TCLA Direct Training Contract Applications Discussion Thread 2025-26

[DesperateStudent]

You all seem to forgetting that lawyers bill by the hour.
Firms — and clients — don’t want someone who will require 2 hours to do a task that should take 75 minutes. It’s an expense

Law firms do no bill by the hour it’s billed every 6 minutes. Those doing billable work will have an hourly rate.

I work in professional services. I required additional time. I’ve been told countless times they’d rather me take longer on a task and get it right than spend half the time get it wrong and a reviewer goes in (who’s chargeable hour is mostly likely double or triple yours) and has to redo it all ultimately charging time to the clients code.

Also a lot of fees are agreed beforehand. Recovery rates are used to see if the firm made a profitable amount if they don’t they’ll increase that fee for that service in the future.

Firms only tend to make losses on complexities and a lack of information which is mostly due to the client not providing said information.

Additional time can most definitely be utilised as a trainee or associate etc as you manage your time and work load. Ensure you’re asking those giving you work what the deadlines are and you plan how you do your work around it.

I have always got 30% extra time in school. I’ve done 1 assessment centre and they gave me extra time also. (Not sure if they penalised me or not)
It’s all about managing your workload rather than needing extra time as you’ll never just be on one thing at a time.

i have ADHD and im medicated. I have periods of the day where im super focused and others where im not.

This message wasn’t directed at you more so the entire discussion

 

[Jaysen]

IRL time pressure isn’t the same as it is in an exam/AC. As much as tasks are time pressured, in my experience working I’ve never been given a task and told okay starting now you have 1 hr to get this done. Most of the time you get work + deadline and you have to manage your time yourself.

So asking for extra time for assessments/AC doesn’t automatically mean you can’t work to tight timeframes as a trainee. I really doubt firms hold it against people, it’s a very common adjustment

I agree.

Yes, there are deadlines in practice. But a firm is not thinking: 'lawyers must get this done in an hour, and this person is going to be too slow because they need extra time'.

When hiring, law firms want great people, and the ability to get quality work done far outweighs taking more time to get something done.

Whether you actually ask for extra time is a personal choice. But I'd keep in mind that graduate recruiters are very used to giving reasonable adjustments. If it's any of the well-known law firms, I'm confident it wouldn't work against you if you had genuine circumstances for extra time.

 

[juanitasimi]

I agree.

Yes, there are deadlines in practice. But a firm is not thinking: 'lawyers must get this done in an hour, and this person is going to be too slow because they need extra time'.

When hiring, law firms want great people, and the ability to get quality work done far outweighs taking more time to get something done.

Whether you actually ask for extra time is a personal choice. But I'd keep in mind that graduate recruiters are very used to giving reasonable adjustments. If it's any of the well-known law firms, I'm confident it wouldn't work against you if you had genuine circumstances for extra time.

Thank you for clearing this up!

 

[Prudentia]

IRL time pressure isn’t the same as it is in an exam/AC. As much as tasks are time pressured, in my experience working I’ve never been given a task and told okay starting now you have 1 hr to get this done. Most of the time you get work + deadline and you have to manage your time yourself.

So asking for extra time for assessments/AC doesn’t automatically mean you can’t work to tight timeframes as a trainee. I really doubt firms hold it against people, it’s a very common adjustment

I work in a legal adjacent field and there have been many times I’ve been given work to do and the deadline is yesterday. The unfortunate fact is as much as firms wax lyrical about being inclusive and reasonable adjustments, they ultimately answer to their clients who are paying them silly sums of money to get work done. If a deadline needs to be met or a deal needs to be closed and it doesn’t happen, they’re not going to be able to explain it away by saying “well, someone on the deal has reasonable adjustments.”

And again, not to sound horrible but training contracts are notoriously competitive. If you had two candidates and one could get the work done to a high standard without reasonable adjustments while the other needed extra time who is more likely to get picked? And I say all of this as someone with ADHD. In the corporate world you’re just expected to manage your symptoms in a way that doesn’t cause a nuisance.

 

[spamelinazoid]

I agree.

Yes, there are deadlines in practice. But a firm is not thinking: 'lawyers must get this done in an hour, and this person is going to be too slow because they need extra time'.

When hiring, law firms want great people, and the ability to get quality work done far outweighs taking more time to get something done.

Whether you actually ask for extra time is a personal choice. But I'd keep in mind that graduate recruiters are very used to giving reasonable adjustments. If it's any of the well-known law firms, I'm confident it wouldn't work against you if you had genuine circumstances for extra time.

Just to push back on this a little bit - I have personally been asked before by an associate to do specific work with X trainee over Y trainee because Y trainee is slower.

The ability to do great work doesn’t outweigh the time it takes to get the work done if everyone is at 110% capacity. I do agree that law firms say they give reasonable adjustments in recruitment and adjustments in general, but if it does genuinely take someone too long to do something, it will likely be held against them. If you can hide that at AC, good on you, but it will show up in practice.

Case by case basis, for sure, but it really depends on how much of an adjustment the reasonable adjustments is.

 

[juanitasimi]

Just to push back on this a little bit - I have personally been asked before by an associate to do specific work with X trainee over Y trainee because Y trainee is slower.

The ability to do great work doesn’t outweigh the time it takes to get the work done if everyone is at 110% capacity. I do agree that law firms say they give reasonable adjustments in recruitment and accomplishments adjustments in general, but if it does genuinely take someone too long to do something, it will likely be held against them. If you can hide that at AC, good on you, but it will show up in practice.

Case by case basis, for sure, but it really depends on how much of an adjustment the reasonable adjustments is.

I do think if extra time is needed as an actual trainee it probably would look bad, but I just don’t see why it would be applied in an AC when they know candidates aren’t finished products? Maybe I’m being too optimistic on recruitment lol

 

[Prudentia]

I do think if extra time is needed as an actual trainee it probably would look bad, but I just don’t see why it would be applied in an AC when they know candidates aren’t finished products? Maybe I’m being too optimistic on recruitment lol

Recruitment is full of biases. I’ve done recruiting before and those experiences have made me extremely careful about what I disclose in terms of reasonable adjustments. It’s not right or fair, but then again, if I wanted a fair industry to work in I wouldn’t choose a corporate career.

 

[Jaysen]

Just to push back on this a little bit - I have personally been asked before by an associate to do specific work with X trainee over Y trainee because Y trainee is slower.

The ability to do great work doesn’t outweigh the time it takes to get the work done if everyone is at 110% capacity. I do agree that law firms say they give reasonable adjustments in recruitment and accomplishments adjustments in general, but if it does genuinely take someone too long to do something, it will likely be held against them. If you can hide that at AC, good on you, but it will show up in practice.

Case by case basis, for sure, but it really depends on how much of an adjustment the reasonable adjustments is.

I think you're right in practice. But to be clear, I'm referring to asking for extra time at the assessment stage. A law firm would not take this to mean 'why would I hire this person when they will be slower than another trainee I could hire'.

I don't think any aspiring lawyers who ask for adjustments in an AC are expecting this to apply to a client in practice.

The reason for asking for adjustments at the AC stage is that it makes sense to ask for extra time if it applies to your circumstances, you genuinely need it, and it would improve the quality of your work in a standardised assessment.

 

[amb303]

Has anyone heard from Wedlake Bell yet? I’m thinking maybe we will hear this week?

 

[Bread]

Law firms do no bill by the hour it’s billed every 6 minutes. Those doing billable work will have an hourly rate.

I don’t see how this is supposed to weaken my argument. 6-minute increments are just hourly rates divided by 10 lol clients still get charged for the time