Full-time grown-up

Studying law for four years can only take you so far and nothing prepares you for your training contract, especially if it's also your first office job, says Pippa Allsop

Until my training contract, my work experience comprised 'summer jobs': farm labour and a brief stint waitressing, which was brought to an end by an incident involving lobster bisque and an Armani jacket. While my education and part-time jobs equipped me with the requisite education and work ethic to fit the trainee mould, I was ill prepared for a full-time job. Not the politics, the practicalities.

One of the hardest things that I wrestle with is how to use secretaries. However clichéd, secretaries are the foundation and driving force of any law firm. Their knowledge is vast and their role invaluable. Therefore, it is not the discussions with or research for the partners that plunges me into a cold sweat, it is asking a secretary to do something for me.

As a trainee, how can you justify delegating to someone of that aptitude? I have wasted time agonising about asking and even more time doing those tasks I should have passed over. And yet no secretary I've met has ever made me feel as though I shouldn't ask for assistance. I have even been berated for doing things myself or for my grovelling thanks.

Another thing I hadn't considered was that when you work full-time, you don't have a summer holiday. Last July, for the first time in my life, I wasn't automatically due a month's respite. I found myself wanting to travel back in time to shake younger Pippa and tell her to stop whining about how hard it is to be a student.

And no one told me that trainees speak to more senior colleagues for 70 per cent of their time, so any ability you had to verbalise your thoughts effectively is lost. You open your mouth to find that anxiety has afforded you the communication skills of a rock.

These are all things that the law degree doesn't prepare you for. Even the Legal Practice Course, with its supposedly 'practical' focus, didn't stop me spending hours trying to format my first letter, so that the address lined up with the envelope window, before finding the template. It didn't teach me how to fix printer jams or not to wear a skirt suit to site visits without carrying a sewing kit. Some trainees have had other office jobs, and I envy this advantage over the 'traditional' route I took.

Adult mind

Occasionally, I have moments when I feel overwhelmed by having a career. I'm training to be a solicitor, and this has the hallmarks of a grown-up. Mostly, I forget how long I have been aspiring to make this a reality. It feels like something that other people do, and I am amazed when I remember that it's something I do.

I am on a two-year job interview and I'm anxious that someone will come to my desk and scream 'fraud'. The fact that I only have these panic attacks occasionally says a great deal about the way my colleagues make me feel. The reason I am not in a perpetual state of angst is because I am made to feel at ease here.

Sometimes at marketing events or client meetings, I realise I am talking about the law and someone is listening. Not only that, but I know what I am talking about. I realise I am having a genuine professional discussion, with someone who looks at me and sees a future solicitor. I have finally got here without realising. I would love to know if these moments will abate when I qualify or as my career draws on, or whether everyone suffers from these flashes of reality.

Pippa Allsop is a second-year trainee at Michelmores, currently in the family and contentious probate team

She writes a regular blog for Private Client Adviser

Is this a common feeling for trainees? Do you relate to Pippa's concerns? Email jpalmer.violet@wilmington.co.uk