Position: Trainee Solicitor
Education: BA, Political Science, Yale University; BA (Aff), Law, University of Cambridge; LPC, College of Law, Moorgate
Joined Clifford Chance: February 2011

After graduating from Yale, I worked for just over two years as a management consultant in Boston and London before coming to Cambridge to study law. After finishing the LPC, I deferred my training contract for six months to study Japanese in Japan and to travel.

I chose Clifford Chance because of the firm’s commitment to quality: quality of work, quality of clients and colleagues, and quality of resources and opportunities. Even more fundamentally, Clifford Chance inspires me. It's hard not to be inspired when you're surrounded by the very best of everything!

I just finished my first seat in Corporate and I am now in Finance. During my time in Corporate, I had the opportunity to work across a variety of transactions, with a number of people in the department, and in a variety of roles. Day-to-day tasks varied from research to drafting to process and document management.

Within the group, I was in a sub-team working on private mergers and acquisitions (M&A) transactions. The high point of my experience was working extensively on a deal currently in the papers: I can't say any more than that! It’s fantastic stuff and it was great working on it.

Training is taken very seriously here, and the programme has exceeded my expectations, both in terms of breadth and quality. It equips you superbly for whatever you go on to do once you have qualified, and it’s very well thought-through and highly prioritised. If you have training on a particular day, any work you are doing of course is important, but what’s refreshing is that you're not expected to sacrifice your training.

As you might expect, the learning curve at Clifford Chance can be steep, but this is one of the many things I love about the firm. I am constantly challenged – though secure in the knowledge that there are extensive resources to support me – and as a result I’ve honed not just my legal skills but business, communication and other skills. Also, the atmosphere is collegial: questions are welcomed, not merely tolerated.


I’m keeping an open mind about what I’d like to do eventually. It’s early days, but I’ve loved Corporate. Having said that, it was seat number one and I’m excited about my new seat in Finance and what’s to come. I’ll definitely do a Litigation seat and I’m looking forward to that; then I’m not sure – maybe a more specialist area such as tax or even a client secondment.

My ambition is simply to strive for the very best in everything I do, and I cannot think of a better place than Clifford Chance to help me achieve that.