Executive Women's Networking Blog : Women Executive News & Information : Epstein Becker Green Law Firm : Business Development, Women Lawyers, Female Business Leaders

As 2009 draws to a close, I’ve noticed a proliferation of annual surveys. Two, in particular – one by The National Law Journal (NLJ) and the other by Law360 – captured my attention because they’re focused on the number of women partners at law firms. The survey results were a mixed bag. While the number of women partners rose slightly in 2009, only 18.47 percent of all partners are women, according to the NLJ. In the article "Women Still Number Too Few in Partner Ranks," Law360 expressed concern that while women make up approximately half of law school graduating classes, many women are “leaking out” of the pipeline, whether due to family reasons or unfair stereotypes. However, Law360 also pointed out that some corporate clients are applying pressure on law firms to become more diverse, which will benefit women attorneys. 

I am proud to be a member (partner) of a law firm that has a long history of hiring, retaining and promoting to firm governance talented women attorneys, when other firms might have turned them away primarily because of their gender. I am not at all surprised that my firm, EpsteinBeckerGreen, ranked among the Top 20 law firms for the high representation of women among its partners in the NLJ and Law360 surveys or that, earlier this year, The American Lawyer conducted its first "Women in Law Firms" study and ranked my firm 8th in the nation among all of the 200 largest firms for its percentage of women attorneys and among the top 10 firms with the highest percentage of women partners.

While I am pleased and honored with these rankings, I am confident that my firm will continue to attract and promote qualified women. This difficult economic environment provides opportunities, as well as challenges. There are qualified women attorneys with varied experience and skill sets that have been outsized from firms and/or corporate legal positions and this is a great time to identify great talent!!

How does your firm rank in the NLJ and Law360 surveys? Is your firm taking any special steps to beef up its number of women partners and include them in decisionmaking roles within firm governance?

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During my career, I have encountered many worthwhile non-profit organizations that promote the interests of women. It’s vital that for-profit firms and companies become involved with women’s organizations—especially as event sponsors. Sponsorships not only provide the women's organization with critical financial assistance, but also help in marketing the event. 

I am very pleased that my firm, EpsteinBeckerGreen, has been involved with numerous women's organizations, such as the National Association of Women Lawyers (NAWL) and Corporate Counsel Women of Color (CCWC). NAWL is the leading national voluntary organization devoted to the interests of women lawyers and women's rights. The CCWC promotes the career advancement and success of women attorneys of color, as well as global diversity in the legal profession and workplace. 

EpsteinBeckerGreen has been proud to sponsor programs that enlighten, empower, and encourage women, as well as give back to the community. For example, during the Autumn of 2009, my firm: 

• Sponsored the CCWC's "5th Annual Career Strategies Conference" in Las Vegas, NV (Sept. 30 - Oct. 2, 2009).
• Sponsored and co-hosted NAWL's National Night of Giving in Atlanta, GA (Oct. 21, 2009). This charitable networking event benefited Girls Inc. of Greater Atlanta, an organization that empowers girls to make good decisions and create healthy lifestyles. At this event, approximately 500 items were donated to Girls, Inc. -- ranging from sporting equipment to school supplies.
• Is sponsoring the "Fifth Annual General Corporate Institute" in New York, NY (Nov. 5 - 6, 2009). This NAWL event will provide attendees with a unique opportunity to network with a dynamic group of women in-house counsel from across the country. I, along with my EBG colleagues Lynn Shapiro Snyder and Amy Traub, will speak on topic "Focus on the Fundamentals: Labor and Employment law for the Non-Labor and Employment Lawyer." For more information about this event, click here.
   

Has your firm or company been involved with sponsoring events that promote the interests of women? If no, please encourage it to consider event sponsorships.

Are there any women's organizations that you would recommend to firms and companies for sponsorship opportunities?

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I just found an interesting article on theglasshammer.com called "Goldman Sachs Returnship (SM) Program Helps Top Women On-Ramp Into Finance." In it, we learn about Goldman Sachs' "returnship" program, which lasts eight weeks and begins on October 19, 2009. The program will offer training and guidance to help highly skilled women return to the financial workforce after having taken voluntary breaks that may have lasted anywhere from a few years to a couple of decades. While participants are not guaranteed jobs at Goldman Sachs at the end of the program, Goldman Sachs has hired more than half of the participants from last year's returnship program.

What are "returnships"? They are similar to internships, except that returnships are targeted toward experienced workers who want to return to the workforce full time. The returnship program may or may not pay the participants, and it may last weeks or months.

