Profile

As soon as I’d accepted a training contract with Lovells and enrolled on my law conversion course, I knew I’d made the right decision. A number of people told me they had heard good things, and then there were the little things, such as being invited to attend the Bristol law school drinks reception as a future joiner, being taken to supper afterwards, and all future joiners being taken to London for various summer parties.

The following year I was part of the first year of the "City LPC" in Oxford, where I had a fantastic time. From a "trainee-bonding" perspective, it enabled me to meet many of the people with whom I would be starting my training contract the following year. It was also great to meet a large number of my peers at the other City firms — some of whom remain among my closest friends.

I started my training contract in 2003, straight in at the deep-end doing a seat in Real Estate. I found myself running around 20 files simultaneously, which was tough at first but I soon found my feet. My subsequent seats were in Intellectual Property (crystallising my view that this was where I wanted to qualify), Corporate, and I also spent six months working in-house on a client secondment.

I qualified in Intellectual Property as I had hoped and soon found myself involved in a challenging multi-billion pound acquisition, which saw me travelling overseas to attend various meetings: a steep learning curve but hugely exciting to be involved in something so high profile, and where the IP aspects were so important. 

Three years on, I have thoroughly enjoyed my time in IP at Lovells. I’ve developed close relationships with a number of clients, in particular one large internet retailer for whom I am the primary client contact, coordinating their legal work worldwide and even assisting on the business side of things. 

When I look back at how I came into law, and how I came to Lovells, I feel very fortunate. It’s clear to me now that, when I applied in 2000, I knew very little about how Lovells differed from the other "big firms". In retrospect I should have done a bit more research, but as it turns out I’m exactly where I would have chosen to be had I done that initial research. Nonetheless, I would recommend speaking to people you know who are already in law, or who are perhaps somewhere in the law school process, as they should be able to offer useful insights. Ultimately, I look back and feel very grateful that I didn’t go into medicine or banking (areas I had considered before joining Lovells), and for the opportunities and experiences that I’ve been given here.