Debora de Hoyos
Managing Partner
Mayer, Brown, Rowe & Maw LLP's Chicago office is the original, and still largest, office in the firm. With more than 500 lawyers, it is also the largest law office in the city of Chicago, with deep roots in the community. Founded in 1881, the Chicago office advised on the original incorporations of Sears, Roebuck and Co. and Continental Bank (now part of Bank of America), guided Chicago leaders in the city's phenomenal growth, and represented clients in some of Chicago's most storied trials.
(L to R): Paulette Dodson of Tribune Company; Debora de Hoyos of Mayer, Brown, Rowe & Maw LLP; and Veta T. Richardson of MCCA
Led by Managing Partner Debora de Hoyos, the Chicago office of Mayer Brown has an impressive diversity profile. Twenty-two percent of the attorneys in the Chicago office are minorities and 47 percent are women. Five percent of the partners in the Chicago office are persons of color and 17 percent are women. "Winning the Sager Award [for the Midwest region] has been very gratifying for the whole firm. We have worked very hard on diversity and inclusion at the firm. We have a lot more to do, and winning this award energizes us to do the work," says de Hoyos.
The work is spearheaded by the Committee on Diversity and Inclusion (CDI), which consists of 28 partners from across the country, a full-time diversity initiatives manager and coordinator, hiring partners from each U.S. office, the firm's managing partner, and the chairman of the firm.
"Diversity is a business imperative," says Mary Richardson-Lowry, partner and co-chair of the Diversity and Inclusion Committee. "We, at Mayer Brown, are acutely aware of that. We also have concluded, quite frankly, that the legal profession is simply better served by diversity and that, indeed, diversity in the profession is no less important than diversity in our society."
To spur its partners to embrace inclusion, members of the Diversity and Inclusion Committee met with the Policy and Planning Committee to request that diversity be included as a benchmark and thus tied to compensation. The Policy and Planning Committee agreed, and the practice that was first initiated at Mayer Brown's Chicago office is now embraced nationwide. At the end of each business year, partners are now required to report not only their business activities, but also their diversity efforts. As a result, the firm has experienced partners seeking diverse attorneys when they have a staffing requirement, which not only opens opportunities for diverse associates, but also opens everyone's eyes to new possibilities.
The firm has also taken formal steps to ensure all attorneys receive substantive, meaningful assignments. Twice a year, the diverse partners review all work assignments. In addition to monitoring the quality of each associate's assignments, these partners examine who is giving which assignments and how many partners each associate works for on legal matters.
The cornerstone of Mayer Brown's diversity and inclusion program is its well attended diversity retreat, which serves as an opportunity for associates to meet with the leaders of the firm. During the sessions, Mayer Brown encourages its junior practitioners to provide feedback as to how the firm's recruitment, retention, and promotion of diverse lawyers could be improved. Additionally, the firm annually hosts a Women's Forum for all female lawyers and participates in the Lavender Law Career Fair.
With more than 1,400 lawyers in seven U.S. and six European cities, Mayer Brown advises clients across the globe, including a majority of the Fortune 100 companies, most of the Financial Times Stock Exchange 100, and one out of every three U.S. banks.
From the November/December 2006 issue of Diversity & The Bar®