Goldman Sachs isn't the only entity that offers returnship programs. There are many others. For example, the Columbia Business School and Bank of America jointly offer a program called "Greater Returns: Accelerating Your Career," which provides networking and training opportunities for executive women who would like to return to the corporate world. "The Greater Returns" program will be held in October 2009.

An excellent tool for locating returnship programs is the iRelaunch Comprehensive List of Career Re-entry Programs Worldwide, which was last updated in July 2009. The list covers programs in companies, universities, foundations, and other organizations. I highly recommend that you review this list, if you are transitioning back to a career after an extended break.

Have you (or anyone you know) participated in a returnship program? If so, please share with us your experiences with the program.

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Recently, the Ark Group’s WOMENLEGAL 2009 forum brought together gender-diversity thought-leaders in New York for an important conference on women in the legal profession. The forum focused on the key career issues facing women lawyers today, and practical solutions for both women lawyers and law firms regarding retaining and advancing women in the legal profession.

Carol Frohlinger’s excellent article, “What Women Want,” thoroughly covers the forum in the June-August issue of WOMENLEGAL Magazine.

Among the many specific topics discussed at the forum were: leadership; management structure and practices; measurement and tracking of progress toward career goals; communication and training; and reward and recognition. Rain-making generally was among the subjects emphasized by speakers as “career critical.”

My colleague, Maxine Hicks, the Managing Shareholder of EpsteinBeckerGreen’s Atlanta office, stressed the importance for women to understand that business development is the currency of law firms. “Billable hours determine your current income but how you use non-billable hours determines your future income,” she said, as part of a panel titled “Current and future outlook on impediments to women’s success: effecting change and taking action.”

Please read more about this invaluable forum in Carol’s article. Which pieces of advice offered by the panelists do you find to be particularly helpful?

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I recently read an enlightening study by Development Dimensions International (DDI) -- “Holding Women Back: Troubling Discoveries and Best Practices for Helping Female Leaders Succeed” -- which reveals that, worldwide, women are simply not getting the same career opportunities as men.  The study is based on responses from 12,800 leaders in 76 countries and approximately 1,500 organizations. However, the study also offers advice on how to overcome such challenges.

We learn that, in addition to earning lower salaries than men, women are often overlooked when employers single out “high potentials” -- employees who have strong leadership potential. High-potential employees are placed in accelerated development programs to foster their leadership skills. The DDI study reveals that the gap between men and women in high-potential programs widens as management levels increase: “there were 28 percent more men than women in high-potential programs at the first level of management and 50 percent more men than women in such programs at the executive level.” As a result, fewer women than men reach senior leadership positions.

The study provides seven tips for organizations and five tips for women to help female leaders succeed. For instance, the study recommends that organizations implement a formal succession plan to ensure that objective standards are followed when choosing replacements for key leadership roles. When an organization in the U.S. health care industry, for example, had a formal succession plan in place, “nearly two-thirds (63 percent) of the executives were women.” However, without a succession plan, only “one-third (36 percent)" of the executives were women.

The study also urges organizations to, among other things, set up objective standards to evaluate job performance; monitor salary programs to eliminate any pay disparities; give women access to leadership training and development experiences; and provide mentors who can encourage women "to be more proactive about seeking new positions" and less critical of their qualifications. (Interestingly, the study noted that, at Hewlett-Packard, women applied for job openings only when they thought they would meet 100% of the job's listed criteria, while men applied if they felt they met just 60% of that criteria.)

I encourage you to read “Holding Women Back: Troubling Discoveries and Best Practices for Helping Female Leaders Succeed” and then let us know your thoughts about it. Has your firm or company provided you with leadership training and opportunities? 

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I read an alarming article about female bullies in the workplace in the May 10th print edition of The New York Times. This article, “Backlash: Women Bullying Women at Work,” reports that “40 percent of bullies are women” and they choose “other women as targets more than 70 percent of the time.” Women are often targeted because they're perceived as less confrontational and "less tough than men."

The Workplace Bullying Institute claims that almost 40 percent of all (male and female) workers have experienced bullying. (Bullying involves verbal or psychological hostility for at least six months.) Unfortunately, many employers are not dealing with this problem.

It’s not surprising that the stresses and pressures caused by the recession are bringing out the worst in people. With many men dropping out of the workforce, women have become the working majority. But will the increasing female workforce result in an more and more female bullies?

As The New York Times article points out, bullying is caused by numerous factors, including “frustration, personality traits, perceptions of unfair treatment” and a variety of stresses. Some women feel that supporting their female colleagues will backfire and aggressive behavior is necessary for career advancement.

