Burges Salmon LLP
1 Glass Wharf,
Bristol,
BS2 0ZX
Website www.burges-salmon.com
Burges Salmon is an ambitious, sustainable and law inclusive firm that ensures its clients, people and wider communities flourish.
Our vision is to be the market-leading independent UK law firm that provides the best proposition for our people and our clients.
By focusing on the markets and areas of expertise where we have extensive knowledge and experience, we achieve the best outcomes for our clients, who range from large organisations, entrepreneurial businesses and public sector bodies, to individuals, families and their global wealth. We are trusted to help them with everything from their everyday legal needs to their business critical issues and all points in between.
With offices in Bristol, Edinburgh, London, Dublin and Cardiff, the firm’s people work wherever clients need them to be, both within the UK and internationally. The firm works across the UK, with lawyers who are qualified to work in all three legal jurisdictions in the UK — England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Burges Salmon’s clients include organisations such as Yeo Valley, EDF, Octopus, Spire Healthcar,e The John Lewis Partnership, The Financial Services Compensation Scheme, FirstGroup, HSBC Bank plc, Virgin GROUP, Costain Group, The Crown Commercial Service, Babcock International Group and Highways England.
The quality of the firm’s expertise is widely recognised across its main departments including corporate and financial institutions, dispute resolution, planning, construction and engineering, projects, real estate and private client. The key sectors in which we operate are energy, power and utilities, financial services, infrastructure, private wealth, the public sector, real estate, and transport.
Burges Salmon’s six-seat training contract is designed to provide you with the greatest breadth of experience possible as a trainee. While traditional training contracts normally include four six-month seats, Burges Salmon’s includes six four-month placements. This ensures you gain the maximum exposure to it’s varied practice areas and experience a wide range of contentious and non-contentious work from across their main departments.
As a trainee you will be given early responsibility balanced with truly open-door support. From the beginning you will be learning from lawyers recognised as experts in their fields who are able to offer the advice and guidance you will need to develop into a trusted business adviser.
You won't find a restrictive hierarchy at Burges Salmon. Throughout your training contract you will be an integral part of the team, working alongside lawyers who are experts in their field and sharing a room with a supervisor who will support your growth and development. Working with a range of associates, senior associates and partners means you hit the ground running and experience a real variety of work from a range of personalities.
Bristol
Every year the firm runs a winter vacation scheme (one week), a spring vacation scheme (two weeks) and two summer vacation schemes (two weeks each), which are open to anyone who is eligible to apply for a training contract – regardless of your degree discipline or the length of time since you graduated.
Edinburgh
We are excited to launch our Edinburgh spring vacation scheme (one week). The firm will be recruiting trainees to be based from the Edinburgh office through the Edinburgh vacation scheme.
You will need to complete a Scots law degree (LLB) and the Diploma in Professional Legal Practice (PEAT STAGE 1).
During the scheme you will have the opportunity to visit one or two departments of your choice. The emphasis is on ‘real work’ and, under the guidance of your supervisor, you will have the chance to attend court or client meetings as well as skills sessions run by trainees and solicitors. In addition to this, there are many social and sports events throughout the placement that offer a real insight into life as a trainee solicitor. Allowance: £300 per week.
Annually reviewed competitive salary, 25 days paid annual leave, bonus scheme, pension scheme, private health care membership, life assurance, mobile phone, Christmas gift, corporate gym membership, sports and social club.
This year the firm will run three presentation evenings in November:
• 21 November 2023 – in our Bristol office
• 28 November 2023 – virtual event
• 23 November 2023 – in our Edinburgh office
Presentations are given by current trainees, a recruitment partner and the graduate recruitment team about life at the firm and the application process. There are also various other insight events throughout the year including open days and Food for thought' skills sessions. You can find out more by visiting our website.
We want our firm to represent the diverse communities in which we operate and we encourage applications from people of all backgrounds and identities. 98% of our people believe we have an open and inclusive workplace – come join them.
four key areas: gender, disability, ethnicity and LGBT+, all of which are underpinned with the ambition to provide social mobility within each of these groups. Each focus area has a strategic action plan and people-led networks to ensure engagement and support delivery.
We have a Gender Action Plan focussed on delivering gender balance across the firm, particularly in the partnership and senior business professional roles; designing a workplace accessible to those with additional caring responsibilities and ensuring all our people feel confident to progress in the workplace. We have been recognised as a Times Top 50 Employer for Women for the second year running, demonstrating the innovative work we’ve done in this area.
We have strong LGBT+ representation within our organisation. We are long-standing sponsors of Bristol Pride and Edinburgh Pride and we have a people-led network championing LGBT+ issues, BProud. We continue to implement best practice in LGBT+ inclusion through our involvement with Stonewall.
We have a Race Action Plan to continue to improve our ethnicity diversity representation within our workforce. Internally, we have an ethnic diversity reverse mentoring programme for key senior leaders, to ensure they continue to build inclusive and representative departments and processes.
We are committed to employing people with long-term health conditions, disabilities or impairments. We are a Disability Confident Employer, ensuring that we provide best practice in supporting out people and providing any adjustments or tools needed in the workplace.
Social mobility follows through each of our diversity and inclusion strands and we have been recognised as a Top 75 Employer for Social Mobility. We follow best practice, such as the Prime Commitment, and take part in local schemes, such as Bristol Future Talent Partnership and Women’s Work Lab.
We have developed active relationships with a number of community partners and local charities to support our efforts in diversity and inclusion. We continue to work with them to implement best practice for our people. To see the work we are doing in this area, please refer to the Responsible Business Report.
We support our people with a number of internal diversity networks:
BProud is our well established LGBT+ network. BProud welcomes both LGBT+ members and allies. The network promotes a culture where everyone is able to be open about their sexual orientation. BProud members run and attend many LGBT+ events through the year.
BCultured is our BAME network, established in 2018. BCultured aims to promote ethnic diversity and inclusion across all aspects of the firm. Through reverse mentoring, BCultured has helped us to build awareness and better understanding of different cultural perspectives and experiences.
Family Matters is a network that has been established for those with caring responsibilities in the firm. Family Matters aims to provide a space for people to discuss and share experiences openly and hold regular information events.
BEnabled is open to anyone who identifies as disabled, cares for someone with a disability or has a general interest in this area and wants to support the Firm in being an accessible and inclusive place to work. The aim of the forum is to ensure that our working environment is supportive, accessible and suitable for all of our people.
BBalanced is our gender network to help support better gender balance, to identify actions and working practices that better support and enable women in the workplace and to help direct certain benefits, traditionally geared towards a specific gender, more fairly to all.