Mayer Brown

Seats

Briefly tell us about the seats at your firm - flexibility, structure, compulsory ones, choice, international or client secondments, etc.
2011 Reviews

  • Trainees typically do four seats including one mandatory secondment. There are a variety of departments that you can sit in such as corporate, finance, insurance, tax and real estate. Trainees do have some choice as to which seat they sit in, but it is often difficult to sit in the more popular departments as they are often oversubscribed. Trainees can also do a seat abroad, but must have sat in finance for the finance international secondments and preferably corporate for the corporate international secondment – but again, these secondments are extremely popular.

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  • We do four seats of six months each. There are several core departments and niche seats a trainee can apply to sit in: corporate, finance, commercial dispute resolution, real estate, insurance, construction, competition, IP, and tax. Plus, we have to complete one secondment as part of the training contract and you can choose between international or client secondments. Choice depends on which seat you want. The core seats are the easiest to get into as they use the most trainees. There is competition for some of the niche seats and international secondments and although most trainees will probably get their first choice at some point throughout their training contract, they may not be able to complete their first choice at the desired time.

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  • Mayer Brown has a four-seat system: one seat must be contentious (commercial dispute resolution, construction, insurance or employment); one seat must be transactional (finance, corporate or real estate); one seat must be a client or international secondment; and then each trainee has a free choice for their other seat. Trainees at Mayer Brown can sit in any department, depending on the amount of places available in each department and the demand for the seat which changes with each seat rotation. HR makes sure to take into account whether trainees received their first or second choice in the previous seat allocations when allocating seats – this usually means nearly all trainees end up with their first or second choice every time. International secondments are currently: New York (finance), São Paulo (finance) or Hong Kong (finance and corporate).

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  • Trainees at Mayer Brown do four separate six-month seats. There is a really broad range of departments in the London office, and we are given a significant amount of flexibility about where you can sit depending on your interests. Before each seat move we are asked to submit a preference form, providing reasons for our choices. There are a number of opportunities to go abroad for six months of your training contract, as we have a number of offices across the globe. It is most common for trainees to go to Hong Kong, New York and São Paulo; however there are also opportunities to go to our Brussels office which specialises mainly in competition law. In addition, trainees can spend six months at one of our clients within the UK. During your training contract you need to spend six months in a department that does contentious work, such as commercial dispute resolution or insurance and reinsurance litigation. In addition, you must do at least one transactional seat which can be either finance, corporate or real estate.

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  • Trainees do four seats of six months each. One seat must be either a client or international secondment. The transactional departments are corporate, finance and real estate. Other departments you can sit in include commercial dispute resolution (litigation), employment, tax, competition, financial services, insurance, IP, pensions and construction. As well as the SRA requirements of doing both a contentious (transactional)/and non-contentious seat, we also have to do a secondment. So there is a lot of choice, within those paradigms. Our international seats are New York, São Paulo and Hong Kong and competition is fierce, but it is possible to go abroad.

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  • We do four seats, composed of one transactional seat, one contentious seat, one secondment (client or international) and an option. I have always got things I wanted, but I don't think that is the case universally. You can do seats in São Paulo, Hong Kong and in New York.

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