Legal Cheek Careers sits down with Imogen Hamblin to discuss a career spanning the bar, employment discrimination and legal education
Imogen Hamblin, consultant solicitor and tutor at The University of Law (ULaw) Nottingham, initially began her career at the bar, qualifying in 2009 from the Inner Temple, driven by a clear sense of purpose. “I wanted to save the world,” she says. “I decided that I was going to be a human rights barrister and that I was going to put the world to rights.”
For around five years, that ambition took the form of public law, judicial review and inquest work focused largely on deaths in police custody and other state settings. “If people were shot by the police, or if somebody died in prison or in an institution governed by the state, then I would represent the family in an inquest proceeding,” she explains. Hamblin also became involved in a number of high-profile cases, including the Mark Duggan case.
It was work she found compelling. “I absolutely loved that kind of work,” she says. “It was really exciting, but we were always the underdog against the state.” However, the nature of the work meant that it required as much emotional intelligence as skilled advocacy. “A lot of my job ended up being about counselling my clients,” she adds, describing how she had to develop a different set of skills alongside the legal work.
A turning point came when legal aid cuts changed the landscape. “When the Conservative government came in, they scrapped legal aid, and at that point I decided I was going to make a career transition,” Hamblin says. She moved to Browne Jacobson in Nottingham and spent a year handling clinical negligence inquests, a move that made sense on paper given her background, but proved difficult in practice.
“Obviously, the link to the inquests came from my previous human rights work, but all of my stories ended with ‘and then she died’ or ‘and then he died’,” she recalls. “It just got to the point where I was like, this is actually quite morbid and I developed an unhealthy fear of hospitals!”
The next chapter saw Hamblin cross-qualify as a solicitor and move into employment law, with a particular focus on discrimination. The rationale behind the move was both practical and principled: it offered, as she puts it, “a commercial avenue while still keeping my human rights background intact”.
This tendency to combine commercial reality with values-driven work carried through later into her career. Alongside teaching, Hamblin has “kept the door open” as a consultant at Thrive Law. She describes discrimination law, especially disability discrimination, as her core area, and speaks candidly about the personal dimension to that work. “I actually am a disabled person, so it’s something that I felt quite strongly about,” she says. “I’m also part of the LGBTQIA+ community, so again, that was a group of people that I wanted to represent. I was the Vice Chair of the Law Society for two years, as the LGBTQIA+ representative. During this time, I was responsible for drafting the UK policy for people transitioning at work, including a template for management to follow, if this situation occurs.”
The clients she gravitates towards, she tells me, are often underprivileged and vulnerable, and she returns to the importance of counselling skills in high-stress situations. “Every contact with a lawyer is stressful, so having that extra skill helps.”
At the same time, she is candid about having acted for both sides in employment disputes. “I did also represent employers as well, so I can’t say that I’m a complete saint,” she says, laughing. But the point is strategic rather than ideological. “If you’re going to be a good and effective lawyer, you need to know what the arguments of your opponent are going to be.” In fact, she says she would often prepare by trying to understand the perspective of the other side and setting out their argument first before undertaking to tackle it head on.
When I ask about standout moments in practice, Hamblin pauses. There were courtroom highs, certainly “those massive adrenaline surges when we win in court” and the “famous advocacy moments where you leave the courtroom satisfied and your client is satisfied”. However, she is careful not to romanticise the work. “The type of work that I undertook was very harrowing,” she says. “Each case was a human being that was lost.” Even on the employment side, she notes the uncomfortable reality that building a career in discrimination law means confronting how frequently discrimination still occurs.
That realism carries into her advice for aspiring lawyers interested in similar areas. “You have to be vigilant, and you have to be dogmatic, and you have to be a dog with a bone, really,” Hamblin says. She describes volunteering from the age of 14 to build an understanding of rights, social structures and the role of charities, but she acknowledges that not every student will have the same opportunities. The key message, though, is about demonstrating genuine commitment in a competitive field. “You really have to demonstrate that you have a passion and a dedication to supporting people’s rights. It’s very political.”
We also spend a good chunk of time discussing wellbeing, an issue Hamblin feels very strongly about. “It is very important to me,” she says, explaining that she is neurodivergent and has a disability herself. Her advice is practical: build movement into your day, protect time to switch off, and learn to compartmentalise. “Understanding when to switch off is also key,” she says. “Being able to compartmentalise is a skill.”
She also makes a point that will resonate with many junior lawyers and students — the profession’s drinking culture can be exclusionary and harmful. “I don’t drink alcohol either,” Hamblin says, describing “a very alcohol-focused, boozy profession which can cause detriment to mental wellbeing”. Reflecting on the bar’s dining culture, she says “the alcohol was excessive”, and argue that better non-alcoholic options and more thoughtful social norms would make a real difference. “Give me a proper choice. Don’t give me orange juice. It isn’t breakfast or the 1970s.”
Mentorship is another recurring theme. Hamblin now teaches at The University of Law and is enthusiastic about the role practitioner-tutors can play in supporting students. “We have the academic background, but we have the practical knowledge to coach and mentor our students,” she says, calling it “our real USP”. In a widening participation role at the Nottingham campus, she focuses on reducing barriers to the profession and highlight peer-to-peer mentoring alongside support from staff and academic coaches.
She is equally clear, however, that students should not wait for mentorship to arrive formally. “When I was a student, I found my own mentors, so networking was absolutely key,” she says, recalling a steady campaign of volunteering, work experience and persistent follow-ups, including sending Christmas cards to chambers and lawyers she had worked with. The reward, she suggests, is discovering that the profession can be more generous than students sometimes assume. “You find that there are some really good people who just want to help other people progress in their careers.”
Before we finish, I ask what makes Nottingham and the East Midlands a good place to start a legal career. Having worked in Leeds and London, Hamblin points to two advantages: a smaller network that allows for closer professional relationships, and geography. “Because you’re based in the middle of the country, you can get everywhere else really quickly,” she says, adding a practical note for aspiring barristers in particular: “there is a lot of travel, so don’t underestimate that.”
Her final message to students is simple. “Don’t be afraid to come second,” Hamblin says. In a profession this competitive, setbacks are inevitable. You may find yourself “banging against the door and not quite making it”. But if you are committed, she insists, “you can achieve it as long as you don’t give up. Just keep pushing and eventually you’ll be that number one.” Finally, she adds, “I also try and have a sense of humour. I think it’s important.”
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