Kitty Rosser
Solicitor
I began my training contract with Leathes Prior in September 2007, joining the firm as a more ‘mature’ trainee at the age of 27. On arriving for my first day I was, of course, delighted to discover that one of my fellow trainees was 36 and I could therefore continue to consider myself relatively young!
Like many people, not being quite sure of where my future career may lie at the tender age of 18, I had opted to read for a humanities degree on the basis that I had been assured it would provide me with a broad skill set that would be attractive to a range of employers(!) Armed with said humanities degree I secured a job working in the housing department of my local borough council, where I worked closely with the legal team in dealing with a range of issues from ‘right to buy’ to tenant evictions. This prompted me to seriously consider law as a career and eventually led to my returning to university to study for the CPE and then the LPC.
Having studied for the CPE at UEA, I was aware of Leathes Prior as a local Norwich firm. I was then lucky enough to secure a few weeks’ work experience there after completing the CPE and discovered that, whilst being situated locally, the firm’s commercial focus, extensive range of niche services and exacting attention to detail and client care enabled it to secure the kind of clients most ‘high street’ firms can only dream of. Realising that I had stumbled upon a firm which provides the elusive combination of high quality work with the opportunity to live in a beautiful (and affordable!) city, Leathes Prior quickly became my first choice of firm for a training contract.
After attending the recruitment day (every bit as individual as the firm itself!), I was delighted to be offered a training contract with the firm. My only concern was whether the trainee experience at Leathes Prior could live up to my expectations. I quickly discovered that it exceeded them.
Within my first week at the firm, while sitting in the Insolvency department, I was able to observe a colleague at court. Within my first month, it was me standing in front of the Judge securing an order for directions. My second seat, in the commercial litigation department, was dominated by preparing for and attending a five day hearing of a franchise dispute in the High Court. For my third seat I was seconded out to Norwich City Football Club, where I was involved in everything from the negotiation of contracts with major breweries to joint ventures to drafting sponsorship agreements for individual players and attending Football League meetings. Forget the clichéd image of the trainee chained to the photocopier, which is sadly all too accurate at many firms; I barely had time to so much as look at a photocopier during my two years as a trainee at Leathes Prior. For my final seat I returned to the Commercial team and this is where I have remained upon qualifying.
I now provide general commercial advice to a wide range of clients and, with the support of the firm, am working on developing our intellectual property practice, which has already seen me launch an in-house trade marks service.
Just to give a flavour of day-to-day life working for Leathes Prior, highlights for me over the last few months have included advising several major franchisor clients on data protection and brand protection issues, negotiating a contract for the provision of print services to a major American film company and advising an international umbrella organisation with members in 60 different countries on trade mark protection within the UK, Europe and Costa Rica. I can quite genuinely say that none of my law school colleagues have found a firm which offers them anywhere near the quality of work or lifestyle that is on offer at Leathes Prior.
