Lewis Silkin |

At Lewis Silkin our ethos is simple. We strive to do the best for our clients, our people and the communities in which we operate. We recognise our trainees as the future of our firm and therefore invest heavily in offering comprehensive training and expert supervision. From the moment you join us, you will be actively involved in Lewis Silkin life. Not only will you be given hands-on training plus interesting, challenging and varied work, you will also be getting early responsibility, a chance to work with some of our big-name clients and most importantly, made to feel a key member of the team.

Our training programme offers you:

Experience: A four-seat training contract across our two business divisions: Creators, Makers and Innovators (CMI) and Employment, Immigration and Reward (EIR), sitting alongside experts in their field.

Support: Dedicated support throughout your training contract including a seat supervisor who will support your development through your seat, two buddies (trainee and senior) who will be able to answer any queries you have and a committed training principal who will monitor your progress throughout your training contract.

Culture: Our small trainee intake allows us to action our ethos – to support and do the best for our employees as individuals. It also means you receive responsibility from the word “go”, being exposed to fast-paced challenging work within a supportive and friendly environment.

“The candidates who have done the most to research into what we do and found a way to relate it to their own experience, often shine through.” Matthew Rowbotham, Training Recruitment Partner

As a firm, we are home to top tier talent within the industry, attracting innovative lawyers with ambition and drive. We concentrate our efforts on finding someone who possesses all the skills and attributes of our existing top talent. To secure a training contract with us you will therefore need to demonstrate solid commercial understanding and demonstrate a strong career focus. You’ll also need to be enthusiastic and motivated, possess strong communication skills and be able to act as a team player who works for the benefit of all.

When reviewing applications, we give as much attention to your experiences as we do to your academics. We do not have an automated filtering process; we review every single application thoroughly, taking account of your personal experience.

Find out more here: https://www.lewissilkin.com/en/join-us/trainees/application-process

Our culture is encapsulated by our ethos of bravery and kindness. We aim to provide a supportive environment for our people, clients and wider community and embrace diversity, ensuring people are able to bring their full selves to work.

We have two things at our core: people — both ours and our clients' — and a focus on creative, tech and innovation.

We are passionate about people. Whether we are working with a fast growth start up or a large multinational business, we help you realise the potential in your people and navigate your strategic HR and legal issues, both nationally and internationally. Our award-winning employment team is one of the largest in the UK, with dedicated specialists in all areas of employment law and a track record of leading precedent setting cases on issues of the day. The team’s breadth of expertise is unrivalled and includes HR consultants as well as experts across specialisms including employment, immigration, data, tax and reward, health and safety, reputation management, dispute resolution, corporate and workplace environment.

Creativity, technology and innovation are at the heart of everything we do. It is reflected in the way we work, as well as in the types of businesses we work with. We help bring our clients' ideas to life by working alongside you as a trusted partner and bringing together leading commercial, corporate, data and privacy, dispute resolution, employment, immigration, intellectual property and real estate lawyers to help create, optimise, manage and protect your ideas and your business.

At Lewis Silkin we recognise that a more inclusive workplace allows for a plethora of ideas and thoughts, a variety of points of view that can trigger discussions or deliver innovative results as well as a wide scope of versatile skills and expertise.

We are proud of the diverse range of people within Lewis Silkin and culture of bravery and kindness that allows individuals to be themselves at work, ensuring we provide the best possible service to our clients.

We are inspired by our own history – a story of social mobility of Lewis Silkin (the man) who was born to a poor family of refugees, but whose determination and hard work won him a scholarship to Oxford University. The opportunity was subsequently lost when, due to his social status, his headmaster reputedly advised the University “this boy will not benefit from a university education”. Undeterred, Lewis Silkin worked in the London Docks until he spotted a notice in the window of a firm of solicitors seeking a ‘bright lad’. He was appointed as a clerk, eventually becoming an articled clerk and qualifying as a solicitor (going on to represent Deptford in the House of Commons and sit in the House of Lords).

This history is at the core of our culture and our values and it drives our commitment to ensure that access to the legal profession is open and fair and that the profession itself is diverse and socially inclusive.

We are a proud signatory to The Law Society’s Diversity and Inclusion Charter, the leading diversity initiative of the legal profession, and Gold Standard award recipient. We are also a legal partner to The Employers Network for Equality & Inclusion.

We have been accredited as a Living Wage Employer since 2012 and we extend this to our outsourced services, ensuring that our cleaners, security and maintenance colleagues are paid the real living wage in our contracts with providers.