User:Anonymousassistant/Anonymous Assistant

The "Anonymous Assistant" began life in 2003 as a newspaper column in The Times depicting the work of Helen Bailey, a downtrodden litigation lawyer in  the City of London.

It ran on an ad hoc basis during 2004 until 2005 when there was a new push in the online services. This led to it being commissioned to run in the leagl section of The Times website as a fortnightly column. It was the first legal blog (or "blawg" as they are now known) of its kind in the UK. It spawned a host of followers and follow ups, including, amongst others Baby Barista.

In 2008 it was launched as an independent legal blog and is now followed by over 30,000 readers and iinked to many of the leading legal websites in the UK and abroad. For example, it is listed as one of the most read humorous articles on The American Bar Association website.

It is satirical and thought provoking, designed to probe the partnership business model and question whether this, basically, feudal system isn't simply enslavement of the highly educated.

Situation background
Helen Bailey is a junior litigation lawyer at Craven Wiley & Sharpe, a medium sized law firm in the City of London. She is best friends with Jane, Alex and Liz and they all have the misfortune of working for the biggest bully in the Firm: The Boss; undisputed leader of the litigation department who values his assistants only for their ability to earn him money.

The Boss has poached new partner Miranda Myers from a rival firm and assigned Helen as her new assistant. Miranda goes out of her way to make life hard for Helen, determined to do anything to secure that elusive equity partnership she craves. If these horrors were not bad enough, Helen has the misfortune being lumbered with the worst secretary in the history of the firm: Melinda Peach. Melinda prefers to pass her days surfing eBay and gossiping than bothering with incidentals like typing and filing. Helen shares Melinda with self styled “head boy” Tarquin who is universally loathed because of his shameless brown-nosing tactics.

As Helen slaves away for no thanks and little pay, Jane, Alex and Liz are on hand to lead her astray,sometimes in spectacular fashion.

Author
The "Anonymous Assistant" is written by a real lawyer working in a City of London law firm. The events and characters she depicts are entirely fictional but many of the scenarios are drawn from her real life experiences.