Hi all,
As promised, the following will be a brief breakdown of my experience of the Travers Smith Vacation Scheme after seeing a flurry of offers made in recent days. It will only be a 'whistle-stop tour', so to speak - it's really designed to be a basis from which other questions can flow! I'm unable to go into any details in respect of assessments and particular activities, for obvious reasons. I'll go over a few tips at the end for what I feel contributed to my successful conversion. I hope it's helpful nonetheless!
Background:
I completed my VS in July 2020, virtually. I was made a Training Contract offer immediately following the scheme without having to complete any further interview - I'm not sure that this is standard practice as we were informed at the beginning of the scheme that offers wouldn't be made without a final exit interview. I would advise proceeding on the basis that you'll need to complete further interviews/ assessment in some form after the VS unless you're informed otherwise.
VS format and structure:
My VS was split into a number of sessions over five days. These included:
Each day was quite busy and full-on, which I really enjoyed. There were breaks built into the day for lunch and between sessions - sometimes these would be run through if sessions ran on. There was always a clear structure for what we should be doing etc and there was never any "oh god I don't know what I should be doing" feelings. Grad rec were always on hand through emails and messages on the InsideSherpa (now Forage) platform which was what they used for my scheme. As you'll know if you've got this far, the GR team at Travers are all lovely and are genuinely approachable - you shouldn't worry about reaching out to them with questions etc.
All the sessions were genuinely enjoyable and I felt like I learned something of genuine value from each session. Something that I really liked about the Travers VS was that it really felt like the senior leadership of the firm were really invested in the VS process, which in turn really encouraged me to 'buy in' to the VS process and push myself to perform to my best standard too. Almost every practice area discussion was partner-led, there were a large number of partners who attended networking events and who really made a genuine effort to get to know us, and we enjoyed a roundtable with the Managing Partner of the firm, too. Another element of the VS I really enjoyed was that we were encouraged to have a genuine, frank discourse with trainees and ask the questions that we genuinely wanted answers to. This added to thee overall authenticity of the experience and also mitigated the impact of losing some of the in-person elements of the VS that you'd normally have in the office.
Each candidate was also given a Trainee Buddy for the week, with whom we had scheduled 1:1's two or three times during the week and to whom we could also have more personal conversations than what you'd necessarily have in a bigger group. My Buddy, who I've kept in touch with, was really lovely and went to a genuine effort to get to know me etc. From chatting to my cohort, this was generally shared across the board. In my view, it is representative of Travers' culture from top to bottom - everyone I've come across through my application process, to VS, to TC and in various other interactions has been genuinely kind, helpful and exceptionally involved in any discussion irrespective of seniority. This is one of the major points that attracted me to Travers in the first instance.
My advice for conversion:
There's no single 'magic formula' for conversion, so it's impossible to give one. The other point worth reiterating is that I'm not in a position to discuss the exit/ secondary interview for TC as I didn't do one. Generally speaking, I would advise the following as general good practice:
That's really everything that's worth including in this part of the discussion. I am acutely aware it's only very brief so please do follow up with any and all questions you have in the thread below. As usual, if anything is particularly confidential then my DMs are always open!
As promised, the following will be a brief breakdown of my experience of the Travers Smith Vacation Scheme after seeing a flurry of offers made in recent days. It will only be a 'whistle-stop tour', so to speak - it's really designed to be a basis from which other questions can flow! I'm unable to go into any details in respect of assessments and particular activities, for obvious reasons. I'll go over a few tips at the end for what I feel contributed to my successful conversion. I hope it's helpful nonetheless!
Background:
I completed my VS in July 2020, virtually. I was made a Training Contract offer immediately following the scheme without having to complete any further interview - I'm not sure that this is standard practice as we were informed at the beginning of the scheme that offers wouldn't be made without a final exit interview. I would advise proceeding on the basis that you'll need to complete further interviews/ assessment in some form after the VS unless you're informed otherwise.
