Think global 

Founded on Wall Street in 1901, White & Case is still known for its stellar banking and finance practice in New York. However, from the 1960s onwards the firm strived to catapult itself across the globe, and today it advises clients in almost every area of law that affects cross-border business. Currently, it has 37 offices worldwide, only five of which are in the USA. The London office, founded in 1971, is a linchpin of the firm’s global finance practice, and many of this office’s Chambers UK rankings are for finance-related matters, including banking, capital markets, trade and asset finance, and project finance.

Training partner Philip Stopford explains how and why the UK is central to White & Case’s future: “The London and New York offices together count for around 40% of the firm. White & Case consciously has a strategy where it wishes to ensure they continue to have significant size, capacity and critical mass.” Rather than simply build up these two business centres, the aim is to move London lawyers out and around the globe. “Clearly,” Stopford adds, “English law is the leading law for the prospective international and commercial transaction. We need to be in the position where we can move lawyers from London to other areas where English law is practised. Within the last year, we’ve moved lawyers from London to Abu Dhabi, Moscow, Warsaw and Paris to name a few. We are an organisation that is light on English lawyers worldwide.”

As well as being an exciting time within the London office, then, the firm looks for trainees who are globally minded. A selling point of White & Case is the guaranteed seat abroad: increasingly, there are opportunities within the firm for lawyers to spend time overseas post-qualification, or even to qualify into another office.

Plane finance 

Once decided on their overseas seat (most trainees will do it in their last seat before qualification), trainees rank their London seat preferences from one to three. At least six months will be spent in a finance-based seat under either the banking and capital markets or energy, infrastructure, project and asset finance (EIPAF) groups. Other potential destinations are corporate M&A, construction, employment, IP, litigation and real estate. Trainees sit in a room with their supervisor and may get all their work fed through them or may be able to pick up work from other members of the team. Supervisors can also be chosen so, rather than the element of “luck” in other training contracts, “if you’re diligent you’ll work out who the best people are and put them down.”

EIPAF makes up roughly half of White & Case's finance practice, and its deals involve the funding of international oil and gas projects, and advising banks when they fund airlines to acquire planes. The team recently advised CIT Group on the ECA financing of 34 Airbus aircraft leased to multiple airlines. It also advised The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ as lender and Euler Hermes as guarantor on the ECA financing of aircraft for Air Arabia. The projects team worked on the $1.1bn Zayed University New Campus and, a little closer to home, represented Serco after it won the £140m contract to kit London out with 6,000 bicycles across nine boroughs. Boris Bikes aside, matters tend to be massive and international. Trainees in asset and project finance consequently have a set quota of tasks: they prepare deal bibles, co-ordinate due diligence, proof-read, write the occasional note and ensure documents are signed. If the multi-jurisdictional nature of the deals is “exciting,” then work at trainee level can be “unsophisticated,” trainees reported. Day-to-day work might involve “photocopying, scanning and being a document pusher,” but it's important to add that many trainees also appreciate that this is a “hands-on introduction” to cross-border work.

Trainees in banking and capital markets have an experience broadly similar to that in EIPAF. They do get more outside contact: “I had the client calling me directly, without the partner ever being on the line,” said one. Tasks included “some drafting, but mainly I was checking prospectuses and changing comments as documents went to the printers.” All our sources who had visited banking had worked though the night at least once. “It's because you don't have control over the timetable,” they explained. “If you get given documents to review then you have to review them until they're done.” The team has been increasingly involved in debt restructures: some examples being its involvement with the $21bn restructuring of Kazakhstan's BTA Bank and Alliance Bank, and its advising of GSO on its refinancing of Almatis, which enabled the company to come out of bankruptcy.

If White & Case's corporate practice isn't as renowned as its finance teams, then it is still Chambers UK-ranked alongside the likes of Jones Day, Baker & McKenzie and Latham & Watkins for high-end M&A. In 2011, the firm acted on a number of large international matters, for example advising Eton Park on the acquisition of retailer Ruch S.A. from the Polish government, and representing one of Russia's largest dairy companies on a joint venture with the Russian arm of French foods giant Danone. Trainees may receive both M&A and equity capital markets work. One “worked on an original public offering, mainly keeping on top of the due diligence side of things – what's in the data room or analysing agreements – but also some drafting.” The future looks bright for the department, and as Philip Stopford says: “There's a long-term strategy to continue to build out our M&A practice in London.”

