Ashurst Interview 2021

[BK]

Please state the month/year you interviewed at the firm.
May 2021

Please specify what the interview was for.
Direct Training Contract

Please give an overview of the day with approximate timings.
1pm -1:20pm - Welcome
1:20pm - 2:20pm - Written Exercise
2:30 - 3:30pm - Q&A with Trainees
3:30pm - 4:15pm - Interview

Please provide a summary of each assessment on the day with approximate timings.
- Welcome - A Graduate Recruitment executive ran through the day
- Written Exercise - A case study written exercise which tested analytical ability, commercial instinct and written communication skills. No preparation was required for this. It was a commercial (rather than legal) scenario and I had to justify a recommended course of action from the information you are given, in a business report format.
- Q&A with Trainees - A trainee meet and greet session where you can hear first-hand from our trainees at the firm and will have an opportunity to have your questions answered.
- Interview - An interview with a member of the Early Careers team and a fee-earner.

What is your best advice for each aspect of the assessment on the day? Please break this down for each assessment. This can include advice for preparation, as well as tips for the day.

With the written exercise, give yourself about 20 minutes to read and spend the rest writing Ask a lot of questions during the Q&A
Prepare thoroughly for the interview

Were you successful?
Waiting to hear back

 

[BK]

Please state the month/year you interviewed at the firm.
February 2021

Please specify what the interview was for.
Summer Vacation Scheme 2021

Please give an overview of the day with approximate timings.
Commercial awareness exercise at 2pm and Interview at 3:30pm.

Please provide a summary of each assessment on the day with approximate timings.

Commercial awareness exercise. You had an hour to read through a business profile and write recommendations to a group of investors.

Interview with a member of Grad Recruitment and a Junior Associate.

What is your best advice for each aspect of the assessment on the day? Please break this down for each assessment. This can include advice for preparation, as well as tips for the day.

The commercial awareness exercise was a written task where you had to analyse some documents and write a report to a client. It was relating to a client's gourmet dip business and they wanted advice on their business strategy in advance of a meeting with investors. There was generally enough time as there were not too many documents to read so I spent most of the time planning and writing. I wrote about 3 sides of a4 in Arial 12 font. I think my approach of having headings for each point the client wanted advice on worked well. Writing in short, easy to understand sentences would be the best approach. Try to link some of your own commercial awareness to any analysis but generally stick to the information you have been provided as this gives you enough to form an opinion/your recommendations.

The interview had some pretty standard questions on teamwork and organisation. They asked me why Ashurst but they did not ask me why law so it would be a good idea to always link your skills to what commercial solicitors actually do. There were some commercial awareness questions which I found more difficult, so research on who the firm's clients are and what particular stories are affecting them, and why, would be useful. Generally, I recommend practising a range of motivation, competency and commercial awareness questions.

Were you successful?
Yes

 

[BK]

Please state the month/year you interviewed at the firm.
February 2021

Please specify what the interview was for.
Summer Vacation Scheme 2021

Please give an overview of the day with approximate timings.
10am Arrival and talk from Grad Rec
10:30am Group Exercise,
11:45 Commercial Awareness exercise,
1:45 Interview with Senior Counsel and individual from GR,
3pm Farewell from Grad Rec

Please provide a summary of each assessment on the day with approximate timings.

Taken from the firm's correspondence:

'Group exercise – 1 hour
Consider both your own priorities and the teams in working on the best way to move forward. This exercise is looking at your team playing skills.

Commercial awareness exercise – 1 hour
You should aim to display your commercial awareness and your ability to consider the business implications of your advice to a hypothetical client. This exercise is not designed to test your legal knowledge

Competency based interview – 1 hour
Consider specific situations from your past experience and be ready to describe, in detail, what you personally did. The examples can be from different areas of your life. We will be looking to find out more on your motivation for a career in law and at Taylor Wessing, your team playing, communication and organisational skills.'

What is your best advice for each aspect of the assessment on the day? Please break this down for each assessment. This can include advice for preparation, as well as tips for the day.

Group exercise:
We were in a group of 6 and each had some different information relating to the overall task so it was key for everyone to speak equally. We had to decide between us what type of witness a new Life Sciences tech company should use in a particular scenario. It was quite difficult over teams for everyone to speak and agree on things. 6 people in a group seemed like a lot to me and made it hard for everyone to contribute equally. We were quite tight for time and had to present for 5 minutes at the end and take questions from the two assessors. Not everyone had time to say something in the presentation so I would recommend you spend more time deciding on this and being really strict with how long each person is talking for.

