What attracted you to your role?
I was initially attracted to the unique overlap of commercial, scientific, and legal knowledge required for the role. I wanted to continue learning about the broad range of scientific concepts and technologies that I had studied in my degrees, so the opportunity to work with industry leaders across a variety of technologies without being restricted to one particular technical field really appealed to me.
So far, I have not been let down: in just one week, I can be working on inventions relating to batteries, pharmaceuticals, sustainability, food compositions, carbon capture technologies and so on. I expect that the opportunities to learn new things will continue throughout my career too, as the science and the law are constantly developing.
What do you do in a typical day?
It’s a bit of a cliché, but it’s true that no two days are the same in this job! Although each trainee has a dedicated line manager, you are not confined to working with just one person. I regularly receive work from across the team, which means I get to learn from everyone in the department and work with a range of clients too.
A ‘typical’ day might include working on 2-4 different cases, or just focusing on one complex case. Work ranges from chatting to clients about their new invention(s) and drafting a patent application, to discussing strategies to get a patent application to grant and beyond.
Some days may also involve researching and writing articles for our website, catching up on developments in the law, and attending our internal training sessions. There’s also lots of opportunities to ask questions and learn from everyone around me throughout the day, which is incredibly helpful as there’s a lot to learn!
As I’m part of Potter Clarkson’s Inclusivity Group, some days also include discussing and implementing events, policies, and ideas to continue to improve the diversity and inclusivity of our firm.
Do you have any advice for anyone wanting to enter the profession?
As it is quite a competitive profession to get into, I would say not giving up, and instead trying to obtain feedback from any unsuccessful applications so that you can use it to tailor future applications. The factor that probably helped me most with my applications was persuading an IP firm to give me a week’s work experience, and being able to talk about that in interviews.
Other tips include making sure you can explain you research project/dissertation in ‘simple terms’, taking any opportunities to learn more about IP (especially anything that gives you an insight into how IP factors into commercial decisions), and not being afraid to ask for reasonable adjustments in the application process if you need them.
