Assignments,  Summer@Weil

Weil Believes in You

When I began my Corporate rotation at Weil, I was frankly quite nervous. Besides a basic corporations class at law school, I was unfamiliar with corporate law and thus doubted whether I would be able to excel in this rotation. As I tried to unscramble the differences between mergers and acquisitions, private equity, and private funds, I felt self-conscious about my lack of knowledge and so initially held back from asking for help. However, I was lucky to have a very supportive summer sibling (a junior associate mentor) with whom I felt comfortable confiding in and she urged me to simply grab coffees with junior associates and to ask them about their work. I decided to follow her advice and it made all the difference.

In one of my first coffee chats with an associate, I was asked if I understood the stages of a deal. I confessed that I did not. He immediately assured me that it was perfectly normal to lack such knowledge and he then offered to take time that evening to teach me the fundamentals of deal-making. That evening, two other summer associates and I gathered in a conference room for our crash course in deal-making. The junior associate entered the room with an armful of hand-out materials and proceeded to explain the intricacies of deals and the key differences between all of the Corporate practice groups at Weil. We then riddled him with questions that he graciously answered. Two hours later, I walked out feeling confident that I had a grasp on Weil’s Corporate practice groups and a basic understanding of what Weil’s Corporate attorneys do to make the Firm so successful.

Now, countless coffee chats later, I am able to carry on a conversation about the latest merger in the headlines. Not only do I find this newfound confidence helpful as I seek to do my best in my Corporate rotation, but I am excited about the work I do and I look forward to eventually gaining expertise in this field. I am thankful for the incredibly supportive learning environment that Weil cultivates, for its ability to instill confidence in budding attorneys, and for believing in those who do not always believe in themselves.

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