Virtual Legal Work Placement Candidate Review

Every day we were set interesting and well-thought-out tasks in each team we sat in (Corporate, Real Estate, Employment and Litigation). The tasks were challenging but doable, with clear instructions. We had a feedback session on the tasks at the end of each day which was great. There were also excellent talks from Adam Collingham, the Learning and Development Officer.

Although hypothetical, the tasks mentioned above were based on actual Irwin Mitchell client issues (e.g. Covid-19), providing a good insight. It would have been good to have some exposure to actual client work, but I understand there would have been confidentiality risks with that given the remote working.

There was a broad range of talks that gave a strong impression of the culture virtually, including wellbeing and diversity & inclusion. In general everyone I met was so enthusiastic and open to answering questions - this said a lot about the firm's culture.

I had already decided on a career in commercial law, but exposure to different teams such as corporate showed me the particular appeal of transactional work.

The firm paid national living wage, which was very reasonable particularly given the remote working scenario.

As mentioned above, there were plenty of different sessions with different teams that we got exposure to so many areas of the business. There was limited time outside of that for further meetings with other employees, but I managed to arrange 3 separate calls with different lawyers which were really useful.

There were limited opportunities for networking outside of the organised talks, but I appreciate it was more difficult to facilitate this virtually. There was one social evening - a quiz. I feel one more similar social event would have been good. We had a networking session at the end of the week which just involved the placement students - I think this would have worked better if it was earlier on in the week so we could have got to know each other informally earlier on.

Yes, there was a London office introduction/trainee lunches that provided information on what people do outside of work.

Yes.