Commercial awareness:
The commercial awareness activity required you to spend 25 minutes completing a task and answering 3 lengthy questions. Your notes on the questions were not assessed - I made sure these were quite thorough but allowed me room to speak naturally rather than reading off a script. It was essentially analysing different modes of investment for a start-up business. I recommend that basic commercial concepts on costs, profits etc. are brushed up on in advance as well as basic aspects of debt/equity. The rest of the time was spent on presenting your answers to two partners and they would ask you follow up questions or probe you on anything you said. It was quite tough and I was occasionally interrupted. However, the partners seemed to be asking questions where they would give you hints on what they wanted you to address, so I would say they were not trying to catch you out at all.

Interview:
The interview was on standard competencies for commercial law like teamwork, organisation and time management, as well as motivations. One interviewers was a member of the talent team and one senior counsel at the firm. The latter is TW's name for senior lawyers who are not partners but are higher than senior associates (I felt silly as I did not know what this was so I had to ask!). The interviewers were really nice and genuinely wanted to know more about you. Again, they never tried to trip you up and were more than happy to clarify any questions they asked. I would prepare competency and motivational questions only as no commercial awareness was tested given the separate exercise for this.

Were you successful?
Yes

 

[Elizabeth K]

Please state the month/year you interviewed at the firm.

November 2021

Please specify what the interview was for.

Winter Vacation Scheme

Please give an overview of the day with approximate timings.

Very straightforward Assessment Centre.
1) Brief Introduction from Graduate Recruitment.
2) A case study exercise in a zoom call. This may vary but mine was a business report on whether a council should take up [x].
3) An interview with a member of HR and an associate.
4) A chat with trainees which is not assessed.

Please provide a summary of each assessment on the day with approximate timings.

1) Brief Intro took about 5 minutes. Every candidate introduces themselves.
2) Case Study was an hour.
3) Interview was also an hour.
4) Chat with trainees was around 30 minutes.

Please list any interview questions you were asked.

Why Ashurst?
A time that you worked in a team that was not working well?
Challenges facing the legal landscape? [By this I think they meant legal industry]
Which other firms have you applied to?
Important skills of a trainee?
What do we look for at Ashurst?
A time when you showed time management?
A difficult concept you understood and what motivated you to understand it?
A difficult law or regulation you understood and why was it important?

What is your best advice for each aspect of the assessment on the day? Please break this down for each assessment. This can include advice for preparation, as well as tips for the day.

Write an executive summary for the business report and try to use formatting and structure as much as possible.
Prepare the key answers for the interview i.e. why law? why Ashurst? Also have an example for each competency.
Ask one or two questions during the trainee talk afterwards. Whilst it is not assessed if you make an exceedingly negative impression i.e. by being on your phone or leaving the call they may take note of this.

Were you successful?

Yes

 

[Elizabeth K]

Please state the month/year you interviewed at the firm.

October 2021

Please specify what the interview was for.

Training Contract 23/24

Please give an overview of the day with approximate timings.

All Online from 10am
Welcome 10:30am
Case Study Exercise 11:30am
Trainee Meet & Greet/Q&A 12:15pm
Competency-based interview with member of Graduate Recruitment team and an Associate
If you pass this stage, there is a 45 minute interview with two partners

Please provide a summary of each assessment on the day with approximate timings.

Case Study Exercise: 1 hour to read through bundle of documents about a proposition and write a business report with pros/cons of proposition and recommended action.

Competency-based interview: 1 hour with all the usual competency questions (Why commercial law? Why this firm? What are the most important skills for a lawyer?); also some scenario-based questions (e.g. What do you do if you think your supervisor has given the client incorrect advice?)

Partner interview: 45 mins, very commercial focused (e.g. how does X news story/event affect this firm and its clients?)

Please list any interview questions you were asked.

Why this firm?
Why commercial law?
What are your strengths?
Are you a leader or a follower?
Which of our practice areas are you most interested in?
Name a recent deal we've done; what do you think about it?
Name a story from the news; how does it affect us/our clients?

What is your best advice for each aspect of the assessment on the day? Please break this down for each assessment. This can include advice for preparation, as well as tips for the day.

Written Exercise: time management is really important: I gave myself 20 mins to read everything and 40 mins to write, which worked well. Try and think of how you would structure a business report beforehand (things like executive summary, table of contents are useful)

Competency interview: make a big bank of common competency questions (there is already a list on TCLA) and think of how you would answer them. Use a formula like the STAR approach to keep your answers structured.

Partner interview: make sure you follow the news regularly (I used podcasts like Watson's Daily, FT News Briefing and Economist Podcast) for a few weeks before your interview. I made a list of big business trends/global news stories and thought about how these would affect the firm. Obviously to do that you need to be very confident about the firm's key clients/sectors, so research that thoroughly.

Were you successful?

Yes