DerivativesLab

I didn’t qualify at a Magic Circle firm. I trained at a regional firm and left two months after qualifying.

On paper, I wasn’t the obvious candidate for investment banking.

What got me in wasn’t pedigree. It was understanding how the business actually worked.

How funds trade.
How prime brokers operate.
How collateral moves.
Why a desk cares about one risk but not another.

That’s the part nobody tells you.

Banks already have access to some of the best legal minds in the market through external counsel. What they need in-house is someone who can take that analysis, understand the commercial reality, and help the business make a decision quickly.

If you want to move into banking, here’s where I’d focus:

1. Find your entry point.
Most in-house hiring runs through a relatively small network of specialist recruiters. Build those relationships early.

2. Target the right experience.
Derivatives, capital markets, structured finance, funds and regulatory work all create natural pathways in.

3. Learn the business.
Understand how products work, how revenue is generated, where risk sits, and how transactions actually flow.

4. Build commercial fluency.
Margin. Leverage. Netting. Liquidity. Risk. These conversations happen every day and the lawyers who understand them become trusted advisers faster.

The lawyers who progress fastest are rarely the ones who know the most law.

They’re the ones the business trusts to exercise judgment.

That’s who investment banks actually hire.

Follow for more in-house legal realities.

Another great conversation locked in for The Escalation Podcast.

This time, I sat down with a talented recruitment advisor specialising in career hires in the fund management industry, to discuss leadership, ambition, and the patterns that shape extraordinary careers.

Stay tuned for the full episode release.

A huge thank you to for hosting us and providing such a brilliant home for these conversations.

I didn’t take the traditional route into law.

My first degree was in Politics and International Relations.

After that, I did what was then called the GDL - a one-year conversion course designed to cram 3 years of legal education into 12 very intense months.

A lot of it came down to memorisation.

Cases. Principles. Rules. Frameworks.

And looking back after 16 years in practice, very little of what I memorised is what made me a better lawyer.

What surprises me isn’t that legal education has gaps.

It’s how little those gaps have changed.

In hiring conversations, mentoring sessions and day-to-day practice, I keep seeing young ambitious lawyers entering the profession without the skills the profession actually rewards.

The ability to review a contract and spot what matters. To communicate clearly under pressure. To negotiate. To think critically when the answer isn’t obvious, or to read the room.

Meanwhile, information has never been more accessible.

A precedent can be found in seconds.

A clause can be explained by AI.

Knowing the law still matters.

But increasingly, that’s the entry ticket.

The real differentiator is everything that happens after you’ve found the answer.