Practice Insights and Government-Sponsored Study Abroad Exam Experience - Attorney Ch'en Yen-chün

On May 27, 2015, the Judicial Reform Foundation hosted a special lecture for trainee attorneys at the Legal Training Institute, inviting attorneys Chou Yü-hsiu and Ch'en Yen-chün to share their legal careers thus far and offer different career imaginations to trainees about to embark on the legal path. This article is a summary of the highlights, with thanks to Attorney Ch'iu Hung-wen for assisting with the transcription.

Thank you to the Judicial Reform Foundation for the invitation today to share some insights on legal practice. To be honest, given my seniority, compared to the senior attorneys with fifteen or twenty years of experience who usually lecture at the Legal Training Institute, I am probably not very qualified to stand here. However, I suppose my days as a "trainee" are not that far behind me (though they have flashed by into many years...), and I have not forgotten too much of the curiosity, anxiety, and tension experienced during that period, so I would like to share some experiences with everyone.

Frankly speaking, my academic performance in university was not among the top tier. I never received the Presidential Award, and from my freshman to junior year, I spent my time participating in clubs or playing sports. I chose demanding courses that I was genuinely eager to take rather than those with easy grading. In my senior year, the graduate institute track I prepared for was not the Civil and Commercial Law group, which is more advantageous for the bar exam, but rather the Public Law group. Therefore, when preparing for the bar examination, I did not expect myself to be an elite student who would pass it quickly.

However, the bar preparation period was truly agonizing, so before taking the exam, I made a vow: if I successfully passed within two years, I would give back to my junior schoolmates in practical ways, such as leading study sessions, discussing scholarly articles together, and sharing study methods. Fortunately, I passed the bar exam right upon graduating in my senior year. Because I led several study sessions after passing, the process of sharing and discussion made me realize that communication and debate are wonderful things. I continued to lead study sessions in subsequent years, hoping to help countless examinees escape their suffering as early as possible.

While pursuing my graduate degree, some cram schools approached me to teach. Initially, I lacked confidence in whether I could teach, but I ultimately decided to give it a try for several main reasons:

If my study methods or insights were helpful to some examinees, then the impact through teaching could be much greater, reaching beyond just the junior students at my own alma mater;

To train my courage and stage presence. I actually knew I was unaccustomed to speaking in front of hundreds of people and becoming the center of attention, so perhaps I ought all the more to try to overcome my fears and shortcomings.

Because of leading study sessions and teaching, many smart, outstanding junior students and students from various schools would come to ask questions. This process forced me to organize my thoughts in a very short time and answer other people's legal questions as plainly as possible, often using examples. Having answered questions multiple times, I became increasingly familiar with applying certain legal interpretations without needing to look them up repeatedly. Moreover, updating my teaching materials required continuously tracking the latest practical rulings.

Personally, I believe such experience is immensely helpful for a litigator's impromptu performance in court. After all, before a trial, even if you feel fully prepared, you inevitably cannot anticipate what the judge might ask on the spot, or what impromptu arguments opposing counsel or the prosecutor might raise orally. Therefore, when teaching, having to answer various legal questions posed by students within a short time frame proved to be an unexpected bonus in litigator training—a true case of mutual benefit between teaching and learning.

Looking back, the process of leading study sessions and the discipline of teaching gave me tremendous help in various aspects of legal practice, including articulation, courage, logical thinking, and the accumulation of intellectual material when delivering written or oral opinions.

Discussing this phase is certainly not meant to insist that everyone must go out and teach. Rather, if you currently have a relatively leisurely period before finding a traineeship, you should, whenever possible, share the study insights and thought structures you have not yet forgotten with those who need help. My original starting point was simply to help suffering examinees, never imagining it could one day help myself. Aside from the courage, articulation, logical thinking, and knowledge accumulation training I just mentioned, this self-help also encompasses the government-sponsored exams I will mention shortly.

How to Choose a Law Firm?

At the time, I chose XX Law Firm because a friend of mine worked there and mentioned that the firm handled many public law cases, which matched my specialty. He thus referred me to apply. Back then, I had also received offers from other large firms. The final decision to choose XX Law Firm was partly because one of the managing partners was an alumnus of my high school and very approachable during the interview. I figured that if my first job allowed me to apply what I learned and derive a sense of accomplishment from my work, I might be less likely to lose passion when encountering setbacks in practice. To be frank, the recruitment offers from other large firms were also very enticing, but I believed that applying what I learned was wonderful, so I chose XX Law Firm.

