Ann Collier & Tamsin Kennie explain the benefits & challenges behind “real time” learning
Knowing that on-the-spot investigations by regulators are an increasing concern for corporate clients, SJ Berwin teamed up with the Pacifico Partnership, an innovative legal training company, last year to develop an experiential learning programme to help us prepare our lawyers to be ready for action when a client faces a dawn raid scenario. Applying the types of training more commonly used by emergency services incident response teams, together we developed a simulation exercise to “immerse” participants in a real time dawn raid crisis and give them an opportunity to rehearse their response in a challenging but supportive learning environment.
Preparation
Phone calls from the “client” were scripted and filmed, as well as door-step interviews with TV reporters and clips showing the raid happening at the “client’s” offices that had ostensibly been uploaded onto YouTube by an employee. By way of additional preparation, entries were made on SJ Berwin’s client contact database, conflicts checks were carried out for the matter and a website was created for the “client” company.