In recent years human rights law has become a popular choice for both students and practitioners. University law faculties are increasingly offering human rights modules as part of their law degrees and more firms and chambers are boasting specialisms in the field. The introduction of the Human Rights Act 1998 has made the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) directly enforceable in the national courts.

Adam Wagner's career path took him to the law via a politics and philosophy degree, a year working for a charity and a political science master's at Columbia University in the United States. He says: "It was at Columbia that I got much more of an understanding of the connection between law and politics, as most of those in Congress are lawyers. I realised that going to the Bar and doing public law would be a great way of combining my interests. I also really wanted to be in an environment where I was trained, and which had a clear career progression that I could follow."

After the CPE at City University and the BVC at BPP Law School, Adam started his pupillage at One Crown Office Row. He was pleasantly surprised by the experience: "It is stressful in the sense that despite spending years searching for pupillage, you only get nine months to prove yourself, but I found myself having a surprising amount of fun!"

Called to the Bar in 2007, Adam now broadly focuses on civil and public law, with a significant emphasis on human rights. He describes his current workload: "At the moment, I'm deep into two public inquiries. One is the Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust Inquiry, where I'm representing the Department of Health. The other is the Al-Sweady Inquiry, which is about alleged detainee abuse and unlawful killing in Iraq, where I'm representing British soldiers. Aside from these, I do a variety of court work, touching on lots of different areas, and some regulatory work involving doctors who are being prosecuted by the General Medical Council." Adam has also been involved in several inquests at which Article 2 of the ECHR, the right to life, is front and centre.

A significant career highlight so far has been working on the high-profile Baha Mousa Inquiry, which again focused on the alleged torture and mistreatment of prisoners by the military. The key issues ranged from the definition of ‘torture' and the way in which inquiries are run to the procedural aspects of the European Court of Human Rights. He says: "I learnt a huge amount from the other barristers, which has served me well as I've gone on to work on other inquiries."

One of Adam's housing law cases, where he is acting for Shelter, is particularly interesting because of a recent Supreme Court judgment that referenced the ECHR: "Whereas councils used to be able to evict people without the evictee being able to do much about it, under the new decision anybody who has been evicted can raise a human rights argument under Article 8 of the ECHR, the right to a private and family life, asking the judge to test whether the decision to evict was proportionate. This is an enormous change in approach; most will take the Article 8 option if they can, so the courts will be dealing with it a lot."

More change, in the shape of the new legal aid funding rules, is looming large on the horizon, says Adam: "With legal aid no longer available for certain claims, such as clinical negligence, there'll be less work around. At the same time, legal aid rates for criminal work have dropped. It may make the profession smaller, or it might mean that some criminal sets branch out into other areas traditionally covered by others. The effects will be felt broadly and for a long time." Adam also references the change that alternative business structures may bring: "Different chambers have different attitudes to innovation - some will go for it, others won't! As much as we're an old-fashioned, chivalrous profession, if something is likely to make money, there will be those who embrace it."

Travelling is a key part of the job, and a look at Adam's itinerary over the past couple of weeks is testament to that, with Eastbourne, Leeds, Southampton and Manchester just a few of the places he's visited. A flexible approach is important, he advises: "You often get instructions at the last minute, so as long as you don't mind not knowing what's going to be happening the next day, you'll be fine. And while it does take you away from home, I like knowing that if I'm not in court or meetings, I can stay home with my baby. I think overall there's a net advantage."

Freedom to plot his own career direction is another big positive: "I like being able to develop my career in my own way. For example, I set up the UK Human Rights Blog for chambers just over a year ago, and we've now had close to half a million hits. If I didn't have the freedom that being at the Bar allows, I wouldn't have been able to spend the time on it that I have."

However, the downside is that your career is so dependent on reputation. As Adam points out, "It's very hard to build a solid reputation, but it's very easy to destroy it with one silly mistake." Thus, a cautious approach is vital. The other frustration is a commonly heard complaint: "You can be paid nothing for six weeks, then receive a flurry of cheques - there's no rhyme or reason to it! So it can be hard to financially plan, and you have to be incredibly self-controlled."

Another key skill is the ability to get on with people. "All the work I do is about people, and it can be quite emotionally heavy going, so you have to be sensitive, able to calm people down and explain things straightforwardly. If you want to be a barrister who sits in your room churning out clever advice, you'd be better suited to tax or commercial law."

To get a sense of what you might expect from a career at the Bar, work experience and mooting are key, says Adam: "Mooting is just like being in court - you're arguing about the law - and advice centres and the Free Representation Unit will allow you to be a real lawyer for a bit and give you something to talk about in your interviews. Internships at legal charities are also very useful." He also urges students to make as many contacts as possible, and to remember that the people you're with at uni and law school are likely to be your colleagues of the future, so treat them well: "The profession is small, so don't upset people. You don't know who's going to be important to you in your later career."

Finally, Adam says that the traditions of the Bar are what make it unique, but they can be somewhat opaque: "Even though the Latin has mostly gone, the language, traditions and etiquette are all something you have to get your head around. For example, one of the invisible rules is that you don't shake hands with your opponent in court, for fear that your client thinks you're in cahoots. Instead, you just nod. However, not everybody does that, so there can be an awkward moment at the beginning of a trial - do I or don't I? But overall, I think that in a profession that has become very commercial and practical, it's nice to still have some oldstyle rules."