Secondment to Innovation
At Stephenson Harwood, our trainees and solicitor apprentices have the opportunity to complete seats in our Innovation team. In this seat, juniors are exposed to work from across the whole firm, and are tasked with designing and implementing innovative technical solutions to modern legal problems.
We asked our trainee Roberta Berardi some questions about her time in the Innovation team.
What attracted you to a career in law?
I did a law conversion fairly late in my career, after almost 8 years in academic research. I used to study (and teach) ancient Greek and Latin rhetorical and oratorical texts – mostly public speeches, including political but also judicial ones. I then came to the realisation that this academic knowledge may be worth transferring into a more applicable sector and that a career change in the direction of new legal studies would be the best swerve for a researcher. I now actually wish I had done it a couple of years earlier!
What made Stephenson Harwood stand out to you?
I have known from the very beginning of my transition from academia to legal practice that I wanted to be a litigator, and among the many attractive features that I found in Stephenson Harwood, the variety of its litigation practice areas really stood out. I felt that at Stephenson Harwood I would get the chance to truly explore the potential of a career as a litigator in a way I couldn’t find anywhere else.
Tell us a bit about your trainee experience so far (where you are in the process, seats you have completed, initial impressions, how you have developed)?
I have been true to my goals and started my training contract with a first seat in construction litigation, a unique type of litigation team, with its own special alternative dispute resolution – the adjudication – which I have had the chance to assist with on several occasions. I have now completed my second seat, in Innovation, and just joined the contentious side of the Group Actions and Competition team. I’m already loving their high-profile cases and very busy days.
What made you opt for a seat in the Innovation team?
Initially, I was not sure how I would handle the completely different kind of work I was expecting to find in the team – different from the typical legal work, but also from my past academic work. The reality is that being a trainee in Innovation allows you to shape your future career in novel and surprising ways. Team members are extremely attentive to trainees’ and apprentices’ needs and make it clear from the outset that they want to shape your experience around your goals and aspirations. During my first week in the team the most frequently asked question was “What do you want to get out of this experience?”
What does a typical day look like in the Innovation team?
It may sound like a cliché but there is no typical day in the Innovation team. The team has several sub-teams, and trainees get to rotate around some of those, depending on their goals. You may be working on pilots testing new legal technologies, you could be working on document automation, on legal project management, eDisclosures, process improvement, legal operations, and more. As a trainee, you could choose to spend shorter periods in several or all the Innovation sub-teams, or focus on two or three teams that you believe will be beneficial to your future career.
What were your highlights?
One important highlight is how the months spent in the Legal Project Management (LPM) team helped me understand what team I wanted to join next. I gained valuable exposure to the work of various teams in the firm, and found that I particularly enjoyed working with the Group Action and Competition team. Getting exposure to both contentious and non-contentious work throughout my sub-rotations also confirmed my passion for contentious work.
Another highlight is how incredibly fortunate I was to be surrounded by so many truly brilliant – and at the same time extremely kind – people in the team.
Were there any surprises, or challenges you had to overcome?
One may imagine that, as someone with a passion for litigation, I may have found working on AI projects challenging – considering the amount of restrictions that litigation work has on the use of AI, especially in relation to research tasks. The truth is, however, that this is a challenge all litigators will need to face at some point: I am certain that AI won’t replace lawyers as catchy newspaper headlines might suggest, but I also believe that lawyers who can use it responsibly, efficiently and wisely, may end up replacing those who cannot.
What were the most valuable things you learnt and how do you think they will help you in your next seat and longer-term career?
I spent the largest part of my Innovation seat in the LPM team. This time has not only helped me realise what team I wanted to join next, but it also showed me the vital role of project management in the legal world, especially when dealing with complex and sophisticated cases. The skills learned in this team will undoubtedly be valuable not only in my next seats, but throughout my entire future career, wherever my profession might take me in the long term.
