agree. In fairness, from what the Op has told us of his/her experience it would be quite difficult to pull it off for long anyway. The result = new employer being annoyed at employing somebody who hasn't got the experience they claimed and either sacking them or having to train them up to the standard needed. Also if the OP is any way conscientious they will not want to 'step up' to qualified level depending entirely on a wing and a prayer and Law Soc manuals!

OP, I feel sorry for you, when I think of the stuff I have been doing as a trainee I feel very grateful at the quality of training and level of responsibility I have received. Not that that is of much assistance to you! Anyway, have you considered holding off applying to be admitted to the Roll and maybe moving offices and doing a sort of unofficial secondment? You could come clean to another firm/individual and explain your predicament, with a bit of good fortune, such a firm/indiviual may agree to train you up as an unoffical apprentice for maybe 3-9 months, which with your experience already gained should be more than ufficient to bring you to the level or beyond of most well-trained apprentices. Perhaps the Trainee Section mighty be able to assist in this regard (or probably not knowing how they operate!). I know it is far from ideal to have to do such a thing, particularly after slogging your guts out for the past 2 years, but do you really want your first experience of a NQ job to be when you feel out of your depth (through no fault of your own) and leaving yourself open to making mistakes that may impact on your PII cover and thus employability later on?

Best of luck.

maidhc

Jev/N wrote: »

Eh yeah, great advice there!

Tell us what happens if, and when, you're found out....

Well once you have a job you have a better chance of keeping it!

Amazotheamazing

Jev/N wrote: »

Eh yeah, great advice there!

Tell us what happens if, and when, you're found out....

there is something close to 1,000 solicitors on the dole.

If you have a better option (one that's grounded in reality) then I'd like to hear it.

I can't imagine any successful interview being based around "I am an expert photocopist and scanner, I do mundane tasks to a high level." Let's face it, the OP isn't alone in getting a bad training, all he can do is get his foot in the door somewhere else and do what he can to catch up elsewhere.

I had a different sort of training, I was thrown in at the deep end, meeting clients on my own in the first week in the office, running files from scratch and I wouldn't recommend that approach either.

What I would do were I the OP in a new job is tell a mate he's completely at sea and needs help. For example, when I started off in family law I didn't have a clue about anything, not an iota. I had to ring the Family Law clerk on a daily basis to find out what the hell I should do in a situation. Luckily, the Clerk where I'm based is a nice guy who doesn't want to see clients getting bad advice. At one point I was working off precedents so old he actually dictated a more modern precedent down the phone to me. Other clerks emailed me new precedents. They don't want solicitors continually sending bad work down to them for them to send back up and I suspect they are well used to badly trained solicitors. Ok, it was massively embarrassing for me to have to do that, but after a few weeks I had found my feet, had an uptodate collection of precedents and was able to work away under my own steam.

Same is true in personal injury litigation, get on to a barrister who works in the area and be honest with them. You send them work, they help you out, it works for both parties.

OP, another thing I would suggest is asking you boss if you can spend one or two mornings a week just observing the District Court. It'll be all new to you at first, then slightly tedious, then you'll start to see the same issues coming before the Court again and again and you'll learn from it.

Maybe lying on a cv isn't the best way to start out, I'll defer to people who have a better plan.