From the first year of law school, lawyers are trained to find the precedents that support their cases. Students and associates devote hours and hours of time researching cases that suggest the best paths by which to approach particular scenarios.
Similarly, there are law firms whose approaches to diversity are setting precedents for the profession. These firms enjoy a staff that reflects the global practice of law and the diverse clients they represent. They benefit from lower turnover, higher morale, and an atmosphere of inclusion and belonging that allows lawyers to do their best work.
Joseph C. Dilg, managing partner for Vinson & Elkins LLP, puts it this way: "It's something we recognize makes good sense to us in going forward, for both talent and business considerations. We're not doing it for pats on the back, but because it's good for us, not for any other reason."
Diversity & the Bar spoke to four firms about their commitment to diversity and their actions in furthering their goals: Vinson & Elkins LLP, Pillsbury Winthrop LLP, Steel Hector & Davis International LLP, and Heller Ehrman White & McAuliffe LLP. Each of these firms have invested time and resources in what it takes to attract and retain minority and women lawyers and associates. Yet, none of these firms are willing to declare that the battle for a more inclusive legal profession has been won.
Pillsbury Winthrop LLP
The major engine for diversity at Pillsbury Winthrop LLP is the People Committee, currently co-chaired by Kevin M. Fong, a partner in appellate litigation in San Francisco, Deborah Johnson, director of human resources, and Miriam Ben-Natan, human resource manager of the Silicon Valley office. The 20-strong group is charged with "making the firm a great place to work for attorneys and staff." The group meets by conference call every quarter, while the co-chairs meet every month. Smaller task forces meet on an as-needed basis.
Two initiatives are the career advisory group, currently in formation, giving attorneys access "to the best advice and mentoring" throughout the firm, and a program for outreach to law schools. Having a presence at law schools means the firm is "not just a name," but students and attorneys have a chance to interact with one another. The firm also takes part in informal opportunities with minority law students, such as a recent reception in the D.C. area.
"We've also done a lot of hiring of first-year summer associates," Fong says, noting that he himself was one. This initiative allows firms to spot and groom promising minority attorneys early. Fong went on to a judicial clerkship for a year after law school to further hone his skills before settling into his promised job.
And Fong has been able to return the favor. "In the early 1990s, I hired a first-year African-American summer associate, and he's now a partner." That partner has recently hired another first-year summer associate, "so we're into the third generation," Fong says with a laugh.
David A. Crichlow, a New York-based African-American partner in Pillsbury Winthrop's litigation group and a former co-chair of the People Committee, has seen changes since he graduated law school in 1989. He started with Winthrop, Stimson, Putnam & Roberts prior to its 2001 merger with Pillsbury Madison & Sutro LLP. Today, Pillsbury Winthrop is a global firm of approximately 800 lawyers in 16 locations. Although Winthrop Stimson had a number of Asian and women partners (even in litigation where women historically have faced daunting obstacles), there were no African- American partners. However, to the firm's credit, Crichlow says he worked his way "up the ranks," starting as an associate and being evaluated for partnership by his law-firm peers within the 7- to 10-year window.
Crichlow was told of the firm's commitment to diversity; that if he excelled as an associate, the door to promotion would be open to him and other minority associates. "I was able to test that proposition and found it to be true," he says. However, "the firm is not willing to rest on its laurels, we still want to improve. But you don't effect drastic change overnight. It's something that does take time." Figures provided by Pillsbury Winthrop show that minorities comprise 17.4 percent and women 34.9 percent of its attorneys.
The "clubby, incestuous, just-a-place-for-white-males-to-succeed" kind of law firms are sensing the need to reform, if only for purely pragmatic reasons, Crichlow believes. Yet, even so, minorities are still underrepresented in law firms, and this is a more intractable problem than recruiting women. While the nation's largest law firms average 14 percent of minority associates, at the partner level, only three percent are minority. "You don't hear as many of the negative stories about the difficulty in finding ‘qualified candidates,'" Crichlow says. "Hey, there are qualified applicants out there. The question is how do we get them here?"
Vinson & Elkins LLP
Given their growing numbers in law school, women no longer expect to sacrifice all for their careers, postponing or foregoing marriage and family for the sake of the firm. Young women associates are putting a premium on flexible schedules that are conducive to family life, and precedent-setting law firms are building programs to attract them.
At Vinson & Elkins LLP, such issues are no longer simmering on the back burner, say partners Marie Yeates, chair of the Women's Career Development Council, and Betty R. Owens, director of attorney development.
Yeates and Owens are representative of the first generation to push through the proverbial glass ceiling. Yeates had her children between the ages of 38 and 41, while Owens, who married at 42, is childless. Says Yeates: "There are two working spouses, and then you try to start a family, and I will tell you from experience, it's not easy. But we want to continue to attract talented women."
To assist in its women's initiatives, Vinson & Elkins has tapped a powerful group of women from business, philanthropy and academe to form a 20-member Women's Advisory Board. Among them are such prominent leaders as Kay Bailey Hutchison, U.S. senator, Catherine A. Lamboley, vice president and general counsel of Shell Oil Company, and Jaqueline S. Martin, president of the United Way of Texas Gulf Coast, and others. The group keeps Vinson & Elkins on track with setting and meeting goals, and enhancing accountability.
Vinson & Elkins adopted a new policy on flexible work arrangements. An attorney (male or female) who wants a flexible work arrangement drafts a proposal and presents it to a committee. "This doesn't mean everyone will get what they are looking for," however, it opens a dialogue about a schedule that will work for both the firm and the attorney. Although Vinson & Elkins has formally offered some type of flexible work arrangements since 1995, the new policy "fine-tunes" the process.
"In the context of work schedules, women will be able to see that they can have a bright career, and a bright future as an attorney—that you can have a family and be a good lawyer at the same time," Yeates explains.
