Hi, there. I am currently an undergraduate law student reading my LL.B degree from the University of London (External Programme) in Malaysia. I am expected to graduate in August this year.

I intend to pursue my postgraduate studies upon graduating. My area of interest is in Corporate and/or Commercial.

I intend to work upon obtaining my master degree and only plan to undertake my practice qualification exam/training few years after that.

I would appreciate if someone could give me some genuine opinions on the following:

1) Would be a waste of an opportunity for me to opt of a MSc degree instead of a LLM?
(I found out that there are indeed some MSc degrees in the area of Corporate which its modules offered are quite good. However, i do understand that the substance of studies between the 2 are different.) Hence,

2) this lead to my second query. Whether it is preferable or not to have an experience in a field not related to law (i.e in MSc Corporate Finance) for someone who actually studied law and only intend to practice law in the near future?

3) Which combination of qualification appears more impressive to a future employer : LLM with a practice qualification or MSc with a practice qualification?
(This is in terms of a future career not in the legal firm per se, but in a general multinational corporation.)

Thank you in advance for anyone who are willing to give me some advice.

Carmen

Tough questions, and I'm afraid not entirely in my field. You are clearly focussing on a postgraduate qualification for the purpose of improving your recruitment opportunities (which isn't everyone's priority for postgrad study), I'm curious to know if you've considered qualifying for practice first, and using that to get to know the legal environment in Malaysia first, and if not, what are your reasons for ruling it out?

You'll likely be exposed to lots of different areas of law while you complete your training, so you'll be able to make an informed decisions as to which area of law you can focus on when you decide, in a year or two, to go back to continue your education? Perhaps too, you'd get a feel for what the best decision, competitively, in the market place would be?

Perhaps, though, Malaysia is competitive to the point that a postgraduate qualification is required to get in to decent firms? (as is increasingly the case in the UK and other parts of the world).

Sorry I can't answer your questions directly, but perhaps my questions will prompt others to come in on the discussion too?

Don't be sorry, i really appreciate the feedback.

Many thanks!