Katy's success story: Securing a training contract at Bristows

Katy is graduate from Trinity College Dublin, and King's College London where she completed her LLM in Intellectual Property Law. She secured a role as a Risk and Compliance Paralegal at Bristows, through Bright Network.  

First, please tell us a little bit about yourself.

Before entering the legal profession, I worked part-time in shops and cafés throughout high school, university and my master’s. Those customer service roles taught me a lot about communication, adaptability and working with different people. Growing up, I wanted to be a writer, which is probably why I was drawn to a career centred around creativity and ideas.

I chose to study law because I was interested in criminology and understanding how the legal system works. It was only after taking an intellectual property module that I discovered IP and realised I could combine my interest in law with creativity.

What motivated you to apply for your role?

Bristows has a required (or in my view: guaranteed) IP litigation seat during the training contract. This was a huge draw for me.

What was your application journey like?

I mainly prepared by staying on top of IP news. I knew commercial awareness was important but always struggled with remembering things. By tailoring my focus to an area of law I liked, I felt a lot more prepared to discuss recent cases and commercial matters that could affect Bristows clientele.

I also made sure I was really familiar with the firm itself and the areas the firm worked in. I was most nervous about the in person interviews, but actually found myself enjoying them!

How did you find the Bristows application process?

The Bristows application process starts with answering several questions and the typical work experience/education sections. I was then invited to complete a video interview, and a timed written exercise which is reviewed by the Grad Rec Team and partners involved in recruitment. Then there is a first round interview with a mix of senior associates and partners. The final stage is a second interview with partners from the firm.

The whole process felt like an assessment centre spread over several months and I found I really enjoyed that. Everyone was very nice and both interviews felt like a relaxed chat with partners at the firm rather then an intense interview.

What have you learned going through the process?

Bristows is very upfront about the training contract appliction process. All the steps are on the trainee website area so there were no surprises! It felt long at that time... but a lot of that was just due to impatience while waiting to hear back!

What are your tips for people looking to follow in your footsteps? 

What I found really made a difference in my applications this year is being confident in why you are applying (as silly as it sounds). Studying IP law I discovered it's an area of law I genuinely love, and I believe it came through far more clearly when applying. Before that, I was applying for commercial law firms in London just to work in commercial law, and always struggled to build a comprehensive answer to the important question of 'why this firm' and 'why commercial law'.

A good resource for this is the open access online internships but also just learning about any area of law you can, whether that be through books, classes, internships or volunteer opportunities. The more evidence you have to back what you are saying, the stronger your application is.

Tell us about the future. What's next?

I will be working as a paralegal until the fall of 2027 when I will start the SQE with my trainee cohort. After that I'm really excited to return to the firm as a trainee in 2028 for two years!