Job for Lawyer + CFA + iOS/Ruby developer?

[Le Dérisoire]

I’m a lawyer working in a financial company. Although I like my job, I’m sometimes wondering what kind of job someone could get with my weird skill set.

Lawyer: My main work skill is being a lawyer that works in the financial industry.

CFA: I’m also currently doing the CFA program. I passed level 1 and I’m studying for level 2. I intend to complete the entire program ASAP. CFA is a professional title in the financial industry.

Developer: As a hobby, I also learned Ruby (programming language) and iOS development with Swift (I can make iphone and ipad apps). Obviously, I’m still a beginner and my skills are no match compared to those of a professional developer. I’m open to learn a new language if I can find some use to it.

Anyone ever heard of a job that would combine those skills, even loosely? My research shows me that there are a lot of good paying jobs for lawyers, CFA and developers, but none that combine all those skills. I’ve never met a lawyer + CFA or a lawyer + developer, so I can’t ask anyone.

You would think that law and finance would go together, but the truth is that you can be an excellent lawyer working in the financial industry without knowing much about finance. In fact, I’ve never met a lawyer in the financial industry that knows more than the very basics!

Any idea?

[AZDude]

My wife works with a lawyer who quit her job to become a teacher. Now she cries every day, hates her life, and had to be talked out of quitting mid-year. Be careful leaving a good paying job you like without a really good reason.

Other than that, I have no idea. My first thought was a private law practice, where you could use your skills to cut costs and develop your own mobile app, but not sure how realistic that is.

[pbkmaine]

Ideas:
1) Regulatory compliance
2) Equities analyst with an industry specialization in technology
3) Bond analyst

[Proud Foot]

Go work for a hedge fund or private equity fund.  At my former job we had an annual manager panel for our investment committee board meeting.  Some of the investment managers for our alternative investments were lawyers, don't think any were CFA's though.  But a CFA is beneficial for that type of a position.

[minority_finance_mo]

I think you may be running up against the "Jack of all trades, master of none" connundrum. As I was reading this, I made the assumption that you were someone who has an intermediate understanding in all of these subjects, but no deep knowledge in any of them. You may be discounting your more advanced financial and law skills with your hobby of dev work. That's just my two cents.

I would lead with law and finance (which are a power couple) and pick up dev skills that might help you with efficience (maybe Python?) If you really enjoy coding. Or just work on dev projects in your free time and see how that goes!

[mskyle]

I work for a company that provides a software product to banks/portfolio managers. I am a Rails developer. One of the other Rails developers is a CFA III, and we also have a quant-ish team that works in C++ and R, and three or four of them have various levels of CFA. I certainly don't think the law degree would hurt (we are getting into providing more "financial service-ish" kinds of things with regulatory implications). You could be a great fit at my company!

That said, I doubt we would pay you more than you get as a lawyer working in a financial company, and I don't know that your development experience would count for all that much... I am also a non-traditionally-educated developer, and I can say with some authority that it definitely takes a while developing full time (months or years) to get to a point where you're really useful, and hobby projects are very different from actual products.

[jeromedawg]

Unless your love for coding (in addition to a strong desire to work in the field) overrides your desire to continue working in finance and law, I would keep it a hobby and continue to grow it on the side to gain the experience. Perhaps you can continue developing your coding skill set on the side and start adding apps to the App store as a side-gig in that case.

If you're entirely serious about getting into coding and trying to fast-track, perhaps take some online courses. Keep leveling up on your coding skills for sure. I know finance + IT/dev is a huge market with lots of opportunities. I would envision the same thing for law + IT/dev as well. Perhaps freelancing or volunteering on coding projects in your spare time would be a good way to gain even more experience. In the meantime, I would definitely pick-up more languages to learn if it's something that truly interests you. Get yourself involved with Github and Sourceforge. The more stuff you do on the "side" for coding, the better it is for you IMHO.

Sounds like there are a ton of opportunities ahead of you, and you're smart enough to figure something out that will let you have at it while reaping the rewards.  Perhaps, ultimately, you could start a business or consultancy that combines all three aspects into one somehow. Or at least, you'd be able to offer legal services, financial services, or IT/Dev services independently of each other if nothing else.

[Le Dérisoire]

Thanks everyone. These are all great advices.

I just want to add that I'm doing the CFA and learning iOS/Ruby only for fun, as a hobby. It’s not a career move per say. I was wondering only recently if these skills could apply in a job that actually exists.

Don’t worry; I have no intent of quitting my real job as a lawyer. And learning other stuff on my spare time does not make me a worse lawyer! ;)

I have an idea of an app that would actually be useful in my job (regulatory stuff for financial products). I’ll make it and see what I can do with it.