Visual impairment
Clifford Chance is one of the world's pre-eminent law firms. With a global reach and thousands of lawyers working from dozens of offices around the world, we offer expert advice to clients on all aspects of commercial law.
We work with multinationals, governments and regulatory bodies across five continents. Many of our deals are newsworthy. Often, they demand the kind of knowledge that only international, cross-practice teams can provide.
Our reputation in the field is formidable. We have more band 1 rankings than any other firm in Chambers Global 2017. That’s why organisations turn to us not just for legal expertise but for advice on their most critical business issues.
It’s not enough to have an expert understanding of law. Our clients need people with real commercial acumen. People who can bring their insight and imagination to complex problems. People who can act as trusted business advisers and deliver the results that matter.
This is what our seven practice areas provide. As a trainee, you’ll see for yourself exactly how by having the opportunity to experience a variety of seats.
Whatever your path, you’ll gain an insight into our global deals, our high-profile clients and our collaborative culture. As an integral member of the team, you’ll also rapidly develop your legal and business skills.
As a responsible business, we support our people in developing resilience and managing their wellbeing. We believe these are fundamental blocks in building a sustainable business and providing excellent service to all our clients.
We are committed to attracting, developing and retaining the best team to deliver the very highest level of service to our clients. As part of this commitment, we invest in our people’s wellbeing so that they can perform at their full potential. This means caring for their physical and mental health.
We have made it a strategic objective to support our people in developing their resilience. One way in which we are doing this is through our Employee Assistance Programme, which provides individual support from trained counsellors as well as fast access to a range of services, including life management advice. Following successful trials in a number of locations, our Employee Assistance Programme is now being rolled out to all of our offices worldwide.
We realise that working in a law firm can be a pressurised and demanding environment. Our wellbeing agenda aims to ensure our people are able to recognise and appreciate the importance of maintaining good mental health and in building their resilience and ability to operate healthily and successfully. Promoting a healthy lifestyle is another focus. We support our people in making healthier choices and encourage them to view exercise as a social activity.
As a graduate recruitment team, we are extremely open and encourage applicants to inform us if they ever need any adjustments to our process. We deal with every individual on a case by case basis and have made adjustments accordingly from the more common time extension of the online tests to inviting candidates into the office ahead of their assessment day to familiarise themselves with the building to ease their anxiety…and everything in between.
Visual impairment
We offer the following positions:
First Years
First year springboard is a week long paid programme made up of classroom based sessions, work shadowing and a trip to an international office. At the end of the programme you will have the opportunity to apply for and secure a Training Contract.
Penultimate year
Summer vacation scheme is a two week paid programme where you send time in two of our practice areas as well as attending social and networking events. On the final day you will be interviewed for a Training Contract.
Training Contract
Our Training Contract is a two year programme where you spend 6 months in 4 of our practice areas. One of these could be international and there is also the possibility of shorted client secondments.
We want every candidate to have exactly the same chance to get through our recruitment process so if there is anything that you are worried about then please speak to us and we will do our best to accommodate any adjustments.
We are looking for individuals with the skills such as team work, resilience, attention to detail and building relationships – as long as you are able to demonstrate these then that is all that matters.
Ask for adjustments early
Please do not wait until afterwards to tell us that there was a problem as that is often too late.
It is your decision to be open
Part of this discussion will be whether you need/want anyone to know about your disability.
We operate a blind CV policy
Whereby your interviewers do not know anything about you so you can choose what you tell them.
We are looking for individuals with the skills such as team work, resilience, attention to detail and building relationships – as long as you are able to demonstrate these then that is all that matters.
When students are going through our recruitment process and they need any type of adjustment, we need them to be completely open and upfront about what they need. If it is feasible then we will do whatever we can to accommodate this.
We have made a number of adjustments to our process such as
At every stage of our process, we ask if you require any adjustments but you can always contact us on graduate.recruitment@cliffordchance.com or 020 7006 4005.
If you need adjustments then please always give the employer as much notice as possible. It can be very disruptive if you want until you are about to start an exercise with other candidates on an assessment day to announce that you need extra time for example. Please also do not wait until you have been unsuccessful to tell us about something that could have made your experience more comfortable. We rely on you to tell us what it is that you need.
As a Firm we make reasonable adjustments for all individuals to enable them to carry out their role. This can be anything from a different type of mouse, specialist software to help with various disabilities or allowing extra time to complete tasks. As each person may have specific requirements and these can vary we ensure that their individual needs are addressed to the best of our ability.
Our building is fully accessible and an Accessibility Audit was completed when we first moved into the building and another is due to take place later this year.
The list of adjustments made to date is endless. We just encourage and urge individuals to share their particular challenges so hopefully we can address these and provide the appropriate support.
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