J. Robert Carr
“Continuing a Diversity Destiny”
By Patrick Folliard
J. Robert Carr
J. Robert Carr, the newly hired executive director at the National Bar Association (NBA), recognizes a sense of historic importance attached to his new role. And how could he not? As head of a legal organization founded in 1925 by and for African American lawyers at a time when they were excluded from admission to the American Bar Association and all other state or local bar associations, Carr continues an undeniably vital legacy. Over the years, the D.C.-based NBA has been vigilant about addressing issues like voting rights, desegregation, the war on poverty, and affirmative action.
While respectful and appreciative of the NBA legacy, Carr is even more concerned with serving its current network of 44,000 members made up of lawyers, judges, law professors, and law students. He is intent on growing the association and ensuring its relevancy not only today, but in the years to come: “I believe strongly in diversity, and I’m wedded to the idea offitting the NBA and its constituencies into the larger fabric of the legal profession in American society,” he explains. “At minority bars, there are many opportunities for leadership development, and that’s one of the things I want to do here. My background in professional development and human resource management allows me to help contribute to the advancement of African American lawyers and the profession in general.”
Formally introduced as executive director on August 1, 2009 (the first day of the NBA’s 84th annual conference), in San Diego, Carr happily took the reins from John Crump, who served as the NBA’s unfailing executive director for more than 30 years. “All week long, I was called ‘the new guy’,” recalls Carr with a chuckle. “Since that first day, I wake up excited to go to work. After many years at associations, I’m in the top job for the first time. The buck stops with me, and that can be tough sometimes but it’s something I’ve wanted for a very long time.”
Prior to NBA, Carr honed his leadership style with the Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM). In 2003, he was named vice president of human resources and strategic planning for the organization. He was later promoted to chief professional development officer, which gave him responsibility for the group’s conferences, seminars, and educational programs. Other previous association positions include serving on the executive team of the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), and several years as senior director for strategic planning and human resources for the Association of Trial Lawyers of America (ATLA). “I’ve had the opportunity to work in associations small, medium, and large,” notes Carr, “and have performed all the roles that lead up to the executive director.”
A member of the NBA since finishing law school in the mid-1970s, Carr became more involved with the association a little over a year ago, when he received a call from an executive search firm asking if he knew of any suitable candidates for the NBA post. He suggested himself. Though unavailable for the first round of interviews (Carr had to be in India for SHRM), he returned in time for the second. Carr spoke with the search team, followed by an interview with then-NBA president Rodney G. Moore, and later appeared before the full board at the association’s mid-winter meeting. Soon after, Carr was hired.
“I didn’t get a single day off between jobs. It’s not supposed to work that way!” Carr notes with feigned ire. Instead, he remained at SHRM throughout the spring and much of the summer, running the annual conference (in the world of associations, yearly meetings are all-important) and pulling together loose ends before officially joining NBA as executive director in August.
Carr is aware that he helms a respected organization with an 85-year legacy. He also is aware of the association’s compelling and relevant mission. “NBA is a strong brand, and I want to build on that,” he shares. “Our members are very involved and engaged, but there aren’t enough of them. One of my goals is to make potential members more aware of what the NBA has to offer. I also want to develop the staff complement, and to diversify our revenue base. We depend largely on events; currently two-thirds of our revenue is derived from events.”
The current economy is not an easy one for associations. Last year, Carr notes, many organizations put a freeze on nonessential travel, and many have cut back on professional development as well. “Attendance for the NBA’s last annual conference dropped off less than comparable meetings,” he continues, “partly because our membership is loyal, and also [because] a large percentage of our members are decision–makers – they are either solo practitioners or from small offices – and it’s up to them to decide where and when to get their CLE credits. It didn’t hurt that we met in San Diego, either.”
In an attempt to attract the younger attorneys that will be vital to the association’s future, Carr proposes continuing the discounted membership fee; offering discounted lodgings at next year’s annual meeting, to be held in New Orleans; and perhaps shortening upcoming conferences (from seven days to three or four days) to better accommodate younger lawyers who might find it harder to take time off . Carr realizes that as the NBA’s membership “grays,” the need to attract younger members becomes increasingly important.
Carr grew up in then-segregated Tallahassee, Florida. When he was just eighteen months old, his biological mother left him with a woman who made a living caring for children. He remained with her for the next eighteen years. “Although she only had a sixth grade education,” says Carr, referring to the woman who raised him, “her strength and ability to work hard motivated me to succeed. I was very lucky; she and her children embraced me as part of the family. We were very poor, but there was love and support there.”
The only white people Carr knew as a child were an insurance man and the guy who collected the rent; otherwise, everyone was African American. Within his homogenous world, Carr found mentors, many of whom played key roles in his eventual success. The principal of his segregated high school arranged a scholarship for Carr to attend his alma mater, Morehouse College, the historically black institution in Atlanta, Georgia. Similarly, a Morehouse professor helped Carr get into Columbia University School of Law.
“Unlike some other black students at Columbia, I didn’t have a less–than– fulfilling undergraduate experience at a predominately white college,” remembers Carr. “I’d come from Morehouse, where I’d had the best time of my life, and was now ready to settle down and study. I made time for some socializing. While at Columbia, I forged meaningful friendships with blacks and, for the first time in my life, whites as well.”
After finishing at Columbia, Carr returned to Atlanta, where he was a litigation associate at Powell Goldstein LLP. It was during this period that Carr met and married his wife of 30 years, Jeanie Collins. His next job, as a litigator for the U.S. Department of Labor, took Carr to Washington, D.C., though much of his time was spent traveling throughout Appalachia representing disabled coal miners with black lung disease. “I spent three years on the road, trying fifteen to twenty backlogged cases a week,” Carr recalls. “That job taught me a lot about litigation, people, and the country. Still, toward the end of my third year with the Labor Department, I realized it wasn’t something that I wanted to do forever.”
Carr’s tenure with the department ended in 1981, when he was hit head-on by a D.C. Metro bus. He escaped with his life (very luckily, considering the seriousness of the auto accident, as Carr later learned from emergency workers). After a year of intense rehabilitation, he began to plot his next step. “What better time to reassess your life than when you’re hit by a bus?“ Carr asks half jokingly.
In the ensuing years, Carr pursued an LL.M. degree at Georgetown Law Center, traveled through Europe, and accepted a position at Howard University in the general counsel’s office. He eventually rose to head of human resources. In 1991, Carr left Howard and kicked off his career in associations at ATLA.
Following the bus accident, Carr has looked for ways in which he can make a difference. “When you come close to death, you feel that you’ve been spared for a reason,” he reflects. “I have a daughter who recently graduated from law school, and I believe it’s important for her and her cohort to have an African American bar association throughout their careers and lifetimes too. ‘Perhaps,’ I sometimes ask myself, ‘taking on this new role at the NBA may be the reason I’m still here?’”
MCCA is not alone in being glad that Carr is “still here,” in his words, and we welcome him as an impressive new leader in the legal profession! ” DB
Patrick Folliard is a freelance writer based in Silver Spring, Md.
From the Jan/Feb 2010 issue of Diversity & The Bar®