William Lucas, January – March 2018

I spent ten valuable weeks working at Mariscal Abogados in Madrid as part of my year abroad at University College London where I study French & Spanish. I was keen to explore the possibility of pursuing a legal career by spending time in an international law firm.

A major benefit of this internship programme is its relatively small intake of interns. This translates to significant responsibility, in addition to allowing us to work closely with the firm’s lawyers at all levels of seniority. I found this incredibly valuable; it allowed me to quickly adapt and settle in, despite this having been both my first experience working in a legal environment and living in Spain on a full-time basis. The firm is also flexible in terms of assigning work to interns, and keen to accommodate individual preferences. I, for instance, worked most closely with the Employment department but was also able to complete tasks in other areas of law, assisting teams including Litigation and Arbitration, Corporate and Real Estate. It was exciting to undertake work for international, high-profile clients and to become familiar with their operations and individual cases through working with them on a long-term basis.

If you’re considering a career in law and are looking for relevant experience in an international firm, I would strongly recommend that you apply to Mariscal Abogados. The firm has a genuine open-door policy meaning that everyone is friendly, approachable and more than happy to answer queries and offer you constructive feedback on your work. I have grown immensely in terms of linguistic ability, cultural awareness and familiarity with the law during my time here.

William Lucas
University College London