Once wrapping up a decade-long career in professional rugby union, Michael Wells found himself starting from scratch in an entirely new field – and doing so much later than most. Here, he reflects on the unique challenges of embarking on a legal career at a later stage of life.
Speaking on a recent episode of The Protégé Podcast, Michael Wells, an associate at BlackBay Lawyers, reflected on the most significant challenges he faced transitioning into law after his rugby career and how he navigated the realities of entering the legal profession later in life.
In the same episode, he opened up about his decision to end his career as a professional rugby union player and pursue a future as a lawyer, and shared what inspired him to pursue a law degree while competing at the peak of his union career.
While Wells had always understood his role on the rugby field, he said the biggest challenge during his career transition was figuring out where he fit within the legal profession.
“The biggest one was just identifying where you sit in terms of entry level, associate level, where do you sit in the corporate hierarchy to know what jobs you’re actually looking for and suited for,” he said.
Despite bringing a wealth of life experience and leadership skills from his time on the field, Wells found that those attributes didn’t always carry much weight in the legal job market.
“As much as you’ve got life experience, rugby and professional sport, whilst it’s got a lot of carryover personal skills and characteristics, it doesn’t necessarily have the legal skills and characteristics that translate well on a resume,” he said.
“You can apply for all these jobs, but the first screening tool is your résumé. Ten years of rugby doesn’t amount to much in terms of getting a legal job”.
Not only was his rugby background overlooked, but Wells also quickly realised that clerkship and graduate programs had strict eligibility criteria that completely excluded him, making the transition into legal practice far more challenging.
“A lot of uni students get their clerkships, and they fall into the grad year, and they get to work in that assembly line of lawyers. Because I sat out of that, I wasn’t the typical prototype. I didn’t even know if I could get into those,” he said.
“I applied for a couple [of] clerkships, and the first screening tool was, ‘Are you in your final year or have you recently finished your degree?’ Finishing my degree in the early 2020s was no. Then you couldn’t even submit an application. So, that was quite sobering to know that, you know, rugby doesn’t amount to anything in the legal sphere.”
While Wells described the experience of facing this challenge as “sobering”, he said that rather than discouraging him, it ignited the competitive spirit that had long driven his sporting career.
“You’re starting from the ground floor, and that then adds to the challenge itself, and I guess again, the competitor comes out. There’s a challenge, you can’t essentially kick stones about it. You’ve just got to embrace it, get over it and move forward,” he said.
“Having the opportunity to work in-house was really beneficial to have because I know a lot of guys stepping away from sport can go months without anything, let alone having to work on qualifications and finishing university. So I was really fortunate to have that opportunity.”
For those considering a late career shift into law, Wells advised breaking the goal down into more achievable steps.
“The biggest one about making a shift is you have to take it off the pedestal and just break it down into manageable and realistic sort of goals. If I put a legal career on a pedestal, it would have seemed unattainable for a large part of my rugby career, because you start thinking of it as an obstacle other than a challenge that’s there to overcome,” he said.
