The first week at Attwells Solicitors is aimed to introduce you to the firm, make you feel welcomed and understand the way the firm functions.
Upon arrival, I was greeted by Emma and Dawn and met the other apprentices starting their journeys as paralegals at Attwells. Dawn started with an introduction session which included a tour of Attwells, key information and an overview of a system Attwells utilises (CASE) to log files of clients. I loved the tour of Attwells and appreciated the beautiful architecture, it was an exciting time meeting the people I will be working with for the next few years, and their warm and friendly demeanour made me feel right at home. We proceeded to have lunch with our new manager for the year – Charlotte Reason, it was a delight to chat with her and learn more about the exciting journey ahead. We ended the day with a team-building activity: the Murder Mystery puzzle, in which we had to deduce who the culprit was.
Tuesday was a day focused on mental health for lawyers led by Dawn, who is a Mental Health First Aider. Since being a lawyer can be a very demanding career, we were informed on ways of managing stress, achieving work-life balance and practicing different aspects of self-care which are essential to maintaining good mental health while managing a heavy workload. We were then introduced to a training website called ‘’MBL Seminars’, which Attwells uses to train their employees on a range of matters, from specific topics to a range of skills. After lunch, each of us was set a task of creating a poster on a chosen aspect of mental health – I chose resilience. I learnt what having resilience really means, what a lack of resilience looks like and how to improve your resilience.
The third day of the week was my favourite day. The day began with an overview of the different areas of law Attwells offers; conveyancing, commercial, litigation, private client and employment. After, we were informed about what our next 15 weeks at the firm will look like, going around the firm to learn how it operates and key information with the different sections: new business, marketing, cashiers, reception and compliance. After lunch, we had an exciting New Starter Session with the founder himself- Nick Attwell, who has the most fun and positive demeanour. Nick explained to us the history of Attwells, all the way from the startup in 2007 to this year and walked us through the goals and plans of Attwells for the next decade. He made all of us feel super welcome and was curious to find out about each of our individual life stories, while also sharing his, which made it a personal experience that enabled us to get to know each other further. The Starter Session made each of us super excited to begin our journeys, thanks to Nicks’s infectious positivity.
Thursday began with a quick office introduction, where we were shown the essentials from working phones, emailing, calendars, scanning post etc. After this, we were introduced to our mentors for the year and had a session on making the most out of the mentoring programme. Lunch was exciting on this day as we had a meet and greet with the conveyancing team and were treated to Bella Napoli. The day finished off with independent time at our desks, doing training on client care as it’s a crucial skill for Attwell’s lawyers.
Friday was a day of adventure as we tackled an Escape Room challenge as a team, it was the first activity of the day and it was super fun filled with puzzles we had to solve in order to make it out under a time limit. We then went out and grabbed some lunch as a group and came back into the office for an introduction to compliance. We learnt what compliance is at Attwells and the importance of being compliant as a lawyer, including what could happen if a lawyer fails to be compliant, which stressed its importance.
I am super thrilled to embark on this journey with such an amazing team and a firm that values not only excellence in law but also fostering a supportive and enthusiastic work environment.
