Lawyer Resume Example (2026)
By FindAJobAI team Updated How we built this page
Lawyer job ads list a practice area and a bar admission, but what moves an application forward is evidence of judgment: cases argued, contracts negotiated, deals closed. A lawyer resume should read like a track record a partner or general counsel can check, not a list of courses from law school.
The example below practices commercial litigation with six years split between a mid-size firm and in-house. Notice how each bullet names the matter type, the stakes and the outcome, instead of counting billable hours.
Lawyer resume template
This example as a one-page template: one column, standard headings and plain text, the format applicant tracking systems read most reliably.
After you sign up, Create my CV builds your own resume in this same one-column layout, from your real experience.
Mid-level lawyer resume example
A complete one-page example for a fictional lawyer: every bullet pairs an action with what changed because of it.
Example resume · fictional person
Odalys Fenwick
Associate Attorney, Commercial Litigation
Denver, CO · [email protected] · (720) 555-0134 · LinkedIn
Summary
Litigation associate with 6 years handling commercial disputes, contract claims and employment matters in Colorado state and federal court. Second-chaired a 3-week jury trial that ended in a defense verdict, and negotiated settlements saving clients an average of 40% off initial demands. Admitted to the Colorado Bar; known for clear client memos and thorough deposition prep.
Experience
Associate Attorney, Marchetti & Cole LLP
Denver, CO · Aug 2021 – Present
- Manage a docket of 18 active commercial litigation matters, from breach-of-contract claims to shareholder disputes, for clients ranging from startups to a regional manufacturer.
- Second-chaired a 3-week jury trial over a $2.4M supply contract dispute, handling cross-examination of 2 expert witnesses; the jury returned a defense verdict.
- Drafted and argued a motion for summary judgment that dismissed 4 of 6 claims in a wrongful termination suit, narrowing the case before trial.
- Negotiated settlements in 11 matters over 2 years, closing at an average of 40% below the opposing party's initial demand.
- Took and defended 25 depositions across breach-of-contract and employment cases, building outlines that shortened average deposition time by 90 minutes.
Law Clerk, District Court, City and County of Denver
Denver, CO · Aug 2020 – Jul 2021
- Drafted 30 bench memos and order drafts on motions to dismiss, summary judgment and discovery disputes for a civil division judge.
- Researched and summarized case law on 15 contract and tort issues, cited directly in 6 published rulings.
- Observed and took notes on 12 bench and jury trials, building a reference outline on evidentiary objections still used by incoming clerks.
Skills
- Practice areas: Commercial litigation, contract disputes, employment claims, shareholder disputes
- Litigation skills: Motion practice, deposition prep, discovery management, trial exhibits, expert witness coordination
- Research and writing: Westlaw, LexisNexis, legal memoranda, appellate briefing
- Negotiation: Settlement strategy, mediation, contract redlines
Certifications
- Admitted to practice, Colorado, 2021
- Admitted to practice, U.S. District Court, District of Colorado, 2022
Education
- J.D., University of Colorado Law School, 2020
- B.A. Political Science, Colorado State University, 2017
Fictional example by the FindAJobAI team: the person, employers and numbers are invented. Keep the structure; use your own work and numbers you can explain in an interview.
Entry-level lawyer resume example
A recent J.D. graduate with a judicial externship and law review note instead of firm experience. Education and bar status sit right under the summary, and the externship bullets are written around the memos and research she actually produced.
Entry-level example resume · fictional person
Quentara Mbeki
Attorney (Licensed, Colorado)
Boulder, CO · [email protected] · (303) 555-0122 · LinkedIn
Summary
Recently licensed attorney with a judicial externship in civil litigation and a law review note on arbitration clauses. Drafted bench memos on 10 pretrial motions and researched case law cited in 2 published opinions. Comfortable with Westlaw, LexisNexis and legal writing under deadline; seeking a first associate role in commercial litigation.
Education
- J.D., University of Colorado Law School, 2026
- B.A. English, University of Denver, 2022
Experience
Judicial Extern, District Court, Boulder County
Boulder, CO · Jan 2026 – May 2026
- Drafted 10 bench memos on motions to dismiss and summary judgment in contract and tort cases for a civil division judge.
- Researched a contested statute-of-limitations question and wrote the analysis the judge adopted in a published ruling.
- Observed 8 hearings and 2 jury trials, producing a 15-page outline on objection handling shared with the next extern class.
Research Assistant, University of Colorado Law School
Boulder, CO · Aug 2024 – Dec 2025
- Researched enforceability of arbitration clauses in consumer contracts for a law review note cited by 3 subsequent student articles.
