When you arrive at the office for the assessment day, you will begin with a written exercise. This requires no legal knowledge and advance preparation is not expected. It will be based around a fictional business, which is going through a strategic review process. You will be provided with various pieces of information, which might make up around five or six pages of reading. You will then need to write your own report once you have assimilated the relevant information. An example from a previous student is that they were asked to advise the CEO of a construction company on three potential business growth strategies, and decide on the best option. They were provided with graphs and charts to help in their judgement.
After the written exercise, you will be provided with a short current affairs article to read. You will be given fifteen minutes in which to do this. This is typically drawn from the Financial Times, and as such you should read the FT regularly in advance of the interview. You can take notes whilst you read the article.
This article will then form part of the discussion that you will have with the partners during your partners interview.
The Partners Interview
This is the principal interview of the day. You should expect questions relating to your CV, your commercial awareness, your motivation for joining Slaughter & May, and the article that you just read.
You will be expected to show an ability to assimilate information, identify the most pertinent issues from it, and then articulate your point of view. You must form an opinion and defend this opinion as appropriate. You should ‘expect to be challenged on your views.’
Previous questions asked during the partners interview include:
- Can you summarise the key issues raised in the article?
- What are the main themes, arguments and conclusions (if any)?
- Do you agree or disagree with the arguments put and the position taken in the article and why?
- Are the arguments provided in the article coherent and logical?
- Are there relevant issues which are not touched on or developed in the article?
- Why your university?
- Why law?
- Explain the disparity between your highest and lowest university grade.
- What was your dissertation about?
- Where else have you applied?
- What A levels did you take?
- Why did you choose your A Levels?
- Why did you do a Law degree / why didn’t you do a Law degree?
- Why Slaughter & May?
Interview with HR
This is the final part of the recruitment process. From previous trainees, it is assessed – whether Slaughter & May admit this or not. You will be asked to reflect on the day, as well as provide further discussion of your CV and motivation for applying.