Law firm sets 40:40:20 diversity target

The problem aside from their proportion system is proportions don’t really by themselves address inequality or institutional misogyny. That is what I am curious about. Such as how are they going to ensure that even before these levels there is equality to the sexes? That once there are women in those positions they will have an equal voice?

I work in a small firm with 6 partners. The majority of them are women (the ‘younger’ partners). The men are not “awful” to women or anything in terms of overt sexism or misogyny- they work with a lot of women as combined with staff our office is 90% women and know they are valuable - but they have been in practice a long time and it is a constant battle for us women to reflect to them how they are at times incredibly sexist when they don’t think they are being so. By “favouring” young male associates for work or raises over females despite the comparable experience and skill (or even greater experience and skill by the females), by holding against female associates the same things they praise in the males. It was not until us female partners got into the partnership we also realized the pay inequalities that were in play when we were ourselves associates compared to the male associates with even less experience. A male associate who started at exact same time I did had less experience and yet started at $5,000 more. Another male they hired a couple years later with even less experience started at $20,000 more! I called it the tall male bonus. Neither of these men stayed with the firm either.

Now that I am one of the bosses, along with my other female partners, we won’t put up with that. And so far the men have been receptive to our positions. But the point is I am sure they would have kept doing what they did if we had not pushed it.

I don’t think that people understand the meaning of proportionate. Half the population is female, so that should be reflected at every level of senior jobs. However, half the population is not BME, trans or disabled but I have seen people arguing for 50% representation of these groups before. I think that any organisation with a commitment to diversity should aim for its workforce to reflect the general population.

I think there can be a few challenges to being very strict with these proportions though. Even apart from questions around whether some industries have reasons other than sexism for an imbalance compared to the population.

Even in an industry that as a whole has proportionate representation, it won't follow that each particular workplace will have the chance to hire exactly proportionately. Over time you would tend to see a certain amount of fluctuation in either direction. If you don't build that flexibility into a quota system it will tend to lead to problems where you may be stuck not filling a position, or hiring someone significantly less competent.

It's also simply not within the control of an individual business to create all the conditions that would lead to them having the right people applying. An engineering firm that said they would hire 50% women cannot do much about the fact that 50% of the engineers graduating are not women. Whatever the cause of that is, it exists at a different place in the system and has to be addressed there.

I think there is also some question, within industries, of what sort of positions appeal to various people. Why do women make up such a large proportion of GPs, but not surgeons? Does it matter?

Making a target like 40%, in an industry like law with a lot of female graduates, is pretty reasonable I think. It allows for enough flexibility to accommodate particular circumstances, but its a pretty robust target that will make a long term difference in how they think about hiring and management.

Happy with 20% disabled quota, especially due to barriers faced by disabled people. But the NB/ trans quota fails to acknowledge the complexities around those who do struggle with gender identity. Many of them will have MH conditions and regardless of what the vocal TRAs say, those conditions are not all caused by bullying or ill-treatment by others. What will probably happen is that people without GD like Pips Bunce will take those places of the quota. Those are people who generally do not struggle in the way that many people who ID as transgender do. For all the harping on about intersectionality, TRAs don’t seem to apply it to themselves. Rich, late-life transitioners or those without GD are not oppressed and can in no way be compared to someone with autism who self-harms and believes themselves to be the opposite sex.

Why not 20% disabled? I would guess there are a lot more disabled people in the population than whatever gender I feel like today. Disabled will not be represented in the working population proportionally either. I can see reasonable having the aim to get a 50 50 balance of people born XX and XY though.

No, it isn't that I accept the proportion of women to be lower, it's that in the real life context, the proportion is even lower than this and the timeframe short. Turning it around to 40% men is irrelevant as you aren't starting from scratch, you are probably starting from 20% or so.

If we "turned it around," and insisted 40% of teachers had to be men, within 6 years, can you see that it could only happen by getting rid of more qualified female teachers?

You have to assume a lot of the senior roles will be filled be the same people, in six years, or people already in senior roles moving sideways. Women will be moving up and space is only created gradually. If we insisted that men were demoted/fired to make it 50:50, I think that'd do more harm than good (especially for the women taking their places).

40% by 2025, then make a new target of 45% by 2030....

The 20% is daft, but if it does just fill up with males, that will at least demonstrate an important point. It'll also be interesting to see which category TW go into. If they are counted in this "third space" instead of in the female group, then that's good.

No, it isn't that I accept the proportion of women to be lower, it's that in the real life context, the proportion is even lower than this and the timeframe short. Turning it around to 40% men is irrelevant as you aren't starting from scratch, you are probably starting from 20% or so.

