Insights

Beppe Degiorgio started his journey with Ganado Advocates as an Intern in the summer of 2013 as part of Ganado Advocates’ summer internship programme. Now an Associate within Ganado Advocates’ capital markets practice, Beppe walks us through his time as an intern and how it facilitated his growth that lead him to his current position within the firm.

From your own experience, how would you describe the internship to others?

It can be an overwhelming experience in the beginning, but the more time you dedicate, the more you will get out of it, so just keep ploughing.  The summer internship is a hands-on, learning experience where one gets a flavour of law firm life and work – it’s definitely a must for any student aspiring to work at a law firm.

Can you recount an important lesson you learnt during your summer internship?

You don’t know what you don’t know. From the very start, I realised how little I knew about everything, and while I was able to recite case names and article numbers by heart, I knew precious little about advising clients and solving legal problems. While this was very daunting and off-putting at first, Ganado offered the right framework to turn what seemed like an insurmountable hurdle into an opportunity for growth. In fact, my summer internship taught me two main lessons (1) to never take anything for granted, especially when relying on memory; and (2) that being a lawyer means that you never stop learning.

Do you feel your summer experience helped you grow as a law student?

Yes, greatly. My summer internship helped me both in my legal knowledge, but even in my approach to learning.

Did it facilitate your transition from a student to a lawyer?

Of course. The transition from being a student to a lawyer is already quite daunting. I can’t imagine what it would have been like had I not worked at the firm before.

As an associate, do you feel the internship contributed to your career progression within the firm?

As I mentioned, one of the important lessons that I learnt from my summer internship is that a lawyer needs to keep on learning. This may seem tiring at first, especially after so many years at University, but having passed through a couple of summer internships where this notion was made amply clear to me, I was already aware of this reality when I started working full time.

What advice would you give to our 2022 interns?

Never shy away from learning something new. When you don’t know enough about something, make it a personal challenge to learn enough about the subject to be able to explain it to someone else. In this way, you will become an asset to any client that you service and any team that you join.

Interested to learn more about our summer internship programme? Register for our Meet & Greet event.