Marc Fèvre – Senior associate

Five years ago I was working in Japan and, much as I enjoyed the country and its culture, I was looking for a new challenge. A friend of mine worked for Freshfields and I knew of the firm's reputation for having the best clients and producing outstanding work and was was pleased to be offered a position with the firm in London.

I worked for five years in the Energy and Infrastructure Team in London and am now a senior associate. The level of responsibility is high but I know I've got all the support I need to be successful. Every partner I've dealt with has been receptive to my ideas. If you show interest in a particular area of work, the partners will encourage you to pursue it. I'm currently on secondment to our Abu Dhabi office in the United Arab Emirates. It's an exciting time to be here because we're right at the forefront of developing public private partnerships in transport and social infrastructure, which make a real difference to people's lives. It is also a very dynamic part of the world, where, after recent years of very rapid growth, governments are now looking to longer term, sustainable development. People are very receptive to new ideas and best practice, but one of the challenges is to take what you know from London and adapt it to the local market. This requires an open mind and sensitivity to local legal, economic, political and cultural conditions. It can be extremely rewarding when the job's completed and you can see the outcome of your work around you, like a new road or a new wind farm. One of the great things about being an energy and infrastructure lawyer is that your work has tangible results.

Working at Freshfields has been extremely rewarding. I have enjoyed working on innovative transactions in interesting places, but above all, the quality of the people within the firm at every level is outstanding. Everybody is willing to make sacrifices to get the work done, and this shared sense of purpose and commitment leads to very tight bonds within the teams.