Studying law has many benefits. For starters, it’s an honorable profession (everybody respects the title “wakili”). However, the versatility of the legal profession is arguably the profession’s most underrated benefit.

Every facet of life has a legal aspect. Moreover, the law is constantly evolving to accommodate advancements in technology, industry, communication, entertainment, health, human rights, you name it. Every advancement creates a legal conundrum for a legal mind to help stakeholders navigate. Therefore, the diversity of Kenya’s legal arena is worth exploring. 

To this end, LawDown Africa’s law career fair adopted the theme “Exploring Legal Horizons.” The event featured three discussion panels, including a panel on the diversity of the legal sector featuring the brilliant legal minds below.

• Pat Mbugua of StanChart and former Partner at Walker Kontos 
• Mrs. Rispah Simiyu, Commissioner for Domestic Taxes at KRA
• Ayieta Lumbasyo, Founder, Fertility Law Clinic,
• Timothy Owase, CEO of Kenya Film Commission. Mr Owase went to law school  in 2019 despite having a master’s in Communication (A young lawyer with 20+ years of experience in storytelling, marketing, and communication)
• Dr. Maurice Ajwang’, Dean Faculty of Law Daystar University (Dr. Ajwang’ also facilitated a masterclass in sports law)
• Mary Njeri, Team Lead, Ending Violence against Women and Girls, UN Women Kenya

True to the event’s theme, the panel above showcases the diversity of Kenya’s legal sector. However, the most pleasant part of this panel was exploring the diversity of their journeys to acquiring the titles and positions they hold today.

Beyond exploring the technicalities of practicing law in different industries, each panelist highlighted the lessons they learned in getting to where they are today. Below is a summary of the lessons that helped them navigate the diversity of the legal sector.

Lesson 1: Cultivate Self-awareness & Understand Your Environment

Although the legal arena’s multifaceted nature is a good thing, it can lead to the paradox of choice ( a concept in psychology highlighting that too much isn’t necessarily good). One effect of the paradox of choice is that the chooser gets dissatisfied with their final decision. However, Timothy Owase’s experience shows that self-awareness and a clear understanding of one’s sphere of operation can help one avoid choice overload.

Mr Owase’s journey into the legal arena is an interesting one because his LLB is one of his many degrees across three different professions: marketing, development communication, and the law. Unlike most legal professionals in Kenya who start with an LLB, Mr Owase started with a career in marketing.

He credits one of his mentors, Koos Bekker, founder of M-net (now Multichoice), with his insights into the value of self-awareness and conscious exposure at the onset of his career.

According to Mr Owase, Koos Bekker used to sit with all his employees and give them a perspective on how he makes money; essentially, he understood how each department worked. “It was here that I first appreciated the importance of being conscious of your work environment.” 

 A second incident that cemented Mr. Owase’s appreciation for understanding your work environment occurred in 2010.  “In 2010, I found myself engaged in the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) after attending their workshops to see how we can protect creators in terms of their products and see to it that issues of copyright and IP are carefully safeguarded. I met a lady who decided to engage me in a journey of empowerment in the creative industry across different African countries.”

From that engagement, Mr. Owase found his footing on how he could add value to what storytellers needed to know in their journey from innovation to creativity, commercialization, branding, contract management, and technology and digital transformation. He highlights that self-awareness in all the elements above is crucial in ensuring that you either enforce or comply with the realities of the law that governs the land.

“Law is a universal subject that is clear to every profession globally. As a marketing fellow aware of the environment in which I operate, I made a conscious decision to become a lawyer to support the creative industry in terms of policy changes and the commercialization of the creative industry.” 

Therefore, for him, choosing an area of practice you’d like to explore is the result of conscious exposure.   “Personally, when I went to the University of Nairobi to pursue a law degree, I went with the full understanding that I was going to become an entertainment lawyer because I understood the environment I worked in.

So, what do you do when you aren’t exposed to an environment that could raise that level of awareness in you? Where conscious exposure may not apply, self-awareness will kick in.

According to Dr. Maurice Ajwang, one open secret you must know to kickstart your law career on the right foot is that not all law schools are the same. “While all law schools offer an LLB, the CLE recommends that each law school has some areas of specialization to prevent having a replica of the same institutions.”

Dr. Ajwang’ has served as Dean of the faculty of law at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa (CUEA) and currently holds a similar position at Daystar University. He has also designed law curricula for various law schools. 

Dr. Ajwang highlights that nuanced specialization when undertaking an LLB comes from two angles: First, while all law schools offer standard CLE-recommended courses during the first two years of the LLB program, law students can choose courses that are more aligned with their interests in the third and fourth years of study. 

Second, he highlights that each law school has a niche area that allows its students to graduate with a strong bias in the area. Therefore, besides checking the fee structure, consider the law school’s niche area before enrolling for an LLM.

Bottom Line

Awareness is an invaluable life skill regardless of where you are in your legal journey.