“There are only a handful of firms that specialise in this sort of global capital markets work. So for many lawyers, it is all completely new to them and they need some convincing to try it. But once they do, there is no doubt that they really enjoy it.

“We deal with securities issues, debt and equity of all sorts – raising huge amounts of money for clients all over the world. The challenge is to make the product work whatever country and laws you are dealing with. For example, if you are borrowing or lending money in the Middle East, you have to get to grips with the local financial rules and systems - which may mean that you cannot pay interest! You also need to take into account different working practices.

“The weekend may start on a Thursday and end on Friday night for your borrower, so you need to take that into account when you need something doing quickly at the end of our working week. Because we can act for either party (the investment bank or the issuer), there is real variety and different levels of involvement. With an issuer who is coming to the market for the first time, you have to hold their hand through the process; and there’s no doubt you get to understand their business, especially when you are the one writing 50 pages or more about it for the disclosure document.

“One of the things that makes our group a little bit different is that no associate works just on any one partner’s team. It’s a bit of a free-for-all system, but in a good way! Associates can work for any partner, so you get a lot of choice over the kind of work you do and whom you do it for. This means you can pick and choose much more and work for a wider variety of clients than if you only worked for one or two partners. You can also take advantage of the best bits of the working styles of different partners.”