VS format and structure:
My VS was split into a number of sessions over five days. These included:
- Introductions to most key practice areas
- Introduction to CSR/ Pro Bono activities
- Virtual Networking activities with trainees, fee earners and grad rec
- Social activities
- Open Q&A/ roundtable discussions
- Written assessments
- Group assessments
Each day was quite busy and full-on, which I really enjoyed. There were breaks built into the day for lunch and between sessions - sometimes these would be run through if sessions ran on. There was always a clear structure for what we should be doing etc and there was never any "oh god I don't know what I should be doing" feelings. Grad rec were always on hand through emails and messages on the InsideSherpa (now Forage) platform which was what they used for my scheme. As you'll know if you've got this far, the GR team at Travers are all lovely and are genuinely approachable - you shouldn't worry about reaching out to them with questions etc.
All the sessions were genuinely enjoyable and I felt like I learned something of genuine value from each session. Something that I really liked about the Travers VS was that it really felt like the senior leadership of the firm were really invested in the VS process, which in turn really encouraged me to 'buy in' to the VS process and push myself to perform to my best standard too. Almost every practice area discussion was partner-led, there were a large number of partners who attended networking events and who really made a genuine effort to get to know us, and we enjoyed a roundtable with the Managing Partner of the firm, too. Another element of the VS I really enjoyed was that we were encouraged to have a genuine, frank discourse with trainees and ask the questions that we genuinely wanted answers to. This added to thee overall authenticity of the experience and also mitigated the impact of losing some of the in-person elements of the VS that you'd normally have in the office.
Each candidate was also given a Trainee Buddy for the week, with whom we had scheduled 1:1's two or three times during the week and to whom we could also have more personal conversations than what you'd necessarily have in a bigger group. My Buddy, who I've kept in touch with, was really lovely and went to a genuine effort to get to know me etc. From chatting to my cohort, this was generally shared across the board. In my view, it is representative of Travers' culture from top to bottom - everyone I've come across through my application process, to VS, to TC and in various other interactions has been genuinely kind, helpful and exceptionally involved in any discussion irrespective of seniority. This is one of the major points that attracted me to Travers in the first instance.
My advice for conversion:
There's no single 'magic formula' for conversion, so it's impossible to give one. The other point worth reiterating is that I'm not in a position to discuss the exit/ secondary interview for TC as I didn't do one. Generally speaking, I would advise the following as general good practice:
- Engage: ask questions, be inquisitive, be involved in sessions, be active with your cohort as well as people from the firm. During networking sessions, for example, network! Take full advantage of the array of people you'll speak to in order to build up your picture of the firm as a whole and decide whether it's somewhere that you'd like to train.
- Be organised: follow the schedule, know where you need to be and when, don't be late for 1:1 sessions (or, if this is unavoidable, send a quick email to whomever you'll be speaking with to advise them that a session is running on and you'll be late for the meeting).
- Ask good questions: although I've touched on this already, make sure that the questions you're asking are of good quality. For me, this is centred around a few factors:
- Relevancy: make sure that whatever you ask is suited to the person you're asking (for example, don't ask grad rec about the nuances of fee-earning work, or trainees about issues surrounding partnership etc)
- Authenticity: don't ask questions whose answers you already know, or that can easily be found on Google, or on the firm's website. Ask genuine, authentic questions to build a genuine, authentic understanding of the firm and the people you're interacting with
- Planning: plan your questions once you're given the schedule and also during the discussions: going in with questions without taking a minute to plan them first often results in rambling and opacity rather than clear, concise questions
- Throw yourself in: this one is rather self-explanatory. Commit 100% to whatever you're doing and put your all into it. Vacation Schemes, especially virtual schemes, are tiring, but don't half-ass anything you do as it will come across poorly and vastly diminish your chances of conversion
That's really everything that's worth including in this part of the discussion. I am acutely aware it's only very brief so please do follow up with any and all questions you have in the thread below. As usual, if anything is particularly confidential then my DMs are always open!