The article mentions some corrective steps, such as encouraging women to work for a common cause and coaching programs that include role-playing exercises and group discussions. Creating an environment that's nurturing and supportive may help eliminate bullying.

I highly encourage you to read “Backlash: Women Bullying Women at Work” and tell us your thoughts. Have you encountered female bullies at your company or firm? If so, how have you handled the situation?

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Because of today's unstable job climate, it's not unusual for professional women to develop a "me vs. them" attitude towards co-workers in an effort to defend their turf and opportunities.

While our troubled times may breed such negativity and competition, Sylvia Ann Hewlett has seen the opposite--professional women lending a helping hand to each other. In the Forbes.com article "Ding, Dong, The Witch Is Dead," Hewlett writes that some professional women are participating in a new way of networking by forming "personal boards of directors" or networking peer groups that offer advice and support to help colleagues weather the recessionary storm and find new jobs.

Hewlett's article spotlights Subha Barry, Merrill Lynch's former head of global diversity. When Subha felt that her career would be jeopardized by Bank of America's acquisition of Merrill Lynch, she "convened a personal board of directors: a diverse group of eight professional women from banking, accounting, human resources and the law." As the article notes, the board members weren't Subha's best friends, but people who knew her from prior jobs and professional associations. The board identified Subha's "strengths, values, goals, options and next steps," offered advice on which job fields to pursue, and put her in touch with others who could provide further assistance. Subha noted that her personal board gave her a feeling that she always had people to turn to.

The article also provides examples of other peer groups, including Lehman Brothers' alumnae, who recently created a network that provides women with "emotional support, practical assistance, and professional development."

I highly recommend that you read Hewlett's inspiring article, as well as the accompanying slideshow "In Pictures: Seven Tips for Great Networking," which contains more useful networking advice.

Have professional women formed networking groups at your company or have you encountered such groups outside your work? If yes, please let us know your experiences with them.

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I found an excellent article in the Negotiation newsletter that I wanted to share with you on the topic of "women negotiators." (See my March 13, 2009 post for information concerning the EpsteinBeckerGreen Women's Initiative networking event on this topic.) The article, What happens when women don't ask, focuses on the pitfalls that women encounter when they try to negotiate -- or fail to negotiate -- to advance their interests. The article also provides advice on how women should ask for what they need without creating a backlash. You can access a copy of the article HERE.

Negotiation is a monthly newsletter published by the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School, and for more information, please visit: www.pon.harvard.edu. The Program on Negotiation home page features more information about the Negotiation newsletter and offers a complimentary article to download. 

Are you encountering any obstacles or pressures that dissuade you from negotiating to advance your interests? 

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Two interesting articles were published this month that highlight current pay disparities between men and women.

In the New York Times article entitled "Why Is Her Paycheck Smaller?" (March 1, 2009), author Hannah Fairfield asks why women still continue to earn less than men do in the same job. She then provides some answers--such as men typically have more experience and log in more hours than women. Also, women tend to work in the lower-wage service sector, while men pick higher wage jobs in management and business. The article also features an interactive chart where you can learn how much more or less women earn than men at specific jobs.

Meanwhile, The Bureau of National Affairs' Daily Labor Report (DLR) states that the share of nonfarm payroll jobs held by women actually increased during the first year of the recession (see "Economic Outlook: Women Boost Share of Jobs in First Year Of Recession, Near Historic Parity With Men," March 2, 2009). Even though women lost 617,000 jobs in 2008, men lost 2.4 million jobs during the same period and account for almost 80% of all job losses. By the end of 2008, the men's share of the U.S. workforce fell to 51.7%. If this drop continues, women may soon make up the majority of the workforce. However, even if women and men reach numerical equality in the workforce, the article notes that women are still far from achieving equality in pay.

Equal pay is a hot-button issue these days because more and more families depend solely upon women's earnings to meet their financial obligations. Obviously, these families want the "mommy breadwinner" to earn as much as men, so that there's more money to spend.

Both articles mention some of the steps that the U.S. government has taken to equalize pay among men and women. For example, the recently enacted Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 expands a worker's right to sue his/her employer for inequality of wages. Also, as Representative Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.) noted in the DLR article, President Obama's $787 billion economic stimulus program "contains significant efforts to save or create jobs in education and the service sector, where women dominate."

What opportunities are presented for women in the wake of an "economic tsumami"?  How can we position ourselves in the new economy to take advantage of the changing professional environment?

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