- Cite-checked and proofread 4 faculty articles totaling 180 pages before journal submission.
Skills
- Research and writing: Westlaw, LexisNexis, legal memoranda, appellate brief drafting
- Practice areas: Civil litigation, contract law, landlord-tenant
- Court exposure: Motion hearings, bench trials, jury trial observation
Certifications
- Admitted to practice, Colorado, 2026
Activities
- Moot Court Board: argued 3 rounds of appellate advocacy competition, advancing to the regional semifinal.
- Legal clinic volunteer: assisted 12 low-income clients with landlord-tenant intake under attorney supervision.
Senior lawyer resume example
Senior counsel fourteen years in, now leading a litigation group rather than just handling her own docket. The bullets shift to managing other attorneys, setting firmwide process and matters measured in the tens of millions, and the summary leads with the team she runs.
Senior example resume · fictional person
Thaddeus Okonkwo-Reyes
Senior Litigation Counsel
Denver, CO · [email protected] · (303) 555-0193 · LinkedIn
Summary
Senior litigation counsel with 14 years handling complex commercial disputes, now leading a 5-attorney practice group at a regional firm. Tried 9 cases to verdict, manages a $40M book of active matters, and built the discovery playbook the firm uses firmwide. Admitted in Colorado and Wyoming; regularly first-chairs jury trials.
Experience
Senior Litigation Counsel / Practice Group Leader, Harrow Vance LLP
Denver, CO · Feb 2019 – Present
- Lead a 5-attorney commercial litigation group, overseeing a combined docket of 60 active matters worth roughly $40M in disputed value.
- First-chaired 6 jury trials since joining, including a 5-week antitrust matter that ended in a $3.1M verdict for the client.
- Built and rolled out a firmwide discovery playbook covering e-discovery vendor selection and document review protocols, cutting average discovery cost per matter by 18%.
- Mentor 4 associates through their first depositions and motion arguments, with 3 promoted to senior associate within 2 years.
- Serve on the firm's pricing committee, setting alternative fee arrangements for 10 key clients that reduced billing disputes.
Litigation Counsel, Marchetti & Cole LLP
Denver, CO · Sep 2014 – Jan 2019
- Tried 3 cases to verdict, including a breach-of-contract matter that recovered $1.8M for a manufacturing client.
- Managed a docket of 20 commercial and employment matters, personally handling all depositions and expert coordination.
- Argued 15 dispositive motions, winning full or partial dismissal in 11.
Associate Attorney, Fenwick Garrity LLP
Cheyenne, WY · Oct 2011 – Aug 2014
- Handled discovery and motion practice for a 7-attorney commercial litigation team across 25 active files.
- Drafted the appellate brief that reversed a trial court's summary judgment ruling in a construction defect case.
Skills
- Practice areas: Commercial litigation, antitrust, construction disputes, employment
- Leadership: Practice group management, associate mentoring, alternative fee arrangements
- Trial: First-chair jury trials, expert witness strategy, e-discovery management
Certifications
- Admitted to practice, Colorado, 2011
- Admitted to practice, Wyoming, 2014
Education
- J.D., University of Denver Sturm College of Law, 2011
- B.A. Economics, Colorado College, 2008
How to write a lawyer resume
Five steps, in the order a recruiter reads the page. The format around them stays plain for every job: one column, standard headings, newest role first.
Header: name, target title and links
Lead with your bar admissions and years of practice right under your name, since that's the first filter a hiring attorney or recruiter applies. Use the title that matches your actual role (Associate, Counsel, Partner), not a firm-specific internal title.
Summary: what you do and your best proof
State your practice area, years of experience and one outcome: a verdict, a settlement range or a deal closed. Skip phrases like "zealous advocate"; firms care about what you've resolved, not your self-description.
Experience: newest first, a result in every bullet
Open each bullet with the matter type and your role in it, then the result: a motion granted, a settlement reached, a trial verdict. Listing practice areas with no outcomes reads like a law school resume, not a practicing one.
Skills: grouped, in the ad's words
Group skills into practice areas, litigation or transactional skills, and research tools. Name specific software (Relativity, Westlaw) and courts or jurisdictions where you're admitted, since both get searched directly.
Education and certifications
List your J.D., school and year, plus any law review, moot court or clerkship that shows writing and advocacy. Without firm experience, an externship or clinic section carries real weight if it's written with the same specificity as paid work.