Additionally, when applying to law firms, you should pay attention to the staff turnover rate. If a firm experiences extremely frequent departures, you might want to inquire about the reasons. When I joined XX Law Firm, more than five attorneys happened to leave. After asking around, I learned that some left for career planning reasons such as pursuing overseas advanced studies, mandatory military service, passing the judges' exam, or setting up a boutique partnership. Hearing these reasons made me feel much more at ease.

Traineeship Experience

The friend who referred me told me to frequently follow senior lawyers to court and observe court proceedings. After all, once you become a formal attorney, you might become busier or feel hesitant to sit in on other attorneys' hearings. Furthermore, investigative hearings specifically require being a lawyer of record to attend, so I frequently attended investigative hearings during my traineeship.

Because partners or senior attorneys would still assign work to you during your traineeship, in order to balance attending court hearings with handling assigned tasks, I often spent my days attending court, meetings, and legal visits, and stayed behind at night to handle assigned tasks or write hearing reports. This is why, during my first month of traineeship, I almost always left the office around 11:00 PM.

At the time, nobody demanded that I do this; I did it simply out of anxiety that upon becoming a formal attorney, others would find out I knew nothing and wonder what I had learned during my traineeship. Although, to this day as a formal attorney, there are still many things I do not know. Nevertheless, based on my personal experience, if you work hard enough during this traineeship period, you can learn a great deal. Conversely, your leisure, entertainment, and sleep time will all be sacrificed, so please measure your capabilities accordingly.

Precautions for Following Court Proceedings

Point 1: "Following court proceedings" is definitely not just "physically tagging along to court"!

I strongly advise everyone to read the case files in advance; the same goes for meetings. Do not ask the handling attorney for the case files a day or two before the hearing, because the handling attorney also needs time to prepare beforehand. (Supplement: This logic is the same as applying to review case files—judges also need to review files a day or two before a hearing, and court clerks might not allow file inspection. Of course, the premise of borrowing files to read is that it does not hinder the main handling attorney from drafting briefs.) It is best to borrow and read the files ten days or a week in advance. For complex government procurement cases, corruption cases, or retrial cases, it is advisable to reserve even more time due to the bulky and complex case records. Take notes while reading so that you can get up to speed faster during the hearing. As for which hearings you can attend, most law firms generally have an internal computer networking system where you can check each attorney's schedule in advance to coordinate accordingly.

Point 2: Take action when following court proceedings—take notes.

If the person you are shadowing is a partner, they will likely ask you to handle almost everything assigned post-hearing. Therefore, promptly transcribe your court notes into a digital text file after the hearing, draft a hearing report, and—after confirmation by the partner or lead attorney—send it to the client, with copies to the handling attorney and secretary. This task is best completed on the same day or the next day while your memory is fresh, as some clients want to know the court proceedings before the official transcripts are even downloadable.

Remember to attach a note when emailing the hearing report to the client, informing them that the secretary will mail the official transcript to them for their records in about a week, thereby fulfilling the mandatary's duty to report.

Point 3: Other precautions for court hearings, legal visits, and meetings:

Remember to bring your trainee attorney ID, business cards, and the notes you prepared from reading the files.
When attending an investigative hearing, you should confirm that the prosecutor consents to your accompaniment before entering the investigative room.

Precautions for Drafting Briefs or Legal Opinions

First, during traineeship, almost all legal issues are unfamiliar to a trainee attorney. Aside from searching domestic and foreign legal databases, most law firms have archived document sections. It is advisable to consult attorneys or senior administrative staff with relevant experience; they will tell you where to find resources the fastest, giving you a clearer direction for handling your issue. We Taiwanese tend to be relatively shy and ask fewer questions, perhaps fearing others might think we are not diligent. However, what we need to ask for is simply the methodology, not demanding hand-outs because we are lazy from the start.

A reminder to everyone: when drafting briefs and citing practical opinions or resolutions from district courts or the High Court, pay attention to whether those opinions or resolutions are still upheld. Do not use an opinion that has already been overturned by the Supreme Court or a superior court, or altered by other resolutions—that would be disastrous!

Second, many administrative personnel are very experienced in handling administrative affairs. They might not give you professional legal advice, but they are exceptionally strong in handling related procedures and administrative matters, such as requesting transcripts, inspecting case files, handling deposit procedures, paying (or supplementing) court fees, and billing different clients. Therefore, do not be afraid to ask questions.

