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Birmingham, Cambridge, Cardiff, Central England, Cheltenham, Hereford, Leamington Spa, London, Shrewsbury, Thames Valley, Worcester, Wye Valley, Norwich

About The Role

What is life like at a UK top 50 law firm? 

Our week-long vacation scheme gives you an authentic look into life at HCR. To give you a real sense of your career ahead, you’ll be given the opportunity to contribute to real life matters, and work closely alongside our people at all levels. By design, the scheme will be both challenging and rewarding – we'll immerse you in a variety of departments, get you involved in interesting work, and give you the opportunity to show off your talent

The structure of the week will include: 
 
  • Working and training directly alongside our solicitors, trainees and paralegals in 4 of our different practice areas – this will be a hands-on week shadowing client meetings, conducting research and practising legal drafting. 
  •  An interactive mock trial with your fellow vacation scheme participants which is judged by a partner of the firm – you will have the opportunity to cross-examine case witnesses (played by our paralegals and trainees). 
  • Networking opportunities with representatives from across the firm – including employability guidance from our talent acquisition team. 
  • Skills and developmental workshops.  

Our summer 2026 vacation scheme will take place Monday to Friday, the week commencing 06 July 2026. The final deadline for applications is 23:59 Tuesday 17 March 2026.  
 

About You

Who is our vacation scheme designed for?  
 
  • Penultimate year or final year law students. 
  • Final year non-law students. 
Our recruitment team will review all applications after the closing date. We expect to arrange telephone interviews and confirm all application outcomes by April 31 March. We are looking for individuals who show a genuine interest in pursuing a legal career. 

What are the likely employability outcomes of attending the HCR vacation scheme? Can I secure a training contract on this scheme? 

We do not offer training contracts directly to students at the end of our vacation scheme. We want you to get the most out of this learning experience – and we feel this is most achievable when we remove the pressure of being under assessment for a training contact.  

That being said, we regularly look at promising students for graduate paralegal roles when recruiting. We encourage you to think about what type of firm you may want to train with – making this scheme ideal if you are looking to get a taste of what undertaking your training at HCR could be like. 

Our vacation scheme will be taking place across all 13 of our office locations, and technology for you to use throughout the week will be provided. 

About Us

What does HCR believe, achieve and stand for? 
 
As a Times Best Law Firm, among the UK Top 50, we provide the full range of services that you would expect to organisations, business leaders and individuals. However, in our mission to give everyone the opportunity to experience a different kind of legal service, we take an entrepreneurial approach. We’re flexible and responsive to the needs of our clients, delivering the best outcomes for them. We have more than 1000 lawyers and support staff, including more than 180 partners, and have been awarded the Law Society’s Lexcel quality mark in recognition of our compliance and client care standards. 

With 13 offices in England and Wales, our well-established presence stretches from west to east, ensuring clients can access a full-service legal offering no matter where they’re located. We’ve expanded significantly across all our regions, and are well-respected as a regional firm with a strong London and international presence. 
 
HCR suits people who love a challenge and want to work in an environment where careers thrive on the back of hard work and personal merit. Our people enjoy feeling part of something bigger than themselves, and whilst our clients drive our development, it is our people who bring their energy, enthusiasm, and entrepreneurial mindsets together to solve problems and help our clients succeed. Our people tell us they enjoy working on good quality, interesting matters from a wide variety of our clients, because they get the experience they want to develop their careers. We will give you responsibility early, the mandate to make things happen, and we’ll back your good ideas
 
As HCR is an equal opportunities employer, we don’t just accept differences, we celebrate them. We want to attract a diverse and ambitious workforce that reflects all backgrounds and skills to create a workplace that is supportive and inclusive, recognises and nurtures talent, and which works together to achieve the best outcome for our clients. We want you to achieve your absolute best during the recruitment process, please let us know of any changes we can make at any point that will help support your application. 
 
A note for recruitment agencies – The HCR Resourcing Team is responsible for recruitment across the firm, no agency ownership will be accepted under any circumstances for this role.

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