Herbert Smith is a leading international law firm with its main office in London. It counts many FTSE 100 companies amongst its wide base of clients, offering them a full range of commercial legal services. The firm is best known for its strength in litigation, with this practice area being regarded as the finest in the City. Over recent years, Herbert Smith has also become a major player in corporate work (indeed, 44% of the firm's revenue in 2008 came from corporate deals, with 35% coming from litigation). Other practice areas include but are not limited to finance, real estate, tax, intellectual property, energy, infrastructure, employment and EU Competition law.
The Herbert Smith graduate scheme
Herbert Smith offer graduates a two year training contract, split into four seats of six months each. A seat in litigation (or somewhere providing similarly contentious work) is compulsory, as SRA training regulations dictate, and trainees are free to choose from any practice area for their three other seats. The opportunity also exists to spend up to six months abroad during the training contract at one of Herbert Smith's international offices (or one of its associated firms' - Gleiss Lutz and Stibbe), from Moscow to Dubai or from Brussells to Tokyo.
The two year training contract allows graduates to gain in depth working knowledge of a range of legal areas that the company deals with, such as corporate and dispute resolution, finance and real estate, private wealth and employment. Graduates will sit four seats of 6 months and can choose the areas they wish to focus on.
What you need:
While no degree specific information is given, applicants must have strong commercial awareness, as well as high levels of motivation and organisation, and excellent interpersonal skills.
