Pluspunten
Working with DWF makes you more appreciative of the next firm you work for. You can use a job at DWF as a stepping stone to another law firm.
Minpunten
In my experience anyone considering a career with DWF is putting their career at serious risk. I went in an award winning law student with exceptional grades and outstanding references from previous firms. I left 4 months later disgraced by the firm as an incompetent HR issue… I was then snapped up by the competition in my very next interview about 3 weeks later, given a much better higher paid job. I received adequate training and mysteriously went back to being the achiever I was before DWF… I’ve been with my new firm over a year now doing very well and I think it’s fair to say at DWF IT WASN’T ME THAT WAS THE PROBLEM!! On my first week I was given a 4 day crash course by 3 individuals whom I (and they) found out were leaving that Friday to another branch of the firm. I was then left on my own with nobody immediately around me whom could see what I was doing, my manager was sat on a different bank of desks all together. It was not till about week 5 my manager did an audit of my work and discovered I wasn’t doing my job right. He arranged a formal meeting with me, made out it was all my fault I wasn't doing my job right and gave papers with warnings on. Everyone I mentioned this to in the office agreed that it was his fault and he was covering his back. The following week he scheduled a formal meeting in front of HR as some complaints were made about me the previous month that he only just got round to telling me about. One complaint was that I had said the letters ‘bs’ on a conversation with someone, and it was inappropriate to say things like that in the office. (bearing in mind this was an office where actual swear words were said on a regular basis by many colleagues, including him) this was very petty. However, a big deal was made. The second complaint was described as ‘comments of the sexist nature’ which was a very uncomfortable accusation to receive in front of an entirely female selection of HR, whom then threatened me with dismissal. I had no chance of defending myself as they were very brief about these comments that I had made the previous month. But it was very strange that they were suddenly coming out as serious offences... I later found that the supposedly ‘sexist comments’ were office tittle tattle that had derived from when I was spending time with a colleague OUTSIDE OF WORK where I said that my university told us that women planning on families faced discrimination by employers in the legal profession. I also later found out that the complaint wasn’t made by the person I said it to but their pregnant manager... On reflection this was clearly a stunt to discredit me and cover up the bad training and supervision I had received in my first month. This kind of politics made it a very uncomfortable place to work. A couple of months later I had successfully got on top of my work load and to reward these efforts they made me redundant... What makes it worse is I’ve heard similar stories from DWF colleagues I’ve bumped into since about people working under the same management. Sounds like the firm will keep employing managers like this whom will never be the problem, it will always be the staff that work under them. Don’t risk your expensive qualifications, work elsewhere.