Reccy Midigo

My current role: Solicitor

I currently work at the University of Birmingham as a solicitor and in-house legal counsel. I am a part of the University’s team of legal advisers whose primary role is to advise the University across a wide range of issues including knowledge transfers, strategic projects, compliance, disputes and understanding the impact that changes to legislation will have on the University. I also advise colleagues at the University of Birmingham Enterprise (the University’s Technology Transfer Office) and support them with launching spin-outs and transforming the University’s ground breaking academic research into real-world products and services which benefit our local and global community.  

A typical day as in-house counsel

Having trained at a boutique IP, commercial and tech law firm, I am one of the general contract specialists within our legal team.  My role primarily involves reviewing, drafting and negotiating contracts which the University enters into with third parties. If things go wrong, I also advise on dispute resolution strategies such as negotiation, mediation and settlements.

As an in-house lawyer, no two days look the same. One minute I am being asked to draft and negotiate the terms of collaboration agreement for a big research project and the next minute I am being asked to advise on a transaction to ensure compliance with data protection legislation, public sector regulation and University statutes. This means I have to be highly organised and able to switch between different areas of law and skills quickly and be able to conduct efficient legal research when I do not immediately know the answer to a query.

A big part of my role at Enterprise involves advising the University on how best to protect and commercialise its IP and any risks associated with doing so. This involves filing trade mark applications, drafting IP assignments and licence agreement and advising on IP infringement, official office actions, export controls and required disclosures under national security legislation. I also advise on key documents and issues that arise in relation to spin-outs such as inventorship rights, confirmatory assignments, founder disputes and governance agreements (e.g., shareholder agreements).

My career journey after graduation

Shortly before graduating, I found a job at a furniture shop through my landlord, where I worked in customer support and eventually as a legal administrator. After working there for a year and half, I started working as a Flex Legal consultant paralegal on secondment at Burley Law Limited. My original 3 month consultancy contract was extended to 6 months, and then eventually became a permanent role after I demonstrated that I had the skills and experience required to support their business long term.

While interviewing, I was asked a series of questions about my skills and previous work experience and used the STAR technique to explain how this experience made me suitable for a role as a consultant paralegal. I was also asked to review a contract and point out errors and suggest amendments to the document for the interviewer to consider and used the knowledge learned from my contract law course to successfully complete this task. 

I worked at Burley Law for around 3 years while completing my SQE courses and exams and the qualifying work experience (QWE) required to qualify as a solicitor in England and Wales. Following my qualification as a solicitor in March 2025, I applied for an in-house solicitor role at the University of Birmingham and was offered a position in May 2025.

As an international job candidate, I had to consider UK visa requirements when applying for roles. Once my student visa expired, I applied for the Youth Mobility Visa which enabled me to work in the UK for 2 years without visa sponsorship. I used this time to gain valuable work experience with UK employers. Once this visa expired, I then had to apply for a skilled work visa and be sponsored in order to continue working in the UK. Although this process was challenging, I was strategic in how I approached searching for roles to ensure I was able to find an employer who would sponsor me. This included using the Tier 2 list of sponsors (available online) to confirm whether an employer has a sponsor licence before submitting an application and being up front with recruiters that I could only be put forward for roles offering visa sponsorship.

My Birmingham Experience

The University of Birmingham was extremely helpful in my career progression. My Personal Tutor and module leaders went above and beyond to provide mentorship and advice about career options after my studies and were references for various applications. Taking part in the Professional Skills Award (Advanced) helped me learn how to improve my CV, LinkedIn Profile, application answers and interview skills. The advisors at Careers Network took the time to go through my answers ahead of application deadlines and interviews and give me constructive feedback from rejected applications, which led to less rejections and more invites to interviews and success securing roles.

My favourite thing about studying at UoB was how supportive the Faculty and Staff were in our personal growth and development. Despite having large class sizes, our lecturers were always happy to make time to help us understand course work or provide us with support applying for work experience. The staff at the Careers Network were always happy to sit down and grow through my applications and help me improve my answers and prepare for upcoming interviews. 

Birmingham's Impact

I always knew I wanted to be a lawyer, but I’ve always struggled to decide on a specific area of law I wanted to practice. Taking the LLB for Graduates course meant that I didn’t have many options for electives as we had to complete our law degree in 2 years. I found that having the opportunity to study various subject areas as well as gain some work experience through CEPLER, helped increase my theoretical and practical knowledge of different areas of law. However, it wasn’t until my work experience as a Consultant Paralegal that I discovered that IP is the area of law I am most interested in practicing, particularly because I am an artist and it allows me to help other creatives secure and commercialise their IP.