If we "turned it around," and insisted 40% of teachers had to be men, within 6 years, can you see that it could only happen by getting rid of more qualified female teachers?

You have to assume a lot of the senior roles will be filled be the same people, in six years, or people already in senior roles moving sideways. Women will be moving up and space is only created gradually. If we insisted that men were demoted/fired to make it 50:50, I think that'd do more harm than good (especially for the women taking their places).

40% by 2025, then make a new target of 45% by 2030....

The 20% is daft, but if it does just fill up with males, that will at least demonstrate an important point. It'll also be interesting to see which category TW go into. If they are counted in this "third space" instead of in the female group, then that's good.

The 40% is only not too bad if one accepts that the proportion of women is usually likely to be far lower. Turn it around and try to imagine a firm saying it would aim to have (only) 40% men - it does not work.

I do understand the aim of the policy which is to create a space for those who identify as non-binary or trans which is not at the expense of either sex. But it straightaway runs into the issue of definitions (what counts as non-binary and why?) and why prioritise gender over other protected characteristics? Why not aim to have BAME or disabled staff, groups who arguably face more discrimination and hurdles? Why not recruit on merit?

I don’t think that people understand the meaning of proportionate. Half the population is female, so that should be reflected at every level of senior jobs. However, half the population is not BME, trans or disabled but I have seen people arguing for 50% representation of these groups before. I think that any organisation with a commitment to diversity should aim for its workforce to reflect the general population.

What a load of crap considering the proportion of applicants who identity as 'other' will be minute. An excuse to justify a low proportion of female lawyers

Law is actually becoming quite female heavy. Many smaller firms are majority female intakes at grad or NQ level now. Women start falling out of the profession when they have children (at which point these kinds of targets are pretty useless anyway). Law is one sector that is perfect for flexible working practices and should be a sector where women thrive.

Baker McKenzie are a ever so slightly dodgy American firm and this is mere window dressing.

Ha well at least they are trying I was at a similar firm and in 2006 the stats for partners in finance dept were
49 Male
2 female (one on long term sick for mental health reasons)
Majority of the solicitors were women but most smashed against glass ceiling due to insane long hours culture

The answer has been discussed here many times: we just all identify as men. No need to change appearance or preferences or anything else, we've been told you can't define 'meaningful transition' and we can just stretch the bandwidth of manhood.

I don't think 40% is too bad, depending on where they are at just now. It's only six years away, so a lot of the senior positions will stay the same. It probably means that new posts will favour women to get to the 40%. It isn't realistic to expect half and half in such a short timeframe unless there is a high staff turnover.

I think that’s actually ok. If you remove the “20% other” bit, what it’s actually saying is that they should aim for a minimum of 40% of each sex in senior roles. Which is basically ensuring a good mix without being too rigid. It allows for natural fluctuations- unless your organisation is absolutely enormous there is unlikely to always be a perfect 50/50 balance in the mix of people most genuinely suited to those roles, and this system recognises that and doesn’t impose an artificial quota. I read something years ago that said you need a critical mass of 30% of women at cabinet/board/whatever level to have enough influence to genuinely break down barriers for the next generation coming through and stop “male thinking” from being the default. That makes sense to me, and this is along the same lines.

It’s not 20% non-binary - it’s 20% of any gender, which basically means it will be men.

So they have a target of employing 40% women in senior positions, know it's a pathetic target, so are hiding behind a weird ratio?

Ah, so more men then

Op doesn't say the want 20% nb. Sounds like they are leaving that 20% flexible, but any nb people will be counted there not under their sex. I expect all the categories are self Id anyway.

They will be hoping non-binary vagina havers are the kind that don’t tend to want kids...

It’s not 20% non-binary - it’s 20% of any gender, which basically means it will be men.

That seems like a really weird target. 20% non-binary seems like they picked it out of a hat.

My lawyer friend is pretty cynical about the wokeness of law schools these days, and it certainly seems to be the case when I hear groups of lawyers speaking in the media.

They're actually aiming to recruit 20% non binary/trans people even though the entire LGBT population is less than 10% of the actual population?
And that's LGB T which is less than 10%.
The population of non-binary or whatever people is probably lower than 2%.

Where are they going to get these people from and why should they employ a ridiculously large number of them compared to other qualified people?

If they can get half the men to identify as non-binary they can pat themselves on the back for only employing 40% women. Brilliant legal minds, obviously.

And for that 40%, there's self-ID...

What a weird target. Are 20% of people non binary? Are 10% of lawyers non binary?