Thomson Geer is a national, commercial law firm with expertise in a variety of practice areas.
I am a Law Graduate in the Employment Team of Thomson Geer's Melbourne Office. We have matters that are as simple as a client requesting advice on a discrete question, such as whether an employer can fire an employee for refusing to get vaccinated, which we can respond to via email later that day. Conversely, some matters can last years. For example, we are working on a 3-year-long dispute in which an employee is alleging that their employer terminated their employment because they exercised their right to make a complaint.
I can take the lead on some matters myself. The Fair Work Ombudsman refers people to us who need advice on COVID-19-related employment law issues. For these matters, I call the client personally to conduct the initial interview, then draft a file note of the interview and advice for the client and send it to my supervisor, who will review and send out the advice.
More often, I work on matters with a partner. Normally, I attend the initial client conference with the partner. The partner may then ask me to research a relevant issue. The issue could be anything from determining which award cheerleaders are covered by, to whether a parental leave policy that only allows females to take leave breaches discrimination laws. After discussing my findings with the partner, I may draft the advice to the client, and remain involved going forward.
What's your background?
I grew up in Melbourne and attended Siena College. At school, I studied mainly science subjects but by the end of Year 12, I had decided that I was interested in studying law instead. I started a Bachelor of Law/Bachelor of International Studies at Deakin University in 2015 but switched from the Bachelor of International Studies to a Bachelor of Commerce after a couple of years.
Throughout university, I worked as a Sales Assistant at Myer, which helped to develop my communication skills and problem-solving ability. In my third year of law, I began to worry (in hindsight, perhaps a little unnecessarily) that everyone around me was getting legal experience and I didn't have any. I decided to take action by contacting some legal centres to ask if I could volunteer with them during the midyear break. To my surprise, the Central Australian Women's Legal Service called to say that they would love to have me join them for a few weeks. After getting my first taste of legal practice there, I knew I wanted to be a lawyer, so completed various other legal internships during the remainder of my degree. In 2020, I completed a clerkship at Thomson Geer, finished university midyear and then worked as a paralegal on the Solicitors Assisting the Board of Inquiry team for the Hotel Quarantine Inquiry. Through this job, I became interested in working in a litigious area of law, which is one of the reasons I like employment law.
Could someone with a different background do your job?
Absolutely - there are people with lots of different backgrounds working at Thomson Geer! Whilst any law graduate or lawyer will need a law degree, I have colleagues who qualified overseas before moving to Australia, colleagues who studied science prior to commencing law and colleagues who had never worked in the legal industry until they started as a Graduate at Thomson Geer.
What's the coolest thing about your job?
I love how client-facing employment law is. Even as a relatively junior person in the team, I regularly meet clients via video conferences and in person. I find this helps to contextualise my work and motivates me.
What are the limitations of your job?
Employment law is fast-moving and unpredictable. This is what makes it interesting, but it also means that your day can pan out very differently from what you had planned. For example, we might receive a request from a client asking for urgent advice on what to do in relation to an employee who has just engaged in serious misconduct. To manage our workloads, we have to be adaptable and able to prioritise, but as a team, we support and assist each other, and we reallocate work when someone's workload is too heavy.
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