Basically, my habit is that after completing a brief or legal opinion and going through internal firm procedures, I scan and convert it into a PDF image file before emailing it to the client. I also briefly explain the strategic framework of the legal opinion or brief in the email, noting that if they have any comments, they can call or write back to discuss them so that we attorneys can make adjustments accordingly. I do this because, first, it gives the client a blueprint or imagination before they read the abstruse legal documents drafted by the attorney; and second, some clients will arbitrarily modify the content of briefs in Word files, potentially turning the brief into a mess. If the client fails to use track changes, manually cross-checking their edits wastes a lot of time and delays the filing schedule.

I must specially mention here that if you encounter divergences in legal opinions with a client during future communication, making it difficult to persuade them or reach a consensus, you can first consult the partner attorney's perspective to see whether to compromise, accept the client's idea, maintain the original draft, or adopt another approach. Sometimes, once a partner steps in to discuss matters with the client, the client stops insisting on their own view and respects your opinion. Although such communication is grueling, it is necessary to prevent client complaints and the profound sense of helplessness that accompanies the exhaustion.

Furthermore, as an attorney, aside from potentially drafting legal briefs, you will also be asked to provide numerous legal opinions. The recipients of formal written legal opinions are usually private legal entities or administrative agencies. The internal operations of these entities may involve long-standing habits, established policy directions, or interpersonal entanglements. These non-legal dimensions must be consulted with partners or senior attorneys. Therefore, at times, the content of a legal opinion goes beyond strictly legal argumentation because many problems stem from considerations of personnel, policy, or finance, even though clients frame them as legal inquiries.

Additionally, if the legal question raised by a client is unclear, it is advisable to call or reply via email to confirm the question rather than burying yourself in research the moment you receive it. If you discover that an inquiry hints at an intent to engage in activities skating on the legal edge, you must report it to a senior attorney or partner, inquire about the handling direction, and communicate with the client before deciding whether and how to draft the opinion.

Finally, when drafting a legal opinion, you should tailor your tone and phrasing according to the recipient, the factual context, and the preferences of different partners. All of these details merit attention.

Which Law Firm Offers the Better Traineeship?

Which one is better? I cannot make the decision for you; at most, I can analyze the characteristics of mid-to-large firms versus smaller firms, and warn everyone to steer clear of toxic firms (students laugh...). Some junior schoolmates refuse to yield to conventional wisdom and apply to toxic firms, thinking they can just secure a spot first, only to endure psychological abuse and break down, feeling that the legal profession has no human dignity to speak of and falling into deep disappointment... Therefore, I believe choosing your first law firm is crucial. If you do not currently see a genuinely good opening, do not force yourself to submit a resume; otherwise, resigning later will be difficult, and staying will be miserable, leaving you caught in a dilemma.

Essentially, look at what kind of cases the law firm handles. You can roughly figure out a firm's practice areas through industry networking or by asking during interviews. In small and medium-sized firms, you sometimes have to learn to handle all legal and administrative matters yourself, and you easily get opportunities to attend court, conduct mediations, and meet with clients on your own. This is quite good training for lawyers who plan to set up their own practice in the future.

The advantage of medium-to-large or large firms is that you get to work with colleagues possessing diverse specialties in team efforts, backed by abundant databases. Of course, the cases handled are correspondingly complex and demanding, though during the initial traineeship or the first year or two, the firm may not allow you to handle cases entirely on your own due to your junior status.

If you do not yet have a clear idea about your future practice, developing your interests remains the most important factor. You will likely only realize this once you actually enter practice. If you truly dislike staying at your original firm, transitioning to another firm is by no means out of the question.

Regarding Government-Sponsored Study Abroad Exams and Applications

The guidelines for this year's government-sponsored exams have just been released. Applications require submitting language proficiency test scores. Aside from traditional fields such as civil and commercial law, criminal law, fundamental legal studies, and social law, there are also fields like "Energy and Environmental Law," "Law of the Sea," "International Civil Aviation Law," and "Immigration Law and Policy." Each field allocates only one spot nationwide. The examination generally starts with a written test in October every year, followed by screening the top one or two highest scorers from the written test for interviews in December, with results announced around the end of the year.

