Can You Pivot From Big Law To An Academic Career? Austen Parrish, Dean University Of California, Irvine School of Law [E95]

About this episode

Austen Parrish discusses the transition from practicing law to an academic career and the skills that lawyers bring to teaching.

Have you ever thought about a career in academics? You've learned a lot from practicing law in the "real world," but do these skills translate into the classroom? And without an academic pedigree, can a practicing lawyer even break into the ivory tower? Dean Parrish believes that lawyers (especially in-house counsel) can be great teachers. Parrish says that legal skills are academic skills--writing, public speaking and the ability to distill complex topics make lawyers the best teachers. In this episode, Parrish shares how he pivoted from a career in Big Law into academics, eventually landing leadership positions in top law schools including serving as dean of three different law schools.  He says that teaching can be a natural progression for practicing lawyers. He believes this so strongly that he invited Stacy and other in-house lawyers to develop a certificate program for aspiring general counsel at UCI School of Law.  Learn more about the program called, "From Lawyer to Leader, the Road to the General Counsel Seat," in this episode.

People in this episode

Host: Stacy Bratcher

Guest: Austen Parrish

Topics covered

• academic career
• Big Law
• teaching
• law skills
• in-house counsel
• certificate program

Keywords

• academic career
• Big Law
• law teaching
• in-house counsel
• law skills
• certificate program
• general counsel

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: University Of California, Irvine School of Law

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