Seat moves are exciting and busy times. Here's a little insight and a helping hand should you rotate into Immigration.
What tasks have you particularly enjoyed in this seat?
All of them! It's been very varied work, dealing with individual applications and appeals, and also corporate matters. I have done pretty much every sort of task you can do in our Immigration team, and I have really enjoyed having the chance to run with my own matters from beginning to end. It's always really gratifying to get a positive result for a client. There have also been some excellent BD opportunities, which has really helped develop my networking skills, and they have often involved really excellent Chinese food, which is always a plus.
What have you learned in this seat that will help in your career?
The clients in the Immigration team are extremely varied; they can be vulnerable individuals or corporate organisations. However, very few of them will really understand immigration law and how the Home Office works. In this seat, being able to explain the rules and the processes to any client is a vital skill, as it can be a very stressful time for them. I have definitely learned how to communicate complex ideas to clients and how to support them during their matter without getting too drawn in. Keeping some distance is definitely very healthy.
What are your top tips for other trainees to hit the ground running in this seat?
My first thing was to familiarise myself with the Immigration Rules. A lot of the work the team does is based on the Rules, so knowing where to find the requirements for different types of application will save you a lot of time in the long run. Another tip is to set up alerts for Home Office announcements. Clients will often (mis)read something in the paper that the Home Office has said, so it is good to be prepared so you can guess what queries will come your way.
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