To help you consider which area of law you might wish to practice, this blog shares with you three examples of very different practice areas, Family Law, Restructuring and Insolvency Law, and Clinical Negligence.

The College of Legal Practice held a virtual event in November 2023 about becoming a solicitor and the panellist were experienced solicitors in these three practice areas. Here they describe their work and what they enjoy about it.

Restructuring and insolvency: Sophie Shaw

Sophie Shaw is a NQ solicitor specialising in restructuring and insolvency sharing her journey on @lawwithsophie

Firstly, I did a business degree, so I've kind of got that commercial background. So for me, commercial law was always what I thought I was going to do.

The first touch point I had with this area was a six month placement that I did on my university degree with an accountancy firm within the insolvency team. Then two of the vacation schemes I did, were in insolvency teams too. So I really started to develop an appreciation of what this area was. For me, what I love about insolvency law is also what makes it really difficult - there's so much to and it's a really technical area.

And it's really quite ironic that I've ended up in this area, because I would not say that I find it very interesting reading cases and looking at statute, that, frankly, is the least enjoyable bit of my job, but I have to do it so that I can advise on these technical aspects of my job.

So why I actually enjoy insolvency is because I work with businesses that are failing. and we need to try and find one solution from our toolkit that might work for them or might help them. And basically we have to get under the skin of that business. And even once they're in an insolvency process, we're basically their trusted advisor going through the process with them, and all sorts of random things would come up that outside of my field. So when I'm in the course of doing my insolvency work, I've worked with IP, employment, tax for example.

There's nothing I can say no to. For example, I was looking at Instagram's terms and conditions the other day to sell somebody's social media accounts. Hopefully that puts in context just how varied it is, and that's why I love it, it keeps me on my toes and every day is different.

But it does also mean that it's a challenge, and some days it would be nice to come into work and just know what's going to come on my desk. We all make our choices in life!

So, life as an insolvency lawyer, I would summarise as varied, and no two days are the same. I would describe it as very interesting, with lots of technical stuff that gets thrown up, but also quite chaotic.

Clinical Negligence – Fiona Bledge

Fiona Bledge is now a module leader at the College, but previously practised clinical negligence.

So I spent 12 years working as a solicitor and I loved that work. I worked in personal injury and clinical negligence. I come from a medical background, as my father was a GP and my mom was a midwife, so I think I was really interested in the medical side as well. So spent real 12 years working at 2 or 3 firms, and they were wonderful firms really enjoyed it.

I worked with clients who had suffered an adverse medical incidents.

For example, there is an allegation that a medical professional so a hospital or a doctor has acted negligently. We would have to prove that something had gone wrong with the treatment received and as a result the client was now suffering with injuries, or other adverse effects.

The clients would instruct me as a solicitor to try and gather some evidence. This is why the cases are so involved and not straightforward. I needed to gather some evidence as to what had gone on, what had happened and whether what had happened was indeed negligent. It's not quite so easy to prove and that that's really why that area is law is so interesting to me. The medical profession doesn't always agree. Sometimes these cases go to trial and they can be more interesting than, say, a straightforward road traffic accident.

I enjoyed this area of law, because you can get very involved with the cases and they do have a real sense of purpose. You have a real sense of achieving something meaningful for claimants.

Family Law  - Sana Saddique

Sana Saddique is a qualified family specialist solicitor who runs her own family firm.

I really wanted to be able to have the ability to go to court and advocate on my own hearings, which again, it's not. It's not possible in some areas of law, but it is within family, because there's a lot of court hearings. So family was what naturally aligned for me in terms of what I wanted from my job and from my career overall, all the best elements of the legal profession, all rolled into one.

The most important thing for me, is that it gave me the time to have one to one interaction with clients which I really wanted within my role.

There's no typical day as a family lawyer. The work is extremely varied. I think. Often people think of family law and think it's just divorce work, for example, but there's so much which comes under the umbrella of family law. So I tend to deal with divorce matters, disputes to do with children custody matters, parents that have separated, and one parent isn't being able to spend any time with the children anymore due to hostility between them.

After the separation, I deal with prenuptial agreements, which is a very new and up and coming topic within the UK at the moment. It's think which has been very common in America for a long time, and we're now seeing an influx of that coming through in the UK. So there's been a surge of prenuptial agreements.

But I also tend to deal with international matters concerning children. So if a parent has taken a child abroad without consent of the other parent trying to locate that child, get them back safely to the UK. Or if a parent wants to move abroad on a longer term basis with a child after separation or divorce going through the correct channel, so that they have the permission and the authority to do that whilst maintaining the relationship for the child with the other parents.

So I don't have any days which are straightforward. They're very, very varied. Some aspects of work involving emergency work as well. If we're dealing with domestic abuse matters, for example. So sometimes I get into work, and it's a case of ignoring everything on my to do list and everything in my diary and just knowing I have to firstly deal with this emergency call that's come through. But those are the sorts of things that I would be dealing with.