The Training Contract Interview

On arrival at our offices on the day of your interview, you will be given a written exercise to complete. This written exercise requires no legal knowledge and you will not be expected to prepare in advance. 

The exercise is based around a fictional business. The business is likely to have been in existence for some years, and is going through a strategic review process. There will be various pieces of information provided, for example, an internal memo, some statistics and a newspaper article. These may consist of 5 or 6 pages of reading. Your task will be to write your own report once you have assimilated the information and facts provided. Clear instructions will be given about what is expected and your report will be assessed for:

• written communication
• ability to persuade
• judgement and problem analysis
• innovative ideas and commercial knowledge

You will be given one hour to complete this exercise and we will provide a laptop for you to type your answer. There is a lot of information to consider and we would encourage you to manage your time carefully to allow you to complete the task and review your work in the hour set.

Watch the video below from Azadeh Nassiri, one of our partners involved in trainee recruitment, for more insights into the written exercise.

Once the written exercise has been completed, candidates will be given a short current affairs article to read for approximately 15 minutes. You will be able to take notes during this time and take both the article and your notes into the interview with you. This article will then form part of the discussion in the interview, along with questions relating to your CV, commercial awareness and your motivations for applying to us.

The interview will be with two partners, or a partner and a senior counsel.

During the article discussion, the interviewers will be testing whether you can assimilate information quickly, identify the relevant issues and articulate and defend your point of view. They will be looking to you to summarise the main points of the article, to form an opinion on the subject matter and to have a sensible debate on the issues raised. This is not designed to be a comprehension test or a test to discover your political leanings or beliefs.

Points you may want to consider when reading the article include:

• Can you summarise the key issues raised in the article?
• What are the main themes, arguments and conclusion (if any)?
• Do you agree or disagree with the arguments put and the position taken in the article and why?
• What may be the counter arguments to your position?
• Are the arguments provided in the article coherent and logical?
• Are there relevant issues which are not touched on or developed in the article?

Although discussion will centre around the subject and themes of the article, the interviewers may pursue any line of discussion whatsoever.  As part of this discussion, you should expect to be presented with questions which you have not considered before and which will require you to ‘think on your feet’. 

Watch the video below to see a mock article discussion which two partners conducted with one of our trainees. The video includes the full discussion with no editing, so it gives you a good insight into what this part of the interview involves, and how the discussion develops.

After the partner interview, one of our current trainees will give you a tour of the office.

We believe that the interview should be a two-way process. It is important for you to ensure that we are the right firm for you. The trainee will not have been prepped on what to say and they will not be reporting to us, so you should take advantage of this opportunity to question them about life as a trainee at the firm.

Our interview process ends with a short meeting with a member of the Recruitment team. You will be asked to reflect on the written exercise and your interview with the partners, and there will be some discussion about your CV and your motivation for applying to us. You will also have the opportunity to ask any questions we have not yet answered for you.

Watch the video below from Ellie, one of our advisers in the Early Careers Recruitment team, for more insights into the HR interview.

• Read your CV and cover letter carefully as the interviewers could ask you about anything you have included. For example, you could get asked about your dissertation/the modules you are taking as part of your degree course, about the political situation of a country you have visited, about the business model of an organisation you have worked at, about the most recent book you have read etc.
• Keep up to date with current affairs and think carefully about what you are reading. You may find it useful to read regularly the business pages of a broadsheet newspaper so you can develop commercial awareness.
• Read about the firm, understand what makes us different and consider why this environment appeals to you. Identify a couple of deals that the firm has been involved in which might be of interest to you. Follow these deals and think about why they are interesting to you and what questions you have about them.
• If possible, book in for a practice interview with your university careers adviser before you begin training contract interviews.
• Consider in advance your answers to commonly asked questions, such as "why law?" or "why this firm?"  Interviewers will expect you to have considered your answers to such questions but they will also try to take you 'off-piste' to see how you think on your feet.

• Be prepared to make small talk – this is an important skill and it will be useful when you are being guided to the interview room and once the interview is completed.
• Listen to the questions carefully and answer the question that has actually been asked, not the one you wish you had been asked.
• Be honest in your answers rather than saying what you think we want to hear.
• Be prepared to be asked for your opinion and to be challenged on your opinion – it is not because you are wrong, whichever view you take you will be challenged. The partners want to see how well thought out your opinions are, whether you can defend them and if you can be persuasive.
• While you should be prepared to defend your views, you should also be prepared to adapt your view as necessary if flaws are identified which no longer make it a strong argument.
• Consider the manner in which you voice and defend your opinion - you should adopt the same approach as if you were speaking to a client. Your arguments should be coherent and logical and you should present them confidently without being aggressive.
• Try not to ramble. We are looking for lawyers who can articulate information in a clear, structured and concise manner.
• Remember to ask questions at the end of the interview. Listen to the answers and consider follow-up questions.