When I finished my A-Levels I had an offer to study law at university. But I still wasn’t confident that the university route was the right one for me, so I decided to take a gap year as I was unsure of what to do next.
I started a new part-time role, but I was really looking for something more permanent, or some work experience in the legal sector. But I found it difficult to find the opportunities I was looking for. When I was in Sixth Form, there was lots of information about the opportunities that were out there. However, I couldn’t find anything aimed at gap year students or people my age who hadn’t gone to uni. There were legal roles aimed at students in sixth form or at university, but nothing for people like me, who were in the middle.
Although I knew I did have some skills, I felt these probably weren’t polished enough to start a career. There were aspects like teamwork and communication that I had developed during school, but I wasn’t sure if I was ready for a corporate environment. I still wasn’t confident in just being myself, or in my ability to do a good job application and then perform well enough at an interview to get an offer.
I found out about LTSB from a member of the 2024 law cohort. When she found out I was also interested in Law, she recommended the LTSB Law Programme. I saw that the programme was advertised as a boot camp for young people who were yet to go to uni but were still interested in a legal career. I could see we would be visiting law firms, and I really wanted to see this for myself: it just aligned with all my goals. So, I decided to give it a try: I reached out, had an interview and then I was offered a place!
While LTSB did offer the chance to visit many different law firms, what I really wanted to get out of the programme was developing my transferable skills. I could see we would have to give presentations and I knew that my confidence in communicating wasn’t the strongest so I could definitely improve it during this program.
When we visited Kroll, they asked us to create a SWOT analysis on potential cybersecurity attack. Our group then had to present this to the President of Risk Advisory and I volunteered myself to give the presentation. This was very intimidating, but at the same time it was exactly what I really needed to push my confidence. What I really appreciated was the fact I was able to communicate my team’s ideas and present these in a way that I could be proud of.
With all the practice we did on presentations and communication, I came out of the programme a lot more assured in my abilities. For my new role, I had three interviews and if I hadn’t completed this programme, I know I wouldn’t have been as confident and as driven as I was able to be in my apprenticeship interview.
The main challenges for me were around communication and confidence. I’ve only recently started trying to push myself to be more confident and more vocal in my ideas and my own perspectives. I was always fairly quiet as school, and I didn’t really speak up.
Now that I’m older, I realise that people will listen my ideas, I just need to be more vocal about it. Since I took part in the LTSB programme, I’ve been much more able to speak up and share my perspectives.
The biggest difference and the most enjoyable thing for me was definitely working with my cohort. When you take a gap year you can feel quite isolated, but being on the programme with other people who were my age and in similar situations became a really important support network for me. When we catch up now, we still always check in and see how we can help one another.
I was also surprised by how supportive LTSB has been. Once you have done work experience people don’t usually keep in touch afterwards. But with LTSB, Debs has always kept in touch and checked in with us, asking what’s going on and if there’s anything she can help with.
My interview skills have definitely improved. Now, I can walk into an interview knowing what I want to talk about, and I can do it in a way that sounds quite natural. I definitely saw the fruits of this during NatWest’s LG&RA work experience, where I managed to stay calm during a mock interview, where I could only answer with one word!
After the boot camp, Debs messaged me to tell me about an upcoming insight day at a leading construction firm. One of the professionals we met was the Company Secretary. I listened to her describing her job, which was just as engaging as a legal career but you get a broader insight into the business by supporting board members.. I never knew that this was something I could do, and I immediately started looking for roles in compliance and government. Without that insight day, I wouldn’t have found my apprenticeship.
I have now secured a Level 4 apprenticeship in governance, and I will spend 18 months as a junior governance officer. This will involve supporting the governance team, making sure clients follow their own policies and procedures to ensure their business is running properly.
I’m very excited about starting my apprenticeship. There’s such a big difference going from a gap year to a corporate role (and that does bring some nervousness) but the skills I’ve developed and the areas I’ve improved on make me much more prepared for the role than I was before.
