Early careers Start your career with a leading law firm, repeatedly voted a top employer

Our legal apprenticeships

Our apprenticeship academy offers modern, cost-effective routes into the legal profession. You have the opportunity to earn while you learn and gain invaluable skills that will help you to quickly progress in your legal career. We currently offer:

• Paralegal apprenticeship (2 year programme)
• Solicitor degree apprenticeship (6 year programme that includes a degree and the SQE 1 & 2)
• Graduate solicitor apprenticeship (32 month programme that includes the SQE 1 & 2)
• Business services (IT and finance) apprenticeships coming soon!

With all of our apprenticeships, you will have one day each week dedicated to off-the-job study and you will then gain work-based experience on the four remaining days, thus enabling you to learn from leading experts in the legal field.

Training contracts in England and Scotland

We offer a traineeship in our Glasgow office. This 24-month training programme is structured as four six-month seats across the business and is designed to provide you with excellent training and experience to gain qualification as a solicitor in Scotland. We also offer funding for the Diploma in Professional Legal Practice (PEAT 1) for those who have not yet completed it.

Following the changes in legal education over recent years, we are still accepting applications for trainee solicitor roles in England and Wales from those who have already completed the Legal Practice Course (LPC). Successful candidates who have already embarked on, or completed, the LPC will be placed on a training contract pathway. Over two years they will complete four six-month placements within our vast range of legal teams.

Legal work experience

We understand how difficult it can be to secure work experience, so this is not an expectation of Weightmans from those applying for early careers programmes. However, we recognise how important it is to gain an insight into a career before you commit to training with a firm, so we offer work experience programmes which have been designed to equip those interested in applying with key information and skills.

Our legal insights programme is for those in year 12 or above, in undergraduate degrees (excluding Law), and all others who are interested in pursuing a legal career.

Our Summer Vacation Scheme is aimed at undergraduate students who are interested in becoming a solicitor. This is a week-long placement at one of our offices and will provide you with first-hand experience at Weightmans.

What are we looking for?

We are looking for individuals with potential and the drive and determination to succeed. The competencies listed below are used to help shape our early careers recruitment processes, we assess for potential in these areas but we do not expect experience.

• Reasons and problem solves effectively with complex data and information and learns quickly
• Plans, organises, prioritises and manages resources and time
• IT literate
• Has a strong commercial focus
• Emotionally resilient, mature and positive when the going gets tough
• Customer-centric — both internal and external
• Flexible and adaptable
• Demonstrates integrity
• Is achievement-driven, shows initiative, takes responsibility with a ‘can do’
  attitude
• Committed to continuous improvement
• Attends to the detail and is quality minded
• Self‐aware — knows own strengths and weaknesses
• Demonstrates effective communication both verbally and in writing
• Assertive and socially confident
• Influential and persuasive
• Team player and team builder who networks effectively
• Diplomatic, tactful and empathic
• Interpersonally skilled, reads people and situations and then adapts accordingly
• Aware of and propagates a positive and professional image and persona

Why choose Weightmans?

At Weightmans our purpose to See the Possibility flows through every aspect of how we do business and treat our people. Watch the video below to learn how we See the Possibility in our business, our clients and our people.

See what our apprentices have been up to

Meet the early careers team

The early careers team strive to invest quality time and resources to explore employees’ potential, and to ‘See The Possibility’ through the lens of equity, diversity and inclusion. We work hand-in-hand with the business to ensure those who wish to turn their passion into their career, get equal and fair access to opportunities.

We design and implement all early careers recruitment processes and then support our successful applicants through their programmes.

Denise Wright — Early Careers Manager

Denise leads the team and is the expert in all things SQE and legal apprenticeships. She designs and implements new processes and programmes whilst also supporting apprentices and trainees as they progress through our programmes. Denise has invaluable experience in training and coaching which underlines all that she does in the team.

Marc Prats — Early Careers Development Adviser

Marc’s role in the business is to empower the current and future apprentices and trainees during the first stages of their careers with us through the design and delivery of bespoke training and coaching. Marc investigates and introduces ways to develop each cohort’s skills using tools such as Insights Discovery.

Siobhan Jesson and Megan Melia — Early Careers Advisers

Megan and Siobhan work closely with all members of the team but especially help support Denise in the design and implementation of the programmes and recruitment processes. They too help support all of our trainees and apprentices by conducting regular coaching sessions and group catch ups. Along with Denise, they are a first point of contact for apprentices, trainees and team managers for any queries they may have.

Katy Moore and Caitlin Worthington— Early Careers Coordinators

Katy and Caitlin are responsible for our team email inbox and will often be the first people you hear from in response to a query. They also coordinate all of our events and training to ensure that the programmes are delivered effectively.

Please contact the early careers team on earlycareers@weightmans.com, if you have any questions or queries around anything that we do.