Dorsey & Whitney - True Picture

Dorsey & Whitney training contract review 2026

The Firm

As the old saying goes, good things come in small packages. While it’s generally true that US firms in London often have smaller trainee cohorts than the British-born heavyweights, nowhere is that more true than at Dorsey. The firm recruits just two trainees a year, but “while it’s  a small cohort in a small office, it’s part of a much larger US firm,” one interviewee told us.

With 17 North American offices, and three outposts in Asia, Dorsey is a long way from being a small fish in a big pond and is recognised in Chambers UK for its corporate work, alongside a host of rankings across the pond, including a top-tier corporate ranking in the firm’s home state of Minnesota. “It’s a small working environment, but it’s a full-service offering,” Joseph Lewin, the firm’s training principal, explains, “the core of what we do in London is corporate and transactional work, and the majority of the team focuses on that.”

“…while it’s a small cohort in a small office, it’s part of a much larger US firm.”

As Lewin adds, there’s benefits that come with a smaller cohort: “Given the size of the office and how it works, we almost out of necessity need to offer a strong degree of responsibility. We don’t have a pyramid-style leverage structure where we can afford to lose a trainee on a disclosure task or verification for four months, so the trainees from day one are phoning clients, speaking to the other side, getting involved in drafting, and forming a core part of the team.” This was something trainees echoed too: “You’re going to get access to high-level work and cross-border transactions. You get a lot of ownership and one-to-one feedback.”

The Seats

Dorsey follows the typical training contract pattern, with trainees completing four six-month rotations. The firm allocates seats without a formal process, but everyone completes at least one corporate seat, one litigation seat, and a float seat which can vary in content depending on business need. That float seat exposes trainees to the firm’s real estate and IP work, but can also involve more typical corporate, litigation and dispute matters depending on how active each team is, and the interests of individual trainees.

While random seat allocation at other firms can cause some grumbles, it wasn’t an issue for Dorsey trainees, who told us that “seats are allocated randomly, because you’ll have to do them all anyway, so it’s not so much of a bother for us.” The other thing to note here is that it helps for trainees to be flexible, as they are expected to be pulled onto matters in departments they’re not formally working with. That’s all down to business need and the size of the office, but it can certainly make for a varied training contract experience!

“…when it was sent to the client, I could see the improvements that had been made, and I learnt a lot through that.”

The firm’s main focus in London is its corporate work, which revolves around almost every kind of transaction you can think of, from M&A and joint ventures to venture capital, IPOs and debt market transactions. In one recent deal, the firm advised one of the UK’s largest petrol forecourt operator, on its acquisition of 337 petrol forecourts across the UK.

Trainees with experience in the team were pleased with the level of responsibility they’d been given: “I would do the first drafts of a lot of things, like deed variations, and then a junior associate would check on them, but it was nice because I got to do it from scratch.” Writing a first draft might seem a daunting task, but one interviewee explained that “I’d look at the precedents and really try my best with the task, and then when it was sent to the client, I could see the improvements that had been made, and I learnt a lot through that.”

Whilst there were still more traditional trainee tasks like drafting board minutes, due diligence, and keeping on top of matter trackers, a source shared that “I think you are given quite a lot of independence because it’s small teams.” Another source was particularly impressed by how their responsibility had increased over time in the corporate department: “I was able to get involved in first drafts of corporate authorisations, SPAs and other ancillary documents, and then became more involved in the signing process and reviewing leads as time went on.”

Dorsey’s trial seat covers the spectrum of contentious work, including high court litigation and international arbitration, corporate investigations and data breach investigations. Dorsey’s London team are regularly working with the firm’s offices overseas, including partners and associates in the US. In one recent case, the London office (in conjunction with the Seattle office) worked on a multi-million dollar probate matter where most of the contested assets were in England and Italy.

The London office was involved in searches for the relevant assets, and applications to the English Court to allow the deposition of a number of witnesses located across England, Wales, Scotland and Italy. Trainees were similarly positive about the level of responsibility they’d been given, with sources sharing that they’d been able to meet clients, send emails directly, and had also “attended meetings where it was just me, one associate and a barrister, which was really good exposure.”

Litigation naturally involved more research than corporate work, but trainees told us that “what’s interesting about litigation is that there’s a lot of multi-jurisdictional work. I did some work where we had to research the law in Arabic, so that involved translating it and trying to grasp concepts in different jurisdictions, which was really interesting.”

For trainees looking to experience the firm’s smaller supporting practice areas like real estate and IP, the firm’s ‘float’ seat presents a great opportunity. We heard that, for trainees more interested in litigation, it was possible to keep contentious work going while in the seat. The seat allows juniors to work in departments not typically offered as seats on their own and for smaller groups with a lower headcount.