In recent years, the policy trend for Taiwan's government subsidies has been a downward adjustment of grant amounts in order to distribute more slots and encourage more people to go abroad. However, US LL.M. tuition fees increase every year. Currently, tuition for a single year of an LL.M. ranges roughly from $48,000 to $60,000 USD (taking top-20 US News law schools as an example). Factoring in living expenses, you must prepare at least 2.5 to 3 million NTD to burn through. Therefore, students wanting to go abroad must be mentally prepared, because US LL.M. tuition is terrifyingly on the rise, and government subsidies from the Ministry of Education cannot cover the entire tuition, leaving you to shoulder a very substantial portion yourself.

Precisely because studying abroad is very expensive, everyone should consider trying for the government-sponsored exam. Do not think it is impossible; when I took the exam back then, I held no particular hopes and even debated skipping it the day before, given that practicing lawyers have virtually no time to prepare. Yet, perhaps thanks to the cumulative experience of leading study sessions and lecture preparation, I fortuitously obtained this qualification; otherwise, in terms of academic brilliance in law, I was not more outstanding than many senior Ph.D. students. If you feel traditional legal fields are too competitive and difficult to crack, you can prepare for less mainstream fields. Some of my attorney friends who applied for specialized legal fields passed and are currently pursuing advanced studies abroad.

If you pass the bar and have some free time before your traineeship—or if your traineeship is not overly busy—I recommend taking English proficiency tests like IELTS, TOEIC, or TOEFL to maintain a sense of contact with English, which could come in handy later when applying for jobs or schools.

When applying to foreign schools, GPA, language test scores, and work experience are the three major focal points. If your GPA can no longer be changed, you can compensate through work experience and language test scores. As for what kind of degree you want to pursue abroad or whether you want to enroll in a special program, I believe I needed to accumulate a certain amount of work experience to truly know what I wanted to study further. Furthermore, with over five years of work experience, your CV and SOP become much richer. However, when you have accumulated a certain level of networking, social status, and work experience, giving all of that up is no easy feat, and returning does not necessarily guarantee the expected compensation, so this aspect must be considered carefully.

When selecting schools, institutions ranked within the top 14 or top 20 for law specialties by US News are all fantastic, and many schools ranked 20 to 30 also possess distinct characteristics. For instance, George Washington University excels in Intellectual Property Law and International Law, University of Washington in Intellectual Property Law, and Boston University in its Banking Track. Every school has its strengths. When choosing a school, factors such as city/location, climate, tuition, distant relatives, and advisor recommendations can all be taken into account. While ranking is important, it should not be the sole consideration in school selection. The considerations for pursuing a Ph.D. versus an LL.M. also differ; for the former, due to the lengthy duration, the amount of scholarship aid and climate (which affects mood) play significant roles.

Q&A

Trainee Question: How should one react when a client asks a question you don't know how to answer or seems to question a young attorney's professional competence?

When I first started practicing, clients indeed mistook me for a secretary on occasions (laughs). Actually, this depends on the attitude behind their question. If you realize they actually have the answer but are deliberately testing you, you can first ask what their own thoughts are so you can brainstorm together.

If you are unable to answer their question, I suggest first clarifying their question and its underlying factual background, and stating that out of prudence and to protect their rights, you will consult with senior attorneys before replying. Most clients feel much more at ease upon hearing this. Basically, no attorney can solve every legal problem, and I advise against pretending to know things and blurting out premature answers.

Trainee Question: How to balance life?

To be honest, everyone knows legal work is arduous. Initially, because I was young and female, many people might have assumed I couldn't pull it off, thought I just got lucky, or still believed men are better suited to be lawyers and legal professionals. Therefore, despite being exhausted during my early years entering the workplace, I still hoped to break down such subtle stereotypes as much as possible through hard work and the accumulation of professional knowledge. Just like how I would sign up for running events and marathons to train my endurance—once you push past the wall, you discover you can actually overcome it. In recent years, as routine matters became increasingly familiar and people recognized my competence, I have been able to better balance the proportions of leisure and work. Of course, for this, I must express my heartfelt gratitude to my mother, who handled most of the household chores and allowed me to dedicate myself wholeheartedly to my work.

Conclusion

Finally, I hope that when one day you graduate from being rookie attorneys, you will also remember not to hesitate in extending a helping hand to any novice attorneys you encounter. After all, you and I both stumbled, felt our way across the river by groping stones, and slowly walked (crawled) our way forward under the high-pressure nature of this profession. I wish everyone smooth sailing in your future legal practice!