Trainees at Cleary get a great deal of exposure to 'cross-border' deals. What does this mean? First, as a trainee at a truly global law firm, most of the transactions you work on will involve parties in a number of jurisdictions (during my first year at Cleary, I travelled to four different countries for work purposes and negotiated agreements with lawyers in more than 30 different jurisdictions). Secondly, you will get a great deal of exposure - trainees at Cleary are encouraged to take responsibility as soon as they are ready to do so.

Second seat: Cleary operates a non-departmentalised structure, which means that, although trainees are allocated to a particular supervisor, we may gain experience of more than one of the firm's main practice areas - corporate, finance, capital markets, dispute resolution, competition/antitrust - during each seat. During my first seat I worked on financing aspects of the leveraged buyout of EMI plc. I then worked on the M&A aspects of a management buyout of a leading hedge fund manager. I started working on this before moving to sit with my second seat supervisor who was leading that MBO. These transactions provided me with significant client contact - I was even given the responsibility of conducting a board meeting at the conclusion of the management buyout, after which I received a handwritten note of thanks from the CEO. During this seat I also continued to work on a financing project for a leading Wall Street investment bank, which I had carried over from my first seat.

Third seat: I spent my third seat in our New York office. Cleary's European and US offices work very closely together. As I had frequently worked with a number of my colleagues in New York during my first year, I very quickly felt at home across the Pond. Within weeks of arriving, the collapse of Lehman Brothers meant that our services were in great demand. I attended the very first creditors' meeting in a conference room overlooking Central Park and, since Cleary advised Barclays in its acquisition of Lehman's North American investment banking and capital markets businesses, I attended the hearing of the United States Bankruptcy Court that approved the sale (eventually - at 2am on Saturday morning!) I continued to advise the investment bank that I had started working with in my first seat back in London, becoming their main contact point at Cleary on a complicated structured finance project, which involved me running a local law survey in over 20 jurisdictions and negotiating an agreement directly against a senior associate from a Magic Circle firm. This natural development of an attorney-client relationship can only be permitted at trainee level by a training contract like Cleary's, where there are no unnatural end-of-seat 'hand-overs'. In addition to advising numerous Wall Street clients during one of the most stressful periods in the history of the financial services industry, I also managed to enjoy being a New Yorker for half a year and to take advantage of the firm's season tickets to the Knicks!

Next year: Cleary recently continued its tradition of retaining 100% of qualifying trainees. Unlike at other firms, trainees at Cleary are not required to qualify into a particular department or practice group. This multi-specialist approach to development means that, upon qualification, I will not be assigned to work in one narrow area, but will continue to work on transactions in a number of the firm's practice areas.

Social: To get a feel of what life is like as a lawyer at Cleary, it is as simple as dining in the cafeteria at lunchtime. Commensurate with Cleary's collegiate atmosphere, partners, trainees and associates sit together. Our lawyers also organise frequent informal nights out and benefit from the firm's popular vacation scheme events, which have recently included in 2009 a drinks reception at Vertigo 42, polo lessons at Guards Polo Club and clay pigeon shooting at the Four Seasons in Hampshire.