I read for you this MSN career article on a Disney recruiter’s top interview tip, which is to be concise. Is it true for legal interviews? Yes, very much so.

Lawyers are used to advocating for others, not so much for themselves. While lawyers are good at evaluating complicated matters and advocating for clear solutions, they usually aren’t used to applying those same skills for themselves. You need to know what the interviewer wants AND explain concisely that you can do it.

If you can’t quickly get to the point summarizing yourself, interviewers will hold that against you. Can you explain anything well? Will you alienate the business team (who often are afraid of talking to Legal as it is)?

Also, the Disney recruiter says “keep[ing] your answers short and sweet” shows respect for the interviewer. “It shows you know that you’re not the only part of their day and that you want to help give them the most relevant information to make their job easier as an interviewer.” Yes.

Additionally, the Disney recruiter says giving “teasers of other things you can talk about” (and not explaining everything to death) will help the conversation flow. I tell candidates to give the interviewer a sense of their breadth and depth of experience with a topic sentence and maybe a one sentence example. If interviewers are interested, they will definitely ask more questions. If they aren’t, then you haven’t wasted precious minutes on a matter they don’t care about.

I believe a good answer should be 60-90 seconds long, which limits you to a handful of sentences, and each word counts. That’s why you need to prepare before the interview how to answer “tell me about yourself” or “give me an example of X experience.” A sample answer to the “tell me about yourself” question for a job covering XYZ could be: “I’m an XYZ lawyer at [name of company] in [type of industry]. I counsel on X, have launched Y, and resolved Z. [Give an interesting example of X or Y or Z.] I’ve been doing XYZ [for # years] [say the # if it aligns with job description/level]. Prior to [company], I trained at [law firm] with [names of top clients] on XYZ [or relate your firm experience to XYZ]. I love [some nuance of XYZ], which your opening focuses on, so I am very interested.” That’s it! State your breadth, give an example of depth, and let them continue the conversation.