UNDERSTANDING COMMERCIAL LAW UNDERSTANDING COMMERCIAL LAW

Stuart Lewin is arguably one of Melbourne’s leading insolvency lawyers Having over 20 years of experience in dispute resolution and insolvency, he has acted for a variety of institutions and companies, and developed a highly regarded reputation.

Starting his law journey in workplace injury, he details how he began and the transition to commercial law

My first two years of practice were spent in the workplace injury section of our firm that was great legal work to cut your teeth on and really helpful as it was the area where there were lots of matters and you would often be in court and be required to do appearance work as a young lawyer

I liked that work, but it was kind of narrow in the sense that you came across the same issue regularly and there were only a couple of acts which governed the area So whilst I really liked the area, it was confined from a legal perspective and you needed to know a lot about a really narrow and bespoke area of law I eventually had an opportunity to move into commercial disputes and found the work to be a lot more varied and the issues a lot broader

You also probably need to be a bit more lateral about how you think when problem solving, particularly in the context of how to find that pressure point in a dispute that might unlock an outcome I think it was that exposure to the litigation and the interaction with clients that piqued my interest in commercial disputes, restructuring and insolvency work.

Noted for his commerciality and his ability to resolve matters in a timely manner, Stuart has had to develop a unique set of skills throughout his practice

The area which I practise predominantly is an area of law which requires expedited outcomes often If you ' re familiar with the voluntary administration process, it has reasonably strict statutory time frames. So I believe the ability to get to the core of the issue which might be driving the dispute or driving the different positions is something that I’ve acquired and developed over the years as part of the response to what the client needs.

Administrators and receivers need to be able to come up with outcomes quickly and cut through those issues and make decisions, particularly if they’re trading a business and an environment where they’re personally liable for debts they incur So it most likely stems from doing a lot of that and knowing that there are clients where having that string to your bow really appeals to them

One thing I’ve learned over the years is to make sure you hire people that are more talented than you and empower them to take ownership of the issues that you ’ re asking them to assist with I think that’s the strength, you ’ ve got to resource things appropriately, delegate and trust

Do you have any advice for students looking to enter your area of law?

Soak up as much experience as you can get, that’s first and foremost Whether it be with law firms or accounting firms because those candidates who show an ability to not just understand the law and recite what they might have learnt at university but can apply that learning to situations that are going to confront them in their professional life really do stand out and are a point of difference.

Students who have a good understanding of financial matters, they can sometimes have a head start with the kind of work that we do, as well because there are a lot of accounting aspects to it, looking at balance sheets and financial statements and reading creditor’s reports, the accounting of the business is a big feature in a corporate insolvency

The other thing that catches our eye with applications is people that have done unique experiences so it might be volunteering that might bear some relationship to the law, that always stands out

We see some terrific candidates who have done a lot of volunteering at legal services and have done work for international courts of justice. That kind of experience is priceless and if you ever get the opportunity to do those sorts of things whilst you ’ re studying, you should really take it