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Message: <blockquote data-quote="j.s.cox" data-source="post: 218002" data-attributes="member: 20454">UpdateI am now around one month into my client secondment at bp and so far I have really been enjoying myself. There are quite a few things that I have noticed differ from private practice at NRF and it has been very interesting to see how differently in-house legal operations function.Working hoursUnsurprisingly, this has been the most noticeable difference for me between in-house at bp and private practice at NRF. I leave between 4:30-5:30pm, depending on when I am finished with work, and the deadlines for work to be produced seems to be a lot longer. People also tend to come into the office much earlier. I've started coming in for around 8am as the office is so close to where I live and it means I can finish up earlier. I could definitely get used to this more relaxed pace of life, and it has allowed me to explore the things I can do after work as well.MeetingsI feel like there are so many meetings in-house. At NRF, I think email is preferred unless a meeting would be a more efficient way of discussing a matter, whereas the opposite is true at bp. A lot of the time, I feel like some of the meetings we have could have been an email, but as my bp supervisor pointed out, it is better that the business wants us to be very involved than to be given a lot of work to do in a short space of time with no context. It's definitely a different way of operating.The other thing that surprised me is the policy for people to always have their cameras on during virtual meetings. This is something that I had definitely fallen out of the habit of doing at NRF, as Teams is often used as a conference call tool rather than a video call tool. People seem to need to explain why they are switching off their cameras (e.g. to eat lunch) which I found odd at first, but I have gotten used to now.InvolvementBy far my favourite thing about being in-house, so far, is the ability to be so involved in company projects. I have learnt so much about the technical aspects of some of the projects I am working on because of the close interactions with people from the business. This also makes it much easier to understand exactly what is needed for those projects. I have learnt so much about the difficulties of a power purchase agreement (PPA) with a single windfarm on green hydrogen projects, and about the complexities of the sea floor in the North Sea, than I ever thought possible in a month. It has certainly solidified my interest in this sector and I think I'd be keen to do a seat in Projects after this to explore that interest further.SafetyAs bp is an energy firm, safety is taken incredibly seriously. This ranges from very strict cyber security to being told that you must hold the handrail when you use the stairs. Initially, I found this quite funny, but I soon realised that the stakes are much higher than at NRF. If someone hacks into their systems, they could blow up a refinery. This is a very different risk profile to losing client confidential information at a law firm. Similarly, you won't find bp branding on anything employees are given (including the shuttle bus at one of their London offices), as it could lead to employees being targeted by activists. Everything at bp seems to be guided by the number one principle of safety, which I have found quite interesting.The legal teamThe bp legal team is incredibly large. I think this is quite uncommon for in-house teams, however, as a mega-corporate, it makes sense for bp's team to be this big. The teams are split along practice areas as well as business areas and one of the most important teams that support the Low Carbon Energy Legal team (LCE) is the bp Competition Legal team. Each legal team is based in different offices on different days, so it would be easy not to see everyone. The people who I have met are all so lovely, and I tend to go to lunch with people from across the legal team.bp also has a significant number of trainee and associate secondees from across it's panel firms. There are 10 trainees here, but we all tend to work at different offices, so we won't necessarily see each other. It's been interesting to compare our firms (for example, one 4th seater from CMS is getting ready for NQ applications, but it seems to be a much more formal process than at NRF).ResponsibilityI was expecting to feel a big jump in responsibility, but whether it's due to bp's mega-corporate status, or the fact that NRF has already given me a lot of responsibility, it really hasn't been that challenging so far. I've found the level and type of work no more challenging than anything I did at NRF. I've been given a few matters to run on my own, and I am otherwise supporting the other members of the LCE legal team. I imagine things will change as I progress through this seat, so this is an area I will keep an eye on, but generally, I am feeling comfortable enough at the moment.OverallThere are a lot more things I could talk about, but I'll leave it here for now to give me something to talk about in my next post! It's been a great month so far, and I'm looking forward to seeing how this seat progresses.Thanks for following my journey!</blockquote>

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