3+ PQE Litigation Solicitor/Senior Solicitor
Job description
Original text imported from Reed
Are you Looking to work with an award-winning local firm that puts their clients and staff at the forefront of all they do?
We are excited to be looking for a Litigation Solicitor/Legal Executive to join a growing, friendly and supportive team.
Experience & Skills
- Achieve billing, time and fee earning targets set and co-operate with the firm’s credit control arrangements
- Proven project and time management skills
- A confident and professional manner
- Work effectively within a team but also as a leader
- Be professional, organised, competent, enthusiastic, and ambitious.
- Be able to work independently and as part of a team with other fee earners, providing advice and assistance whenever needed to develop knowledge and skills within the rest of the team.
You will have strong experience in dealing with all manner of commercial and civil disputes with excellent attention to detail, including:
- organising, drafting and preparation of witness statements and trial bundles;
- organising and preparation of trial bundles;
- advocacy experience in County and High Courts;
- dealing with Counsel;
- costs management and budgets;
- CPR rules and other procedural-related matters;
Benefits:
- Agile working (up to 40% working from home)
- 25 days' holiday (FTE) (plus statutory holidays)
- Pension scheme
- Death-in-service/Life assurance benefit scheme
- Critical illness insurance cover
- Eye care voucher
- A structured career progression plan tailored to you and with the aim of enabling you to achieve your career goals and ambitions including up to Partnership.
Salary dependant on experience
For more information, please apply with your CV.
Key skills
AI-extracted from the job advert
Application advice
5 AI-generated recommendations to maximise your chances.
⭐ Lead your CV with a Personal Statement that explicitly names your PQE level and highlights commercial and civil dispute experience, as the advert specifies 3+ PQE as the minimum threshold.
📊 Quantify your billing performance: e.g. 'Consistently achieved 95% of annual billing target of £180,000 across a mixed commercial and civil caseload of 60+ active matters.'
🎯 Dedicate a skills section to CPR procedural knowledge, costs budgeting, and advocacy experience in County and High Courts — these are explicitly listed as core requirements in the advert.
📝 Include specific examples of trial bundle preparation and witness statement drafting, noting the complexity or volume: e.g. 'Prepared trial bundles for 12 High Court hearings over 24 months, including multi-party commercial contract disputes.'
🤝 Reference your experience working alongside Counsel and other fee earners, as the advert emphasises both independent working and team contribution — frame this with a concrete example of a collaborative case outcome.
Suggested CV bullets
3 bullets our AI drafted for this specific advert, mirroring its ATS keywords.
Add these 3 bullets under your most recent experience:
- •Managed a caseload of 55 active commercial and civil litigation matters, achieving 97% of annual billing target of £175,000 while maintaining full CPR procedural compliance across all files.
- •Prepared and filed trial bundles and witness statements for 14 High Court and County Court hearings over 18 months, including a multi-defendant contract dispute valued at £2.3M.
- •Drafted and submitted costs budgets under CPR Part 3 for 20+ matters annually, securing court approval on 18 occasions and reducing costs disputes with opposing parties by 30%.
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Letter preview — tailored to Reed
Dear Hiring Manager,
The 3+ PQE Litigation Solicitor opportunity at your Cambridge firm is a strong match for my background in commercial and civil dispute resolution. With hands-on experience in High Court and County Court advocacy, CPR costs budgeting, and the preparation of trial bundles and witness statements, I am confident I can contribute to your disputes team from day one.
My background in litigation spans a mixed caseload of commercial contract disputes and civil matters, where I have consistently met billing targets while managing procedural compliance under the CPR. I have worked closely with Counsel on multi-party proceedings and supported junior fee earners in developing their technical knowledge — experience that aligns directly with the team-leadership dimension of this role.
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Interview questions
10 questions generated from this advert.
Technical
- ›Walk us through your process for preparing a trial bundle from instruction to hearing — what systems or tools do you use to manage document organisation?
- ›How do you approach costs budgeting under the CPR, and can you describe a matter where effective costs management made a material difference to the outcome?
- ›Describe your experience with advocacy in the County Court and High Court — what types of hearings have you conducted, and how do you prepare?
- ›How do you manage a caseload of mixed commercial and civil disputes to ensure billing targets and deadlines are consistently met?
- ›What is your approach to instructing and working with Counsel, and how do you ensure continuity and quality of advice to the client?
Behavioural
- ›Tell me about a time you had to manage a particularly complex or high-volume litigation matter under significant time pressure — how did you prioritise and what was the outcome?
- ›Describe a situation where you had to take a leadership role within a team of fee earners — how did you support colleagues while managing your own caseload?
- ›Give an example of a time you identified a procedural risk under the CPR and took steps to mitigate it before it affected the client's position.
- ›Tell me about a time you had to deliver difficult advice to a client regarding the merits or costs risks of their case — how did you handle the conversation?
- ›Describe a situation where you contributed to the development of a junior colleague's knowledge or skills — what approach did you take and what was the result?
STAR answer examples
Model answers using the Situation-Task-Action-Result framework. Adapt to your own experience.
Tell me about a time you had to manage a particularly complex or high-volume litigation matter under significant time pressure — how did you prioritise and what was the outcome?
Describe a situation where you had to take a leadership role within a team of fee earners — how did you support colleagues while managing your own caseload?