Sahil Shoor, winner of the OBA’s 2024 Heather McArthur Memorial Award, has established himself as a rising star and recognized expert in construction and infrastructure law with a considered, consistent and courageous approach to cultivating relationships, knowledge and reputation. His advice to young lawyers? Never shy away from a challenge!

Lawyers across practice areas can suffer from a particularly insidious form of burnout, often without even realizing it. In his 30 years of advocating for injury victims, Frank Van Dyke has learned how to identify the slow creep of specialty burnout and to deploy the strategies that will prevent it from taking hold.

While he’s often the David taking on a Goliath in highly charged legal battles around everything from workers’ rights and encampment evictions to racial profiling and free speech, Wade Poziomka has become a giant in the field of human rights law by doing exactly what he always imagined a lawyer was meant to do: fight for the underdog.

With Call to the Bar ceremonies taking place across the province this month, and a new cohort of legal change-makers carving out career paths, what better time to pull back the curtain to expose the possibilities – the intrigue and enrichment – found in some of law’s most dynamic legal specialties and settings?

Figuring out a career path to pursue long term – a preferred practice area and a setting – is a common struggle for law students. For those looking to find the right fit, articling with a municipality offers not only hands-on experience in several areas of law but exposure to both barrister and solicitor work.

"Get comfortable with losing" – and other lessons learned from legendary litigators at a uniquely revealing, riveting and reassuring evening of tales from the courtroom and mentorship through storytelling.

Solo practitioners tend to be motivated self-starters; however, given the demands of working at personal capacity, they are often acutely aware of their limitations. By way of encouragement, Rajen Akalu offers sole practitioners a reminder of why they should be respected by the legal profession and selected by clients in the market for legal services.

No firm is the same, but there are common keys to establishing a successful enterprise uniquely yours while building a solid reputation and stepping up client service. Sparing would-be sole and small-firm practitioners potential missteps or missed opportunities, OBA members from a variety of practice areas share what they wish they'd known before setting out on their own.

Legal leaders on the rise reveal how the OBA Career Accelerator Program, an innovative initiative designed to advance the participation of Black, Indigenous and racialized early- and mid-career lawyers in emerging areas of law, has provided them with the specialized training and unparalleled support to forge new paths and ascend to roles of impact on the cutting edge of the profession.

Woven into the fabric of the profession, mentorship connects lawyers to those who came before and those who follow, empowering them to be vulnerable and victorious, to learn and develop, and to pursue a path singularly rewarding but never solitary.