Although some of the problems with female attrition are unique to women, some are shared with other underrepresented segments. Like minority attorneys, women are looking for mentors and role models who embody opportunity at the firm, and show that it is possible to reach its highest levels.
Therefore, an important component is strengthening career development. At many firms "the way work is allocated is a bit of a mystery, and tends to work to the detriment of women," Owens says. "Men have formed the relationships that lead to the getting and giving of work, especially because historically men have been in leadership positions."
Part of career development is having a clear roadmap of what is expected of an associate at every step of his or her ascent, and getting women more involved in the business development process. "Partners need to take responsibility for training associates," explains Owens, and "be more transparent about rewarding and developing behavior." Once more women are in the "partnership pipeline;" they will in turn play a greater role in assigning work and managing firms.
As of June 1, of 849 lawyers at Vinson & Elkins LLP, 248 are women. Of 343 partners, 54 are women.
Steel Hector & Davis International LLP
Steel Hector & Davis International LLP, with offices in Miami, West Palm Beach, London, Rio de Janeiro, and a number of other Latin American cities, is proud of its record on diversity. In fact, in the most recent National Law Journal survey on women and minorities at the nation's 250 largest law firms, Steel Hector & Davis ranked first in percentage of minority attorneys. Indicative of its heavy presence in Latin America, fully 35 percent of its lawyers are Hispanic, 3 percent are African-American, and 27 percent are female. One half of the class of associates who joined the firm in the fall are women.
Edwin G. Torres currently spearheads the recruitment and hiring at Steel Hector & Davis. Torres says that the firm takes part in some formal programs to increase minority hiring, but mainly there is just a pervasive awareness that in each year's hires, there is representative diversity.
Like other firms, Steel Hector seeks to make the connection with law students early by doing things such as taking part in the University of Miami Law School's Professional Opportunity Program (POP), helping to fund the organization, and actively recruiting from its ranks. Targeting law schools with minority enrollment, the firm hires both academic and summer law clerks with an eye toward attracting minority talent.
Torres concedes that recruiting African-Americans is the biggest challenge for a number of reasons. "Women are easier," Torres explains, because they are a larger segment of the hiring population. According to statistics from the U.S. Department of Education, of nearly 40,000 first law degrees granted in 1998-99, only 2,803 went to African-Americans, while 13,506 were earned by women.
But even after talented African-American lawyers are pinpointed, "Our biggest challenge is convincing them to come to Miami. A large percentage stay in New York or Washington, D.C. when they graduate from Northeastern law schools. One advantage of the POP program is that we can find local students from local schools."
John W. Little III, administrative partner with the West Palm Beach office and former hiring partner, says, "Obviously you don't end up at the top of law firms in diversity without a strong commitment. Our managing partner certainly gets credit for foresight, for believing that the firm should mirror our community. This is a result of many years of being focused on minority hiring. We have contacted professors in law schools and judges to help us identify promising candidates. Everything is a process, which has yielded great benefits for us. The fact that we've shown long-term commitment gives us a certain advantage."
However, no matter how a firm mirrors the diverse society around it and nutures diversity, or how many mentors and role models there are in the firm, there will naturally, says Little, be attrition among not only minority, but majority attorneys also. Some will move on to corporate practice, others will go into public interest law. However, "we encourage people to stay because they believe we are investing in their future."
Heller Ehrman White & McAuliffe LLP
It could be said that Heather Martinez Zona, an associate at Heller Ehrman White & McAuliffe LLP, embodies the fruit of diversity efforts over the past few decades. At 34, she was just elected 2002-03 president of the New York Women's Bar Association, the youngest person and first Latina to hold that prestigious post. She was heartened to discover that her accomplishment was celebrated across the firm-congratulatory email came from the firm's top management, a press release was issued, and administrative support was promised.
"Two of our core values are people and community," explains Robert Hubbell, firm-wide managing shareholder. "Diversity has been part of the fabric of Heller Ehrman since the firm was founded in 1890. Ethnic diversity didn't have the same meaning it has today, but the firm was founded by ethnically and religiously diverse lawyers who felt they didn't fit into the traditional law firm."
Today, the firm has almost 600 attorneys and professionals in 13 offices nationwide and abroad. Women comprise 18 percent of shareholders and 42 percent of associates; minorities, including self-identified gays and lesbians, represent 7 percent of shareholders and 31 percent of associates. The American Lawyer's "Women and Power" issue ranked Heller Ehrman among the top five law firms in America for women.
What is affectionately known as R2D2 (The Recruitment, Retention, Development and Diversity Committee) has been joined by a newer initiative that brings senior shareholders together with minority associates to tap into the wisdom in both groups.
Heller Ehrman also takes part in bar association diversity initiatives, such as the Bar Association of San Francisco "No Glass Ceiling Task Force." Like many other firms, they recruit at law schools with large minority enrollments and regional minority job fairs, and participate in minority student clerkship programs.
For associates like Zona, the efforts over the years have paid off. As a legal assistant at the San Francisco office prior to law school, Zona had been impressed that even during the economic downturn in the early '90s, the firm's commitment to diversity never wavered.
Married and a stepmother to four, Zona believes that mentoring is key for the development of attorneys. "The reality is most firms need to take a stronger approach toward mentoring, to look at how to implement a structure that allows folks to be mentored—to do the ‘star making' that, I think, is key to a firm's success in terms of promoting and retaining women and minorities."
"I think if you look several years down the road in both directions, you'll see a difference," says Vinson & Elkins partner Marie Yeates. "It's a journey, not a destination."
Hope E. Ferguson is a freelance writer who works in public relations for Empire State College, State University of New York.
From the September 2002 issue of Diversity & The Bar®