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K&L Gates

4.4
  • 1,000 - 50,000 employees

Annabel White

As a junior lawyer, we often do the first round of drafting. There are lots of precedents and examples in our system so it is easy to get a sense of the substance of these agreements.

5.45 AM

I don’t like waking up so early but I can't get to the gym this afternoon so I need go before work. I drag myself out of bed and jump on the bus to the CBD. I always read the AFR on my way to work to catch up on the headlines.

6.30 AM

Although I never feel like it when the alarm goes off, a morning Pilates class is a great way to start the day.

8.15 AM

I like get to work around this time to make a coffee and eat my breakfast. It's also a great time to make my to do list for the day and see if any emails have come in overnight that need urgent attention.

8.30 AM

One of the tasks I was working on yesterday is to amend a Deed of Settlement reflecting comments from the opposing solicitor. It's due later this morning so I do a final sense check to make sure everything thing is captured and send it off to the senior associate before they get in the office.

9.00 AM

The Finance team meeting is on Tuesday morning. Today it's a whole group meeting with colleagues from both banking & asset management and restructuring & insolvency. Banking & asset management do front-end, transactional work involving lending by banks and other financial institutions whereas restructuring & insolvency are more litigious and work with companies in financial strife. Everyone including all the partners, business development and human resources is at the meeting, as well as the Brisbane team via video link today, so it's a great chance to hear what's happening across the country.

10.15 AM

After our team meeting, we go back to our offices and the coffee train is departing. I head downstairs for a coffee with my colleagues. We chat about different matters people are working on or the most recent antics of dogs or children.

10.30 AM

I work in the restructuring and insolvency team and we frequently act for the liquidators from large accounting firms. One of our matters involves the liquidator of various insolvent companies who has resigned and needs to be replaced. It's mostly a procedural court application but we still need to draft the court application and supporting affidavits, explaining to the court why we need them to make the orders and why it is just, quick and cheap to appoint the people we are proposing. I draft documents to my supervisor for review.

Drafting

1.00 PM

It's lunchtime so I duck downstairs to buy lunch (we have a food court underneath our building that is delicious but dangerous!) before meeting friends from my cohort for lunch. Today is a beautiful autumn Sydney day so we sit outside and enjoy the sunshine. I always finish my lunch break with a walk around the block.

2.00 PM

I received an email this morning about a new matter that has come in so I pop into the office of my senior associate to discuss it. At this stage it involves preparing a Deed of Forbearance for one of our banking clients. We act for banks and sometimes when a customer is financial difficulty, they agree to temporarily postpone the loan repayments or not exercise their power of sale as mortgagee. We don’t have a lot of information about the loan agreements yet so at this stage I'm drafting it in fairly general terms and we'll include more information later. As a junior lawyer, we often do the first round of drafting. There are lots of precedents and examples in our system so it is easy to get a sense of the substance of these agreements. Once this is drafted, I send it to the senior associate and print out a copy since I know she likes to review in hardcopy. I diarise to check back in about it if I haven't received any comments within a few days.

4.30 PM

Last week I wrote a research memo on a discrete area of law relating to enforcing mortgages. I check in with my senior associate to see if she has any questions or if there is anything else we need to do before it is sent to counsel. This is a litigious matter before the courts so advice is settled by our barristers. We also discuss the other matters we are waiting for instructions on. 

4.50 PM

We've been asked to coordinate a section on insolvency law as part of our Doing Business in Australia Guide. As a globally integrated law firm, we often refer work to other offices and vice versa so a guide like this can open up opportunities to work with international clients. I've just received comments back from one of the special counsels in our team so I work on integrating those changes and drafting on another topic.

5.45 PM

Tonight I'm going with some of my team to a restructuring & insolvency networking event so I walk over to Barangaroo with some of my colleagues. We have a Q&A with some industry heavyweights and bump into people we previously met a Young Insolvency Practitioners event. These functions are attended by lawyers, accountants and bankers working in the industry. In my team there are lots of networking opportunities and client functions, even at the very junior level.

8.00 PM

The desert canapés signal the end to festivities so I head home.