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Throughout the year the Trainee Social Committee organises several events for °ÄÃÅÁùºÏ²Ê×ÊÁÏ’s trainees across all five of our offices. This time around, they really excelled themselves by setting up an evening for trainees and newly qualified solicitors and barristers at Birmingham’s ‘The Floodgate.’ When the budget covers beer, burgers, curling and batting cages, you know you’re in the right firm!

We travelled to °ÄÃÅÁùºÏ²Ê×ÊÁÏ’s Birmingham office from each of our respective regional offices and spent the day bumping into each other and having catch-ups in the kitchen over hot drinks. It’s always fun getting everyone together but the timing of this social was particularly fortunate as there are a lot of exciting changes ahead. The trainees have just been allocated their next seats so we were able to discuss who’s who in our new teams and the type of work we will likely be involved in. Also, a number of the second-year trainees will be using their ‘time to count’ to qualify early – so they will no longer be trainees when we see them again!

The evening kicked off at 4:00 p.m. with drinks at the office. It felt great to sign off a little early on a Friday afternoon and catch up with a beer (or prosecco) in hand. After draining the office drinks supply, we all marched over to Floodgate. Those of us harbouring quiet competitive streaks were exposed in the batting cages and on the curling sheets. In one particularly eventful episode in the batting cages, personal and professional relationships were moments from being torn apart as we pitted ourselves against one another. The athletes in question achieved scores ranging from 12 to 1 in a remarkable win (or catastrophic loss, depending on who you were supporting). The winner and runner-up then experienced a shattering defeat at the hands of new competition on the curling sheets. Happily, I have been reliably informed that this rivalry was (almost) completely forgotten by the time the culprits returned to work on Monday morning!

Anecdotes aside, trainee socials are a great opportunity to chat with colleagues who are either at the same stage in their training or have recently been through it. In the wake of the latest round of seat allocations, these evenings are a timely reminder that whatever challenges we may be facing, there is a great network of support at °ÄÃÅÁùºÏ²Ê×ÊÁÏ. These events are also a perfect chance to flex those special skills you would never get to show off in the office. How else am I supposed to prove that I was crowned Amateur Curling Champion ’09*?

*I did not because I was not.