Company/commercial and corporate lawyers advise on complex transactions and work closely with other specialist departments in acting for businesses of all sizes. General company law work involves advising on company directors' rights, duties and responsibilities, company board meetings, memoranda and articles of association, company secretarial matters and shareholders' rights.

Corporate transactional work concerns mergers and acquisitions, demergers and restructurings, joint ventures, takeovers, equity financings, privatisations, initial public offerings and new issues of shares and other securities on the international markets.

Sumit Indwar is an associate in the corporate group at Linklaters LLP, one of the world's largest firms. Sumit studied law at Downing College, University of Cambridge. He knew early on that the law was for him, thanks largely to the allure of everyone's favourite American defence attorney: "When I was a teenager my favourite programme was Perry Mason. Largely due to him, at 16 I did some work experience at a law firm in Birmingham and found it pretty interesting, so then decided to do a law degree. Although I've ended up doing a very different kind of law to Perry's criminal defence practice, you could say it's all down to him."

In an effort to determine whether he was destined for the Bar like his TV idol Mason, Sumit spent time during the summer between his second and third years at university doing three vacation schemes and three mini-pupillages. He says: "It helped me to decide that I definitely wanted to be a solicitor. If I'd really loved advocacy, then the Bar would have been the answer, but I wanted more than that, including exposure to the financial markets and learning about how they and big companies work." Sumit did his training contract at Linklaters, which he says was excellent, including a stint in Hong Kong - "the best six months of my life". He qualified into the corporate group in September 2006.

Sumit outlines the sort of work he's involved in day to day: "In the mainstream corporate group, you have a generalist practice. So I deal with any mergers and acquisitions (M&A) transactions, be they public or private, and equities work, such as initial public offerings and rights issues. Public M&A deals involve buying and selling interests in public, listed companies (including recommended or hostile takeovers), whereas private M&A involves acquisitions or disposals of interests in private, unlisted companies. The equities practice, broadly, deals with companies raising capital by issuing shares. Since I qualified, I've probably done half and half M&A and equities. I spent six months on secondment to the equity capital markets team at Merrill Lynch in 2007, so my first full year after qualification was particularly equities flavoured."

There is a three-way split in terms of the types of task that Sumit does each day: "First is document drafting and review - that might be drafting share purchase or underwriting agreements or a prospectus, or reviewing the same as drafted by the lawyers on the other side of the transaction. It's quite technical work but is extremely rewarding when you get it right. Second, I might be doing any research that crops up - so that could be a quick technical question or it might be more complex research that goes to the entire structure of a transaction, which can take a long time to complete. Third, I spend a lot of time answering phone calls and emails, and attending conference calls and meetings - these transactions can be very fast moving, so we have to respond quickly." Sumit returned from Merrill Lynch in January 2008 and since then has worked on several rights issues and on a hybrid equity/public M&A matter, all of which he says has been very interesting. Another personal highlight was the first time he was sent off to represent the firm as a newly qualified lawyer: "When I was three months qualified I was sent to Geneva to handle the closing of a deal. It felt like I was going into the lion's den - it was just me representing the client, whereas the client on the other side turned up in person together with what seemed like an army of lawyers! It ended up being a lot of fun and when the deal was done there was a real collective adrenaline rush in the room. I felt like I'd really accomplished something as a qualified lawyer."

Sumit dispels a myth about the nature of corporate work: "I really enjoy that, contrary to what some people might think, I actually do a lot of law. It's not just document work. Every day some technical issue of company law comes up. I also really enjoy working with people. Big businesses are ultimately just made up of people, and you have to understand those people to understand the challenges they and their businesses face, so it really is about building relationships. Hand in hand with that is the unpredictability, which I both like and dislike. I'm still doing things for the first time and the variety is very rewarding."

And what about the legendary all-nighters that are associated with corporate work? Sumit gives his take on things: "In the five years I've been doing this, I have only worked a handful of proper all-nighters. I've also had a few weeks where we've been going home in the small hours each night, but this is usually in the build-up to a closing. Every deal has a life of its own but the week before a closing is usually quite fraught. It's about managing your time sensibly and using the resources that are available, such as secretarial support and document centres. One of the really nice things about working here is the spirit of camaraderie that develops during these times - and although I can be working late, I'm working with people who I can genuinely have a laugh with."

Sumit's view is that in terms of essential skills, good communication is key: "When you retain Linklaters, you expect us to get the law right, but the value comes in presenting something to the client in a way that is relevant to their business. They don't want to look at a three-page treatise - they want a crisp email saying yes or no, or offering another way around the problem. You also need to learn to be commercially inclined, and take the time to think and listen to the client and what they want to achieve."

Project management is another crucial skill: "A lot of what we do is just that - these are big transactions, often involving other advisers that might include investment banks and accountants. You're in the middle of the web and can be in charge of making sure that each party is in the loop and on track. Within Linklaters itself, there are often other departments involved in a deal and you can be in charge of making sure those other work streams are being followed up, so you have to be very organised."

Sumit's final advice to budding corporate lawyers is to take charge and get involved. He says: "Just read as much as you can, talk to lots of people, go to vacation schemes, open days and events at your university, and ask honest questions. Any experience is good experience - even if you don't get onto a vacation scheme at a particular firm, that shouldn't preclude you from applying for a training contract at that firm as long as you've done something to show you're committed to a career in the law."