Legal Cheek Careers sits down with John Francis
“The volume and breadth of law that you have to study, and be prepared to apply, was greater than I had expected,” says John Francis, reflecting on his SQE experience. It’s an honest assessment of a process many aspiring solicitors will recognise as demanding from start to finish, and one that came at the end of a longer route into the profession than he first imagined.
We began by asking Francis about his career journey and what first drew him to law. Born in the UK and raised in Canada, he moved back in 2016 knowing he wanted to enter the legal profession. He went on to study law at the University of Sheffield, including a year in the US, graduating in 2021 at the height of the pandemic.
The route into commercial law was not immediate. Francis chose not to apply for vacation schemes during his final year, explaining that he “didn’t enjoy the prospect of everything being done virtually.” Instead, he stayed on full-time with a small charity in Sheffield where he had been working part-time, before moving into a role on a government-funded capital projects programme, supporting the construction of youth facilities across England. Alongside that, he kept applying for graduate recruitment schemes. An unsuccessful 2022 cycle was followed by a 2023 vacation scheme that didn’t convert into a training contract. It was only in 2024 that things clicked, with a vacation scheme and, ultimately, a training contract offer from Eversheds Sutherland. Since then, studying at The University of Law (ULaw), he has started a master’s, passed SQE1 in January, and is awaiting his SQE2 results ahead of a September start.
That persistence runs through his account of why law appealed in the first place. After speaking to lawyers in Canada from a young age, he knew he wanted to work in the legal field. Once back in the UK, the solicitor route in a commercial environment began to stand out because of the opportunity to advise businesses on practical challenges. Francis was also drawn to the profession’s competitive side. As one of five siblings, he tells us he was “always quite competitive”, while also valuing the law’s history and evolving nature, and the profession’s clear opportunities for development and progression.
On the SQE, Francis is clear about both the challenge and the attraction. For someone who had always wanted to be a commercial lawyer, revisiting areas such as wills, trusts, probate, and criminal law wasn’t necessarily what he had expected, and the sheer scope of what he had to cover caught him off guard. Even so, he stresses that the intensity wasn’t a total surprise. What he has enjoyed most is how practical the course feels. “It is not surface-level academic law like at the undergraduate level; it is very practical,” Francis explains, pointing to the constant focus on clients and ethics as what makes the work feel more real than undergraduate legal study.
The toughest part, he says, was the gap between SQE1 and SQE2. Sitting the first exam in January and then moving quickly into practical skills assessments in late April and early May made for a demanding turnaround. So how did he manage it? “Fundamentally, it’s about being organised and motivated,” he tells Legal Cheek Careers. Having a training contract and a clear September deadline helped, as did being supported by Eversheds Sutherland. Beyond that, he stresses the importance of “recognising weaker areas early and giving those subjects more time.” Just as important was having others around him going through the same process. A friend who will also be training at Eversheds Sutherland studied alongside him, and Francis is full of praise for “the value of leaning on colleagues when the workload begins to bite.”
Francis is equally positive about studying with ULaw. “Overall, it has been phenomenal and a really valuable experience,” he says. The SQE manuals and question banks were especially useful for SQE1 preparation, but it was the teaching faculty that stood out most, with workshop leaders he describes as “engaged, patient and always willing to follow up on questions.” His message to students considering ULaw is simple: make the most of those workshop sessions, because that’s where much of the real learning happens.
Legal careers can often feel overwhelmingly London-focused, so the conversation naturally turns to geography and Francis’s deliberate decision to pursue a training contract in Leeds. Having travelled to London for work, he knew it wasn’t where he wanted to live, and his undergraduate years in Sheffield had also reinforced a preference for the North. Leeds, he argues, offers a strong legal reputation outside London, growth across the legal, financial, and public sectors, and solid connections.
Francis was methodical about researching firms. “Researching firms is a numbers game, and you just have to spend the time doing it,” he says. For him, “growth potential and the opportunity for informal mentorship mattered most.” Firm websites could only take him so far, so open days, networking events, and assessment centres became crucial. He would often ask trainees and partners how they approached development and progression, paying attention not just to the substance of the answer but to the attitude behind it. That, he says, is where Eversheds Sutherland stood out, with people who “seemed genuinely invested in helping trainees get the most from their two-year training contract.”
His view on converting a vacation scheme is shaped by that same emphasis on people. Francis says there’s no single formula, because outcomes depend on firms, culture, and available places. Still, one theme stands out: “rapport.” Academic ability and motivation are assumed, but candidates also need to show they can speak to people, attend social events, and engage with genuine curiosity. “You need to cultivate a genuine sense of curiosity to develop relationships,” he says, adding that “so much of life in law comes down to relationship management and making clients feel comfortable.” These are skills, he suggests, “that can be built in all sorts of settings, not just legal ones.”
As for Eversheds Sutherland itself, what appealed most was “its focus on development opportunities and trainees’ long-term growth, alongside the breadth of work available at a large multinational firm.” In Leeds specifically, Francis highlights “the strength of the office’s construction and real estate offering.” Looking ahead, what excites him most is getting “stuck into four six-month seats across challenging, commercially relevant and varied areas of the law.”
Before we wrap up, I ask for the one piece of advice he would give students about to embark on the SQE or training contract applications. The answer goes back to the resilience that has defined his own route. “Don’t beat yourself up if you are not successful initially,” he says, stressing just how competitive the profession can be. More broadly: “My key piece of advice would be to get as much experience as possible, even if it is not legal experience.” Learning how to cooperate, build rapport, and identify informal mentors, he suggests, “can make all the difference.”
Join us THIS WEDNESDAY (8 July) for ‘Secrets to Success Leeds — with Eversheds Sutherland, Pinsent Masons, DAC Beachcroft and ULaw‘. Apply now to attend.
About Legal Cheek Careers posts.