Skills to put on a lawyer resume
Hard skills are the tools and methods of the job; soft skills are how you work with people. Each comes with one way to prove it, because a skill named only in a list counts for little. Add the ones you really have.
Hard skills
- Motion practice
- Name a motion you drafted or argued and what the court decided, not just that you "filed motions."
- Deposition prep and defense
- Give the number of depositions taken or defended and one detail about how prep changed the outcome.
- Legal research (Westlaw/LexisNexis)
- Tie the tool to a specific legal question you resolved, ideally one cited in a filing or ruling.
- Contract drafting and review
- State the contract type and volume, and flag one risk your review caught before signing.
- Discovery management
- Mention document volume or e-discovery tools and how you kept the review on schedule or on budget.
- Settlement negotiation
- Give the demand, the result and roughly how much it saved or recovered for the client.
- Trial experience
- State your role (first chair, second chair, witness prep) and the verdict or ruling.
- Appellate briefing
- Name the issue on appeal and whether the brief led to a reversal, affirmance or published opinion.
- Client counseling
- Describe a client decision your advice shaped, such as settling early or avoiding a filing.
- Regulatory or compliance knowledge
- Name the regulation or agency and a matter where that knowledge mattered.
- Case management software
- Name the system (Relativity, Clio) and what it let you track or automate.
- Bar admissions
- List jurisdictions and courts by name; this is often a hard requirement, not a nice-to-have.
Soft skills
- Client communication
- Describe a hard update you delivered clearly, with how the client responded.
- Judgment under pressure
- Give a deadline or courtroom moment where you had to decide quickly and what you chose.
- Persuasive writing
- Point to a brief or memo that changed a court's or opposing counsel's position.
- Attention to detail
- Mention an error you caught in a contract or filing before it caused a problem.
- Negotiation
- Describe how you moved an opposing party off an opening position, with the before and after.
- Mentoring
- Count the junior attorneys or clerks you trained and one skill they picked up under you.
- Time and docket management
- State your caseload size and how you kept deadlines across it.
Lawyer resume bullet examples: weak vs strong
The same work, written two ways. The strong version names the tool, the scope and a result; the numbers are examples, yours must be real.
Weak: Handled litigation matters.
Strong: Managed 14 breach-of-contract cases from intake through resolution, closing 9 by settlement and taking 2 to a jury verdict in the client's favor.
Names the volume, the case type and how each matter actually ended.
Weak: Drafted legal documents.
Strong: Drafted the motion to compel that forced production of 40,000 withheld emails, which became the basis for a favorable settlement 6 weeks later.
One filing tied to a concrete result instead of a generic document count.
Weak: Negotiated settlements.
Strong: Negotiated a wage-and-hour class claim down from a $900K demand to a $310K settlement, saving the client's insurer the cost of a 2-week trial.
Shows the negotiation range and why it mattered to the client.
Weak: Conducted legal research.
Strong: Researched a novel preemption issue under state franchise law and wrote the brief section that persuaded the court to deny the opposing motion to dismiss.
Research tied to a specific legal question and its outcome.
Weak: Worked with clients.
Strong: Advised 3 small-business clients through OSHA investigations, walking each through document requests and interviews, with 2 closed without citation.
Client work measured by the number advised and the result they got.
Weak: Reviewed contracts.
Strong: Reviewed and redlined 60 vendor contracts a year, flagging indemnification gaps that avoided an estimated $150K in uncapped liability on one master services agreement.
Contract review turned into a volume and a dollar risk avoided.
Weak: Participated in trial.
Strong: Prepared and examined 2 fact witnesses at a 4-day bench trial over a commercial lease dispute, contributing to a ruling that awarded the client full back rent.
Specifies the trial role and the result the testimony helped secure.
15 more lawyer resume bullet examples
Grouped by area of the job, so you can find the ones closest to your work. Keep the shape (action, scope, result) and replace the invented numbers with your own.
Litigation and motion practice
- Drafted and won a motion to exclude the opposing party's damages expert, which narrowed the trial to liability only and shortened it by 3 days.
- Handled discovery for a 12-defendant commercial dispute, managing document review of 85,000 pages within a 6-month schedule.
- Argued 9 discovery disputes before a magistrate judge, prevailing on 7 and limiting the scope of 2 overbroad document requests.
- Drafted the removal papers that moved a $1.1M contract case from state to federal court, where it later settled on favorable terms.
Trial and negotiation
- First-chaired a 2-week jury trial over a construction defect claim, cross-examining the opposing expert and securing a verdict within 85% of the client's asking damages.
- Negotiated a non-compete dispute to a confidential settlement in 6 weeks, avoiding a preliminary injunction hearing the client wanted to skip.
