Commercial Awareness is a skill that takes time and effort to develop and demonstrate, but can be gained through practice.

To explain what it is exactly, it is about having a wide understanding of the development and changes occurring in businesses and different industries. As a lawyer, having commercial awareness allows you to better understand your clients business and their competitors and the industry in which they operate which leads you to be better placed to advise a client.

The first step to developing that skill requires you to understand how and why business behave the way they do and how a law firm acts as a business too.

Step 1 on improving Commercial Awareness

There is an array of resources and tools which can be used to develop or improve your commercial awareness. The lists below mentions books, podcasts, social media pages, newspapers and subscriptions which are hugely beneficial and have been endorsed by aspiring lawyers, trainees and law firms.

Books:

1. Commercial Law Handbook by Jack Schogger
2. All You Need To Know About The City by Christopher Stoakes
3. The Money Machine: How the City Works by Phillip Coggan

Podcasts:

1. Commercial Awareness with Watsons Daily
2. Today Programme on Radio 4
3. Economist Radio
4. Wake up to money
5. Thinking Commercially Podcasts
6. BBC Law in Action
7. FT News Briefing
8. LawCareers.Net Podcast
9. The Commercial Awareness Podcast

Newspapers:

1. The Economists
2. BBC Business News
3. The Financial Times
4. City AM

Social Media pages:

1. The Legal Line up (@thelegallineup)
2. LawCareers.Net (@lawcareernet)
3. Legally Jones (@legally.jones)
4. The Legal Update (@thelegalupdate)
5. Commercial Law Made Easy (@lawmadeeasy)
6. Legal Chronicles (@legal.chronicles)
7. Little Law (@littlelawnews)

Subscriptions:

1. LawCareers.Net, sign up to their LCN Weekly email which provides bite-sized and informative updates of the weeks key stories.
2. Law.Com, sign up to their ALM Digital Reader which features daily articles covering global insight and trends in the UK, Continental Europe, US, Asia, Africa and Middle East.

Other:

1. Law Firms also offer plenty of workshops throughout the year, to improve commercial awareness skills.
2. Sign up to Legal Cheek ‘Virtual Commercial Awareness Workshops’ with city firms like Norton Rose Fulbright, RPC and many more.
3. Signing unto and completing the Free Legal Virtual Internships on FORAGE can aid in improving not only your commercial awareness but of the type of work carried out in particular practice areas of a commercial firm.
4. Experience an industry first hand i.e. continually gain experience of a practice area you enjoy or would potentially like to work within. This can be part time or freelance, in person or virtual.
5. Joining your universities’ Law Society and following their socials, for commercial updates.
6. Follow law firms’ social media pages and listen to their podcasts, to stay updated on the latest news which they are commenting on or writing about.

Step 2 on improving Commercial Awareness

Now that you are equipped with the resources and tools to improve your commercial awareness, there comes the questions of how to demonstrate it exactly or what to do with the resources. There is no good in just reading the news stories, commercial updates or listening to the podcast. You must take into consideration many questions when reading or listening to the latest business news, and form your own opinion on the current trends, issues or changes occurring.

Top tips and questions to consider when reading or listening to news stories:

1. The legal implications of a industry change or development.
2. The impacts on a firm’s clients or particular practice area.

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1. How does this business operate?
2. How does the business make money?
3. What department work together to make this work?
4. How are these different departments or organization interconnected?
5. Are the markets rising or falling?
6. Is this trend only happening in the UK?
7. How is AI, Blockchain and/or technology this impacting development?
8. How would this impact me as a lawyer of my work?