The Hot 100 career quiz: “Pupillage in the ’90s really prepared you for the gritty parts of life at the Bar”

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

I remember routinely, standing in front of a photocopier, sometimes into the wee hours preparing bundles for the Court of Appeal, for one silk or another in chambers for a hearing the following day in the Court of Appeal and the following morning, being sent to Horseferry Road Magistrates Court with ‘a brief’ consisting of a Post It note with a name on it, sometimes spelt right, and having to swap cigarettes for instructions from the ’Old Lag’ who could see that you were cabbage green.

Pupillage in those dates (the very late 1990s!) utterly prepared you for the gritty and unglamorous parts of life at the Bar as a junior barrister, and it certainly installed in you the lifelong work ethic, vital to this job.

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

“Don’t turn anything down as you don’t know where it will lead and what doors it will open.” Mark Milliken- Smith KC.

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

Politeness and kindness costs nothing and is a powerful tool as well as the right way to behave. It is disarming to your opponents, nearly always gets back to the Judge from the Court staff and gets the best out of your case team.

While this job is not a personality contest, you will be remembered, respected, trusted and repeatedly instructed if you are thought of as a decent, minded team player, who can get the best out of those around you, rather than someone who is rude and unapproachable and gets the backs of others up.

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

After a little time at the Bar, she switched to academia and writing comedy and novels. Her debut novel The Negligents (by Kate Smith) beautifully combines all of the above.