Bundles of fund-les 

The dispute resolution group is highly regarded by Chambers UK, and the litigation seat is popular among trainees because of the “really lovely” team as well as “reasonable working hours.” Large amounts of bundling are rewarded by “going to court or shadowing a QC. Even if the work isn't the most interesting, you'll be rewarded: people are grateful – irrespective of how busy they are you'll get a thank-you e-mail.” What do trainees do? At the time of our calls, they were seeing an unusually high level of doc review, as well as “general admin tasks and research.” The team represented Siemens in a dispute with several ex-employees who disclosed confidential technology to their new employees. It also acted for aircraft leasers Babcock & Brown after a Boeing 737-300 was delivered late by AirAsia. There's also a large international arbitration practice, from which trainees may have the opportunity to get work, and a construction litigation team.

Trainees love their overseas seat. Going to a smaller office (often as one of few English-speaking lawyers) has its benefits. “It’s the biggest selling point,” explained one, “as you’re seen as someone who's much more experienced. I enjoyed the responsibility, and there was a lot more law involved.” There will often be a lot more legal research required of trainees, in addition to “a huge amount of drafting” which ensures “you will come back much more confident.” If there's an element of leaping in the dark, all sources assured us how “well looked-after” they felt, as “HR say you can call them any time with problems.” Would it be fair to say that the chance to work away is the focal point of a training contract at White & Case? No, says Philip Stopford. “The overseas seat is critically important to us, but no more so than any other seat. If someone has been over to another office, then they have the ability to communicate better with that office. One of the things that vac scheme students always say is it’s astounding how much of our work is cross-border. The overseas seat is just a natural progression of our work.” Trainees can currently opt for Brussels, Frankfurt, Moscow, Paris, Prague, Abu Dhabi, Almaty, Beijing, Hong Kong, Johannesburg, Singapore, Tokyo, or try their luck at the most popular choice: New York.

Live to work 

If we’ve given you the impression that trainee hours can be long, then it’s because they certainly can be. Rather than just being “stuck on boring tasks,” many sources said: “People don’t work viciously hard because they’re made to, it’s because they want to.” White & Case employs the ‘eat what you kill’ approach to partner remuneration (meaning partners' pay is dependent on the business they bring in, rather than on their seniority), and this ethos of entrepreneurialism can rub off on how trainees approach their workload. “There are people here who work all day and all night and there are opportunities to go mental: there are some extremely hard-working and focused individuals.” Another summed up the equally present hierarchy: “The deals are big, and they really are high-value transactions. For juniors, that creates a certain type of work. A certain type of person enjoys that. Now, you’ll be photocopying until 2am, but in a few years you’ll be flying off to negotiate with an oligarch in Kazakhstan. It’s not necessarily negative, but it’s the nature of the beast.”

Here’s another perspective: “You have to be hard-working and really want to be here. Yes, you have to do some things that are less interesting, but that goes hand in hand with wonderful opportunities.” If trainees had gripes, they aren't reflected in the acceptance of NQ jobs. White & Case had another sterling year, retaining 15 out of 16 qualifiers.

There is “a social scene if you want it.” New starters across the firm get a trip to Bruges for an integration programme, and trainees often continue friendships throughout their time at White & Case. On top of a “beautiful” summer party at Sky Bar there are frequent impromptu Friday trips to nearby boozers in the City like Rocket, a bar and restaurant snuggled in a courtyard between Threadneedle Street and Old Broad Street, very near the office. Interviewees were glad that the ever-growing intake is still “small enough for everyone to know each other.”

And finally... 

“I was looking for firms which had the best work, the highest profile and international clients,” one trainee told us. The chance to spend time abroad isn't to be sniffed at either, we might add.