Thoughts on employment

Yesterday was a good day for me. Not only did I find out that I've won the academic prize for being the top insolvency law student last year, I also received a job offer from one of Australia's largest law firms.

And I know what some of you are thinking: 'Damn, I really liked the guy...why'd he have to be a lawyer?'

To be honest when I first started studying law four years ago I had similar thoughts running through my mind, and I've only really set myself on a career in law for around a year now. My thinking is this: my skill set is best suited to law, and rather than pushing myself in community legal centres or social aid organisations (which I've done my share of over the past few years) I'd be better off working in a place where I can do good work, earn a good wage and put my money into organisations I feel do good things. You can laugh that off as naivety or self-deception, but that's what I've honestly concluded after several years of exploring my career options.

Plus, for a law student with my background (Arts/Law double degree, major in Japanese), there are only so many options. A lot of other law students with a commerce background have jobs in the commercial world, and many arts/law students move into human rights or government. I unfortunately find myself unsuited to any of those fields. And at the end of the day, it's about being to enjoy your work, put food on the table, take care of your family and have a little something left over for yourself and society at large.

While I know it's going to be a real slog for the first couple of years, I can honestly say I'm excited about going to work for this firm. People I know who have worked there have told me a lot of good things about it, and it suits up very well with my aspirations career wise.

All that aside, it's interesting to see how important employment has become to society and to me personally. My parents were ecstatic, and my friends were all eager to shake my hand and offer their congratulations (many of them could no doubt empathise with the grind and stress associated with looking for work). And personally, receiving the offer felt like having a huge burden taken off my shoulders. The fight for work is so competitive these days that your life really does bend around it, and with my employment settled I can enjoy my final year of uni with the knowledge that my immediate future is taken care of.

There is little doubt that our society (or at least Australian society) has become more work-focused over the past decade or so. I work part time as a home tutor, and the pressure I see on kids these days is even more intense than when I was their age. The stereotypes I was fed as a kid that the immigrant kids were hard workers and the local white kids were all slackers has well and truly been put to rest.

Part of me worries about the social implications of this development, as I've studied Japanese society quite deeply and am well aware of the effect that a work-focused culture can have on individuals, families and society at large. Nevertheless you won't find me dropping out of the race: whatever the truth of the matter, you need to be around and relevant in order to find out and make a difference. Whether I do turn into the sort of soulless, cynical lawyer that I feared I would become is yet to be seen, and I can only hope that the lessons that I've learned over the past few years stay with me in the years to come. However one thing is certain: for now, my path is set out for me and there's no looking back.