Some Firms Increased Diversity Despite Layoffs

In this series, we focus on the actors and ideas in the legal profession that are making a difference through innovative effective ideas. All this talk about the problems of the workforce can be a little disheartening. After last week's look at the unprecedented decline in law firm diversity in 2009 (See A Sobering Report []), let's take a moment to highlight what is working at a few firms that bucked that trend.

According to a survey 202 law firms conducted by The American Lawyer The American Lawyer , "fourteen large firms lost at least 10 percent of their U.S. head count and still upped their percentage of minority lawyers" last year. The experience of Dallas-based firm Winstead  http://www.winstead.com/ demonstrates how efforts to integrate diversity into the accountability structure of a firm can pay off. The firm's director of professional development, a partner at Winstead, said that the firm made "no pointed effort to save minority lawyers from layoffs." Back in 2007, the firm hired a consultant, tripled its diversity budget, and make recruitment of minorities lawyers a factor in compensation for each practice group leader. The resulting structure, which incentivized practice group leaders to look out for their minority recruits, was worlds away from the experience of one layed-off black associate who chose a firm based on its diversity reputation, and found mentors among black attorneys in the firms partnership, but couldn't connect with mentors in his practice group, but couldn't connect with mentors in his practice group.  According to Winstead partner Teresa Schneider, "the best way to ensure that minority lawyers survive a downturn is to create an atmosphere that fosters diversity during flush times."

 Chadbourne & Parke [http://www.chadbourne.com/] also attributed their improvements in diversity to accountability, but of a different sort. In 2006, it created a diversity committee and hired a diversity manager to act as a point person for its initiatives. Last year, it's "percentage of minority lawyers rose from 13.6 percent to 16.7... even as it lost dozens of lawyers in its U.S. offices."

Foley Hoag made an effort to avoid a firing strategy that disproportionately targets minority lawyers. Foley's partner for diversity initiatives Peter Rosenblum said that his firm "consciously avoided the 'last hired, first fired' mentality" for business reasons, favoring a more strategic long-term evaluation of a lawyer's role in the firm's future. Since minority lawyers have above average turn-around rates, they are disproportionately represented among the first-year and second-year associate classes, which can be bad news when 'last hired, first fired' is blindly applied.

Kudos to these firms and the smart decisions that they made with regards to their diversity policies.

Building a Better Legal Profession (BBLP) is an organization based at Stanford Law School.   BBLP is a national grassroots movement that seeks market-based workplace reforms in large private law firms. For more information, visit BBLP's Web site at www.betterlegalprofession.org.