- Prepared 18 witnesses for deposition across 4 matters, cutting average deposition length by 45 minutes through tighter prep outlines.
- Mediated a partnership dissolution dispute to a settlement that preserved an ongoing business relationship between the parties.
Contracts and transactional work
- Negotiated and closed 8 commercial lease agreements for a retail client, each under a 2-week turnaround from draft to signature.
- Reviewed 40 vendor and licensing agreements a year, standardizing indemnification language that cut outside counsel review time by 30%.
- Advised on the contract terms of a $5M acquisition, flagging a change-of-control clause that would have triggered early termination fees.
Client and team management
- Managed a rolling caseload of 20 active matters without missing a court deadline over 2 years.
- Trained 5 new associates on deposition prep and motion drafting standards during their first 6 months.
- Built a client-facing status report template adopted by 3 other attorneys, cutting client check-in calls by half.
- Reduced average time-to-respond on client emails from 2 days to same-day across a 30-client book.
Lawyer resume summary examples
Two or three lines on what you do and your strongest proof. Start from the one closest to your level and use your own facts.
Recent J.D. graduate and licensed attorney with a judicial externship in civil litigation and law review experience in contract law. Drafted bench memos on 10 pretrial motions and researched case law cited in 2 published opinions. Admitted to the state bar; comfortable with Westlaw and legal writing under deadline.
Litigation associate with 6 years handling commercial disputes, contract claims and employment matters in state and federal court. Second-chaired a 3-week jury trial that ended in a defense verdict, and negotiated settlements saving clients an average of 40% off initial demands.
Senior litigation counsel with 14 years handling complex commercial disputes, now leading a 5-attorney practice group. Tried 9 cases to verdict, manages a $40M book of active matters, and built the discovery playbook the firm uses firmwide.
Common lawyer resume mistakes
Each one is easy to make and quick to fix before you apply.
Burying bar admissions in the education section
Put jurisdictions and courts near the top of the resume or in the header; hiring attorneys check this first and may stop reading if they can't find it.
Describing matters with no outcome
"Handled contract disputes" tells a reader nothing. State whether the matter settled, was dismissed or went to verdict, and in whose favor.
Counting hours billed instead of results produced
Billable hours describe effort, not skill. Replace hour counts with the motions won, settlements reached or trials tried.
Listing every course or seminar attended
CLE credits and law school coursework rarely differentiate candidates. Keep education brief and let experience carry the resume.
Confidentiality used as an excuse for vague bullets
You can describe the matter type, dollar range and outcome without naming the client; specificity about facts isn't the same as breaching confidentiality.
ATS tips for a lawyer resume
Applicant tracking systems turn your file into text that recruiters search, mostly for the skills and titles in the ad. They rarely reject a resume on their own; one that parses badly or misses the ad's words just doesn't come up.
- Name your bar admissions and jurisdictions up top; a resume without them gets screened out before anyone reads further.
- Describe matters by type, stakes and outcome (settled, dismissed, verdict), not by how many hours you billed.
- If you tried a case or argued a motion, say what role you played (first chair, second chair, argued) and what the court decided.
- List the research tools you use by name (Westlaw, LexisNexis, Relativity) if the job ad or firm expects them.
- Quantify negotiation and contract work with dollar figures or volume where you can state them accurately.
For the format itself, run the free ATS resume checklist.
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Lawyer resume FAQ
What should a lawyer put on a resume with limited courtroom experience?
Lead with research, writing and matter management: motions drafted, depositions prepped, contracts reviewed. Clerkships and externships count as real legal experience, and should be described with the same specificity as firm work.
Should a lawyer resume include every case worked on?
No. Pick the matters that show range and results, such as a trial, a notable settlement or a motion that changed a case's direction, rather than listing every file touched.
How long should a lawyer resume be?
One page for under 5 years of practice, two pages beyond that. Partners and senior counsel can run slightly longer if the added experience is substantive, not padding.
Do I need to list every bar admission and court I'm admitted to?
List state bar admissions and any federal court admissions relevant to your practice area; drop admissions you no longer maintain or that don't apply to the jobs you're targeting.
How we built this page
The FindAJobAI team wrote the three example resumes, the bullets, the skills and the advice for lawyer roles. The people, employers and numbers in the examples are invented; the structure, the tools and the way each bullet is built are the parts to copy.
Once we track enough live lawyer job ads, this page also shows the skills they ask for most, counted the same way as our in-demand skills report.
Last reviewed on November 1, 2026.