Alyssa

As a part-time paralegal, I predominantly performed due diligence on prospective businesses, outlining their assets and liability, and where appropriate, provide a brief evaluation of its commercial potential. In addition, I would also keep up to date with any new applicable laws or regulation, predominantly concerning banking and finance law in the UK, in order to produce short summaries of how they may affect the company, its business and its clients. I have also proofread various draft contracts to ensure that there are no spelling or grammar mistakes, as well as flag-up terms that may contradict any pre-approved agreement or regulation.

The internship was a highly enjoyable experience whereby I learned and refined many of my legal, transferable and interpersonal skills. Having lived in the UK for the majority of my life and studying English law, it was a challenge in the beginning to become accustomed with Malaysian legal practice and culture. However, this was a worthwhile experience and a welcomed challenge as it provided me with an opportunity to network with others outside the UK, learn and familiarise myself with other practice areas, jurisdictions and cultures to reflect my goal of becoming a great, versatile and international solicitor or consultant. It is my intention to take full advantage of any worthwhile opportunities available in order to better myself as an individual and for my career.

Had I not taken the opportunities presented to me during my internship at ZICO, I would not have been able to experience other practice areas such as Islamic financing law, corporate and commercial law, and data protection and privacy laws in Malaysia. Neither would I have been able to cultivate my mediation, negotiation and pitching skills, both on an individual level and as a team, through exercises and challenges set by the law firm. As a result of my determination and enthusiasm to absorb as much experience and information as possible from the internship, my team and I were awarded with a certificate for ‘Most Outstanding Team’ out of the cohort.

I was an intern in Wong & Partners in Malaysia where I worked under the corporate and commercial department. There, I did primarily research work regarding Malaysian common law cases relating to insider trading and market manipulation. I also learnt the significance of corporate governance and the laws governing wills, which at the I had yet to learn. Furthermore, I had to call clients to follow up on some questions some of the lawyers had.

Here I was placed within the finance and projects department and I mostly learn the basics of banking law. I helped put together various loan documents as well as reading through them to ensure that there was no spelling mistakes. Additionally, I did research around the area of utility infrastructure in Singapore relating to the rules regarding its financing. I was also able to speak to a number of lawyers there to gain advice in relation to communicating with clients and the importance of maintaining relationships with said clients.

The Client Protection team is a dynamic and autonomous function designed to help our clients use our services and access knowledge safely. We have a wide remit, numerous cross-function visibility and operate on a variety of levels within the business - from policy and product development to training and oversight.

In my role as a Client Protection Associate, I predominantly covered the EMEA region, however I have on numerous occasion covered the US and Asia and region too. I worked alongside the 39 other Client Protection team members and core service delivery teams to ensure our clients are provided with the highest quality of experts with first-class standard knowledge, whom have been vetted accordingly. All knowledge passed on have been previously screened by us to ensure that no material non-public information will be shared and ensure that the information are relevant and up to date.

On a day-to-day basis, I monitored active projects to flag and mitigate potential risks in the company. I have also communicated and provided guidance to delivery teams on projects they were working on and have also designed and implemented global operational policies and processes that protect our clients. Specifically, I have individually led two projects during my 4 month tenure at the company whereby I updated and rolled out a new policy on our primary platform, Front, which the Client Protection and Legal team use daily. I have also delivered tailored training to our EMEA delivery team and the global Client Protection team. Lastly, within two months of my tenure at AlphaSights, I became the global data person for the Client Protection team whereby I would extract data from the Front Analytics to produce a report on the team's efficiencies and communicate this to the VP of the Client Protection team as well as the global Client Protection Managers.