Chevenning Scholarship Networking Essay for Master's in Law

This is my response to the second question in the personal essays for an application to the Chevenning scholarship. I've removed some of the personal details from the essay and replaced them with brackets.

Here's my answer to the first question, if you'd like to see the whole thing:

https://essayforum.com/scholarship/fortunate-enough-direct-leadership-experience-78241/

2. Networking Questions: Chevening is looking for individuals with strong networking skills, who will engage with the Chevening community and influence and lead others in their chosen profession. Explain how you meet this requirement, using clear examples of your networking skills, and outline how you hope to use these skills in the future.

to mobilise the network of personal and professional contacts

As a result of my nearly seven years of experience in the legal profession, I have accumulated a plethora of business contacts from across a range of industries, including many leaders of commerce outside [country].

My work at [name of firm], widely considered to be the best law firm in [country], put me in contact with several luminaries in the field, many of whom I was privileged to work alongside. Since the firm facilitates a wide variety of clients, I was also exposed to an array of legal fields and to individuals involved in various business interests, increasing my network of contacts to include areas such as telecommunications, the energy sector, aviation and banking.

The telecommunications industry, in particular, is one I am exceptionally familiar with due to the five years I spent at the [government body], putting me in contact with government officials, representatives from the Ministry of Communication and other respected public figures in [country]. In the pursuit of my aforementioned reforms to the Telecommunication Act, I was also required to interface with other departments at the agency. My position on the Tender Approval Committee positioned me as the focal point between the various external contractors seeking a government contract and the agency's approval committee, all of which serve as examples of my ability to communicate effectively both within the organisation and beyond it.

My brief stint at Bank [name] expanded my network to include those involved in the finance sector, and I will soon be moving to [name of company], tasked with establishing the firm's legal department. I aim to mobilise the network of personal and professional contacts I've fostered over the years to aid me in this mission and, as we expand the department in the future, to also mine my legal contacts for other lawyers of a high calibre. I then plan to repeat this exercise at a larger scale, in helping set up my own law firm in the future.

Dear friend, I am also a chevening applicant, so we are both learning here. I think the command of this question is how do you use your networks to develop your career and what are the benefits to the chevening community. And in my opinion have not been answered in your essay. Perhaps to help you focus on answering these networking skills questions is to answer: 1. What is your job?, 2. Have you ever encountered a major problem while in your assignment?, 3. In solving the problem, did you ask for help from your professional network?, if yes explain the process. Next, also explain whether your professional network is beneficial to chevening community? if so, explain why.

Muhammad, the advice given to you previously is incorrect and does not apply to anything in your essay. You perfectly framed your response to the networking essay that shows how directly networked you are in terms of government agency relevance to your line of work. I speak o course of the Telecommunications Act and your participation in the realization of the law. You can safely remove your opening statement in this instance as it doesn't really reflect a usable network in the sense that your presentation of the Telecommunications Act does. Your bank stint is not developed enough to prove that this job was able to help you increase the scope of your network so you should either develop that some more or delete it. don't speak of future job opportunities. Chevening is only interested in your past experience and your here and now experience. Expand the 2 scenarios I indicated here so that the essay will become stronger in terms of networking asset presentation. Don't forget to insinuate how these networks can perform a vital function in terms of helping Chevening and its scholars expand its network. That is not represented in the closing paragraph at the moment. Since that is a requirement, you cannot skip that presentation.

@Holt

Well, the part about the future job is relevant because the last part of the questions asks us to explain how we plan on using this network of contacts in the future and I think explaining how I will use it to set up the legal department of an company - and then my own firm - speaks to that, no?