Trainee Life

While trainees describing the culture at Dorsey as “very friendly and very non-hierarchical” might not seem to tell you much, our interviewees went further to explain that “people respect that you have a life outside of the office. You’re obviously expected to work very hard and take your job very seriously, but everyone wants you to have a nice life, and they value that.”

Though partners outnumber trainees at the firm three to one, one interviewee explained that “they’ve built an environment where partners are less intimidating because I see them so much, so it’s actually been really good.”

It would be easy to assume that an office of its size would be lacking on the social side of things, but we heard that at Dorsey, partners take it in turns to host office drinks at the end of each month, and they got great reviews from the firm’s trainees: “It’s not just awkwardly doing 30 minutes and then going home. People do enjoy them and look forward to them!”

The firm orders in lunch once a fortnight and hosts your more typical Christmas and Summer parties too. When it comes to diversity and inclusion, trainees were positive and impressed at how much work the office’s diversity committee gets involved in given its size. They shared that the firm had recently hosted students from the Sutton Trust for work experience and were part of the GROW mentorship programme too.

“I got to learn through observing what they talk about with clients, how they give instructions to other people, and what it’s like to work with people from a certain country or industry.”

There was plenty of positivity about how supportive lawyers at the firm are. One rookie beamed, “people more senior than you are always very happy to help,” and that feedback was easy to come by. “You typically get feedback and sometimes it might be obvious, but it’s nice to hear when you submit something and you’ve done a good job,” explained one interviewee.

Trainees typically share offices with their supervisors, and “one of the benefits is just that I got to learn through observing what they talk about with clients, how they give instructions to other people, and what it’s like to work with people from a certain country or industry.” Sources also felt that this office set-up meant that you “you learn a lot from listening in and having someone to speak to directly.”

There’s a mixture of formal and informal training sessions for trainees to get involved in: “I would say the bulk of it is learning on the job and asking partners and associates questions, so you have to use your initiative in that respect,” explained one insider.

The firm also involves trainees in delivering some firm-wide training sessions with another partner or associate, and “there are lunchtime sessions where someone will talk through a specific area, like a real estate partner talking about developments with the land registry, tax partners talking about things to be aware of on corporate matters, or litigation partners talking about governing law clauses.”

Trainees come into the office four times a week, and the policy for other fee-earners requires three days of office attendance. Interviewees were happy with the policy because they felt they learnt a lot from being in the office, and they were pleased with their working hours too.

Our interviewees noted they were typically leaving the office between 6pm and 8pm, though did add that “when I’m on a live deal and things are busy, it can be anything up to about midnight, so it varies depending on where you are in a deal.” They did reassure us that even when things can feel a little crazy, “there are busy periods, but you do get down-time as well.”

The firm recently had a salary increase at the junior end, but trainees told us that compensation wasn’t generally an issue: “It’s a trainee position and you’re not a trainee for the money, you’re there for the development and the career that comes after it, so I have no real complaints.”

They also shared that the qualification process at the firm is fairly informal and straightforward given the size of the office. The process starts with a conversations early on with the training principal as they go into their fourth seat, and they usually hear back around April or May once the US has signed off on any decisions. In 2025, the firm retained one of two qualifiers.

How to get a Dorsey & Whitney training contract

Training contract deadline: 30 June 2026

Initial applications 

Dorsey receives around 200 applications for its two training contract spots each year.

The first phase is simple: applicants need only submit a covering letter and CV. “You have to be quite succinct nailing down your experience and how it’s relevant to the firm,” according to trainees. “Ideally, we are looking for candidates who have a 2:1 from a reputable university,” according to training partner Joseph Lewin. 

Given the nature of Dorsey’s London office, applicants tend to be individuals who “want the best of both worlds: to work for a major international firm but also to be part of a smaller intake, where they can take on more responsibility and get more experience from the very start.” Paralegal experience is not essential. Of the most recent cohort, both have paralegalled at other firms before joining Dorsey. Lewin confirms that “paralegal experience is certainly helpful, but it is not the only thing that we are looking for. What we really want is well-rounded and self-motivated people who are going to make a real impact during their time at the firm.”

The interviews 

A group of lawyers combs through every application and invites around 20 candidates to a first-round interview. “The first stage is really a chat with one or two partners or a senior associate so we can get an understanding of you as a person,” Lewin says. “We are really looking for somebody who has a clear interest in the firm: someone that knows who we are and what we do.” 

Eight to ten strong performers then progress to round two. This involves writing a response to a practical legal problem, giving a five-minute presentation on a non-legal topic of the applicant’s choice, and a final interview with two Dorsey partners. Lewin explains that "we are looking for people who are confident on their feet, and who can analyse legal problems and present them in a clear and methodical way."

As for what not to do, Lewin advises that “candidates who haven’t done their research on the firm are the ones who often come off least well.” Fit is also very important at this stage, and applicants get to chat with a couple of the firm’s current trainees to see if they gel. Dorsey makes offers to the two candidates who perform best overall.