Hot 100 career quiz: Bestway’s Rabiah Younus Sheikh

What’s your most vivid memory from being a trainee?

During my training contract, I remember assisting a partner on the defence for a case contingent on the defendant (our client) not being aware of the facts which the claimant alleged. I remember sitting through call after call where the client insisted they had no knowledge of the facts the claimant alleged. At one point the client sent us a large bundle of all correspondence they had with the claimant.

As a trainee, I was tasked to go through the large bundle of correspondence… where I of course found an email from the client to the claimant setting out all of the facts the claimant was now alleging. I remember taking this email in to the partner’s office, watching the blood drain from his face and holding his face in his hands exasperated as he explained to the client we no longer had a defence to the claim.

Lesson learnt… never assume you’ve been told the whole truth!

What is the wisest thing anyone ever said to you (and who said it)?

“Never take what you have for granted. You never know when you might lose it.”

Whilst this is sound advice from my father for life in general, when it comes to my career I’ve taken it to mean that you never settle for what you have and you should always stay hungry for more. His hard work and determination is something I strive to replicate in my career, particularly when facing challenging circumstances where he’s always encouraged us to ask “what opportunities and lessons does this bring?”.

Who (for better or worse) has been the most influential person in your career? Why?

Throughout my years as a solicitor I’ve always wondered whether I ought to have found a mentor to help me focus on my career aspirations and developments. Looking back now I realise it was best that I didn’t look for one person to influence me, instead I was exposed to a great wealth of experience in many people I worked with; my supervisors, my colleagues and even my opposing counsel.

If I had to single out one then I would say it’s litigation partner Peter Babb, who I was fortunate enough to be seconded to, become a client of and ultimately remain friends with. Of the many things I learnt from him and which I try to live up to, the most valuable lessons for me were how to motivate a team, how to advise clients without the legal jargon and how to approach any subject as a generalist rather than a specialist.

He gave me the confidence to take on a role at Bestway despite my limited experience and he was most certainly right about the learning curve I was about to ride once I was in!

What advice would you give to someone who wants to get to where you are/do the job you do?

If you’re a lawyer, people will assume you have the right legal skills and so the real question is what makes you stand out from all the other brilliant lawyers in the room?

Be inquisitive, build good relationships and foresee curveballs! Be a “trusted friend” to the business so that they want to come and share their candid views with you. Understand what drives the business so that they know you appreciate what’s incentivising them. Ask what keeps your colleagues awake at night so that you can try mitigate risk. But at the end of it all, accept that you won’t always have the answer to everyone’s problems…that’s when you fall back on the network you’ve built to ensure that you always know someone who does.

What’s your best friend from law school doing now?

My two close friends from law school are great examples of the different routes available to qualify as a solicitors. One has followed a very traditional route by qualifying in private practice, moving in-house to a multi-national airline and subsequently setting off to start his own firm, while the other is due to qualify through a non-traditional route after years of working her way up a legal team in a global marketing agency.

It just goes to show whether you have a traditional route into “Legal” or not, ambition, skill and determination is enough to get you to where you want to be!