Legal Cheek Careers sits down with Philip Dupres, infrastructure partner at Addleshaw Goddard, to discuss the complexity and reward of long-term infrastructure projects and why people skills matter more than ever for trainees
When I ask Philip Dupres, a partner at Addleshaw Goddard specialising in infrastructure and projects, about his route into law, he’s quick to admit it wasn’t part of any grand plan. He read law at university “without any kind of great intention of being a lawyer,” seeing it as a broad and useful degree. But once lectures turned to the practical application of law, “I found that more interesting than the academic study,” he recalls.
He went on to secure a training contract at Addleshaw Goddard during the late-2000s credit crunch and remains grateful the firm kept faith in its future recruits. “Lehman Brothers went bust very early on in my time at law school and AG were one of the very few firms still pushing ahead with graduate recruitment,” he says. That decision, he reflects, “shaped my career.”
Although he enjoyed every seat during his training, a mix of personal values and good timing nudged him towards infrastructure and projects. “My mum was a social worker and my dad was an engineer, so I guess it was fate that I ended up doing something that involved infrastructure for the public good,” he laughs. “It combines both of their careers in a weird way.” Wanting his work to have social impact, he found himself drawn to major infrastructure and energy projects.
Today, much of Dupres’ practice revolves around large-scale deals in the water and utilities sector, an area he freely admits he fell into by accident. Returning from a client secondment a few years ago, he helped pitch for a major United Utilities project, a longstanding client of the firm. “Having stumbled into it, I’ve really relished the fact that you get to do something which has a genuine impact on the world and there’s something physical and useful to show for the work,” he says. And the work is far from monotonous. “It’s really complicated, it’s really novel and you get a lot of intellectual stimulation and challenge. It’s a nice combination.”
One standout example is the Haweswater Aqueduct Resilience Programme (HARP), the six-year United Utilities scheme Dupres describes as “career-defining”. The project involved upgrading a 50-mile aqueduct built in the 1950s, supplying drinking water from the Lake District to Manchester and serving 2.5 million people. “It’s an absolutely critical piece of infrastructure in the North West of England,” he explains, noting that the ageing aqueduct needed replacing to secure future supply.
What made the deal particularly novel was the procurement model. United Utilities used a direct procurement for customers project finance approach similar to PFI, the first of its kind in the English water sector. Instead of the utility funding the entire project itself, financing was outsourced together with the design, construction and long-term maintenance of the new aqueduct.
For the lawyers, this meant devising a bespoke commercial and legal structure almost from scratch. “We had to create a legal structure almost, but not quite, out of thin air,” Dupres says. This included negotiating changes to the client’s regulatory licence and even advocating for primary legislation to enable the model. Its significance, he emphasises, lay in its precedent-setting value. “What was really exciting is being able to create a commercial and legal model that facilitates not just that project but then projects which tens of millions of people will essentially rely on.” The deal proved career-changing for the team too. Many of the core team of lawyers, including Dupres, were promoted during its lifespan.
Naturally, conversation turns to the role of trainees and juniors in such colossal projects. “On a big deal, their role is really important because there were hundreds of documents involved,” he says. While major projects centre on one core contract, they are surrounded by hundreds of ancillary agreements amounting to “tens of thousands of pages’ worth of stuff.” A partner cannot feasibly manage every clause, meaning juniors become the engine of the document process. They draft, check, cross-reference and coordinate an endless stream of versions. “We went through thousands of iterations of the main project contract,” he adds, a task that cannot run without diligent juniors.
As the years roll on, juniors grow with the deal. Dupres cites one lawyer who started on HARP in a very junior role and finished it as a senior associate. Early responsibilities were focused on document management, but over time she found herself “sat next to me in these negotiation meetings, helping me do the drafting,” he recalls. By the later stages, she was even leading elements of the negotiations. On such high-value deals, “every single word of every single clause matters”, giving trainees a rare opportunity to understand not just what the documents say but why they are drafted that way.
Looking ahead, Dupres notes that the infrastructure sector faces significant transformation, particularly around energy, AI and data centres. Could the rise of AI and energy-hungry data centres strain utilities? Water, he suggests, is less of a concern in “a fairly wet, rainy country.” Energy, however, presents a larger challenge. With data centres, electric vehicles and low-carbon heating pushing demand up while supply shifts towards renewables, “the grid at both ends, both supply and demand, has to change. There’s an infrastructure challenge and a regulatory challenge as well.” The government’s target of a carbon-free power network by 2030, he admits, “is going to be challenging, but without targets, you never make it.”
So what does an infrastructure projects lawyer actually do all day? “There is no typical day-to-day,” he says. Early in a deal, much of his time goes on planning and strategy. At the moment, “I’m in meetings 75% of my core working hours,” as he helps clients brainstorm commercial structures. Beyond client work, partners juggle graduate recruitment, team management and business development. His aim, he says, is to ensure “we have a team that feel well looked after and supported”, while also maintaining strong client relationships and attracting new work.
On the business development front, he has reassuring advice for juniors. While trainees are not expected to land huge clients, he encourages them to begin building networks early. “Often the relationships you build when you are much more junior… as you get more senior in your career, so do your contacts,” he explains. Peer-level connections may one day become major clients. And crucially, doing great work is itself a powerful business development tool. Many clients return specifically requesting juniors who impressed them. “The absolute best business development tool in any lawyer’s armoury is their ability to do a good job,” he says. With AI advancing, the “interpersonal, face-to-face contact and human relationship aspect” becomes even more important.
As the conversation circles back to careers, Dupres highlights the qualities he values most in trainees. “Diligence and enthusiasm are the top two traits that I look for.” Organisation is key on deals with countless moving parts. He needs juniors who will take ownership and “see that task all the way through to the end.” Enthusiasm matters just as much. Partners are passionate about their specialisms, he notes, and “somebody who is enthusiastic to learn about your area goes a hugely long way.” Not every seat will feel like a perfect fit, but staying open-minded is essential.
It is advice he extends to aspiring solicitors too. “Everyone thinks they know what they want to do when they’re 19 or 20,” he says, but a training contract often opens doors you never expected. “You may have thought you weren’t interested in a certain area, but you end up doing a seat there, so be open to the idea that actually this could be the right thing for you.”
Having secured his own training contract in the middle of the 2008 recession, he understands today’s pressures. And for him, one thing is constant: the importance of people skills. Many applicants focus solely on technical ability, but as AI takes on more routine tasks, “the stuff that you can’t replace with artificial intelligence is the human element.” Relationship-building with clients and colleagues matters now more than ever. “The days of the robotic lawyer who is just really good technically but can’t talk to people — I think that’s an endangered species.”
Phil Dupres will be speaking at ‘Understanding global law firms — with Addleshaw Goddard‘, an in-person student event taking place today (17 November). Places for this event are now fully booked, but check out our other upcoming events.
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