Skills
Law Professor Skills & Tools
The technical skills, people skills and tools employers look for in law professors, and how to build and show them.
What skills do law professors need?
Law Professors need technical skills such as legal expertise, socratic teaching, and legal writing, plus people skills like public speaking and critical thinking. They also use tools such as Westlaw and Lexis and Learning management systems.
Technical (hard) skills
- Legal expertise
- Socratic teaching
- Legal writing
- Legal research
- Clinical supervision
- Scholarship
People (soft) skills
- Public speaking
- Critical thinking
- Mentoring
- Persuasion
Tools, equipment and technology
- Westlaw and Lexis
- Learning management systems
- Case files
- Presentation tools
- Court filing systems
- Writing software
Skills in action: common tasks
These step-by-step guides show how law professors put their skills to work:
- How to teach with the socratic method
- How to supervise a legal clinic case
- How to write a law review article
How to show these skills on a resume
- Lead your skills section with the technical skills from the job posting, for example, “Legal expertise” and “Socratic teaching.”
- Prove soft skills with results: instead of listing “public speaking,” describe a situation where you used it.
- List credentials such as J.D. near the top, with the issuing organization and date.
- Use the employer’s vocabulary. Our law professor glossary covers the terms hiring managers expect.
How to build these skills
Formal training, supervised practice and certification are the most direct routes. Our Law Professor training introduces each of these skills with plain-language lessons, procedures and a final knowledge check: a strong foundation before hands-on training or your first day.