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John Dove works for the CPS as a Senior Crown Prosecutor. Before this, he spent many years working in defence, so has a broad experience of criminal law. The two most important skills for John’s legal career have been advocacy and decision making. He was able to work on these during university by doing a lot of mooting, and by joining a local speaker’s club to work on public speaking.
In his current role, John really enjoys the variety of cases that he deals with and he gets to see the full spectrum of criminal cases. He’s involved early in cases, so he drafts pre-charge advice for the police on where there is a case and what the appropriate charges would be.
Working at the CPS means there’s no commercial element to John’s job, so he doesn’t have the pressure of tracking and billing hours that often comes with private practice. However, because there isn’t the need to network and develop new business, John’s role means he doesn’t get much opportunity to develop these skills.
Ryan Adams first started to build his business skills while studying at BPP, when he managed his brother’s band. It gave him the opportunity to work on his negotiation and influencing skills, and to learn by experience. This proved useful for his future career, as he now works for a number of businesses within NBC Sports Group.
One aspect of his role that Ryan enjoys is working with high-profile deals that often make the news. He’s a General Counsel and business adviser as well as a lawyer, which brings a lot of variety to his day-to-day. This means Ryan can work on anything from business deals, contracts, data protection and employment law to property law.
Working outside private practice allows him to see business deals or projects through from start to finish, and to see the fruits of his labour. However, the challenge of not being part of a big law firm is that he doesn’t have a range of colleagues with diverse experience, which makes it hard to broaden his own expertise in new areas.
Amy Davis is a solicitor employed by the city council and loves that her job means she’s often the first to know about exciting things like the new British Library North that’s coming to Leeds. She often advises locally elected councillors and MPs, which strengthens her interest in politics, as well as advising a wider range of people within the council.
It was this interest in politics that helped Amy to step into the world of in-house law at the council. She developed this interest while she was studying, and it was this passion that helped her to secure an internship at a council, where she became aware of her future career path.
Working outside of private practice means that Amy can dedicate as much time as she needs to tasks, without the worry of tracking time and attributing hours. However, the challenge of working for the public sector is that you have to really change the way you consider implications. For example, it’s not just a case of thinking whether something will win or lose money. Instead, she needs to consider things like the impact on equality and diversity, data protection, and other legal obligations.
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