Hear from the 2024 winner of the ILBF’s law undergraduate essay competition, Lauren Davis, about why stepping out of your comfort zone and entering the 2025 competition is a great way to boost your legal career. Entries for the 2025 competition are now open and the deadline is 22nd April.
Watch Lauren’s film here.
Lauren’s prize was to spend a week with international law firm McDermott Will & Emery in July 2024. Read about Lauren’s experiences and how she benefitted from the internship below.
Work Experience with McDermott Will & Emery
The prize of the ILBF essay competition 2024 was a week of work experience with international law firm McDermott Will & Emery, a fantastic opportunity, for which I travelled to London in July.
The internship program began with an introduction from our internship co-ordinator Andrew West, and the London office managing partner Aymen Mahmoud, who made myself and the other interns feel very welcome. The office itself is beautiful, and occupies the second tallest skyscraper in London, so you can imagine how awe-inspiring the views are! During the internship I had the chance to gain insight into the diverse range of practice areas at McDermott, including Finance, Energy, Healthcare, White Collar Crime, and China Practice, amongst others. Helpful presentations were given by partners, associates and trainee solicitors, covering everything from Structured Finance and the Capital Market, to navigating the SQE, and life as a trainee at McDermott. The atmosphere was relaxed and friendly, and it was very easy to engage with the presenters in order to learn further. There were also opportunities to socialise with the other interns and lawyers at McDermott, which was good networking practice and a nice change from learning.
It was particularly interesting to hear about the large amount of pro-bono work and projects that are supported at McDermott. All lawyers at McDermott are given a certain number of hours per year to devote to pro-bono activity, although many go above and beyond this, and employees of the firm are encouraged to take the initiative and work with causes that they feel strongly about. It has certainly encouraged me to become involved with pro-bono work during my final year at university and has shown me how to carry this forward in my further career.
Towards the end of the workshop myself and the other interns were asked to present a legal topic of our choice to each other and our internship co-ordinator. This was a useful opportunity to both learn from each other and share our own knowledge, as well providing valuable practice for the sort of tasks that will be required during a career as a lawyer.
Work experience with McDermott Will & Emery was a hugely positive experience which gave me a much broader understanding of working within an international firm, and insight into complex legal practice areas I had never before heard of such as Impact Finance. It also provided valuable experience that will help me during the job application process, and when considering future career paths. I am very grateful to everybody at McDermott Will & Emery for such an interesting and motivating week, to the judging panel of the essay competition, and to the ILBF team for making the opportunity possible.
Lauren Davis, winner of the ILBF’s law undergraduate essay competition 2024
All the details of the 2025 ILBF law undergraduate competition are here.
