I relate to this personally as a fellow northerner hahaha. It’s difficult and the imposter syndrome is real. It’s mostly psychological but people have had awful experiences by being told to ‘change’ their accent if they want a successful legal career. It’s probably an indication of that firm’s culture if the lawyers there say stuff like that tbh. I think as of recent, accent bias training is becoming more prevalent and especially at firms that partner with rare recruitment, it should be less bad. As a result, I’ve found interacting with lawyers actually ends up being a positive, as it turns out many of them are also northern and/or socially mobile! To overcome it, just know you’re in those rooms cos you earned it and you belong there too!
When I went to the Weil Oct insight day, as I was leaving, I bumped into someone in the lift who obvs at the time I didn’t know who they were. We were both chatting away about my experience at the open day and my interest in Weil for about 10 mins. Then they dropped a major bomb: he was in fact an insolvency disputes and restructuring partner at the firm, and he was also northern! Genuinely it was that interaction that boosted my confidence knowing that I can and should be able to speak freely and not worry about potential accent biases cos I’m northern. He was acc so unfazed by me calling him lad and mate the entire conversation without realising he’s a partner lmfao. 😂😂
Sorry for the essay I’ve just written lad idfk how I’ve managed to write so much haha. Hopefully this helps and pls dw about being northern. Own it!
