Allen & Overy

"A&O’s pro bono portfolio was a big draw for me."

I was keen on pro bono work as a student, and wanted to join a firm that offered a range of community and pro bono opportunities.  A&O’s pro bono portfolio was a big draw for me; in particular the chance to go on secondment to Liberty (the human rights organisation, not the department store!).

I have just spent the final three months of my training contract at Liberty, and it was everything I had hoped for.  I am joining the A&O litigation department as an associate, so the opportunity to work at Liberty in such a small team on cases currently in the House of Lords and on their way to the European Court of Human Rights has been a fascinating challenge that will stand me in good stead when I return to A&O.

Similarly I’ve advised at Battersea Law Centre about once every six weeks since I started my training contract.  It’s pretty scary to start with, but you can sit in as an observer for the first time, and it’s really rewarding to feel the warm glow of having actually helped someone with a legal problem.  More selfishly, it’s also a great way of practicing your interviewing and advising skills on real problems and real clients.  This level of client contact can be rare for trainees working on billion dollar deals, so this should be invaluable training for later in my career at A&O.

It’s not all legal pro bono work: I’ve been part of an eight-strong team of trainees that cooked 200 breakfasts at the Whitechapel Homeless Mission, and there are ongoing community programmes for helping local school kids with reading and numeracy skills.  I have also researched and summarised case law for Interights (another human rights organisation) and advised homelessness charity Crisis on its marketing contracts.

I really enjoy doing pro bono work.  All my trainers have been very supportive and in the main I’ve been able to fit it around my chargeable work.  In addition to that warm glow it’s a fantastic opportunity to take on real, complex and rewarding work that is substantively very different to my day-to-day work, but develops precisely the skills required to be successful at associate level.