At entry level the number of women in the legal sector now exceeds the number of men yet the proportion of female partners in firms is still less than 20%.

The difficulty in bridging this gap is increasingly a problem for law firm management due to wasted investment in training, the resulting brain drain, and increasing pressure from clients to demonstrate genuine diversity at all levels.

A unique how-to guide
Managing Partner's new report Advancing and Retaining Women in the Legal Profession explains in detail exactly what is happening within your firm to effectively prevent the development of your women lawyers to partner level.

Once you have a clear understanding of the current barriers you are provided with a comprehensive selection of proven solutions to these issues. A menu of programmes and initiatives is provided with practical examples that will clearly explain what will ensure their success or failure.

Finally, the report will help you to measure and communicate the success of these initiatives, improving your firm's reputation and culture for diversity.

Overcoming resistance to new initiatives
Particularly in the UK it is common to encounter resistance claiming initiatives supporting minorities represent an unfair bias.
The report specifically takes into account these objections and ingrained perceptions and helps you not only overcome but demonstrate the value of your initiatives.

You will learn:

• Who must be involved to ensure initiatives are a success;
• How to tie your programmes and initiatives into the core business objectives;
• How to ensure initiatives are consistent with the prevailing firm culture; and,
• How to monitor, evaluate and measure initiatives against targets and expectations.

The entire report is packed with case study examples to ensure you can understand all of the provided examples in practice, see how and why they succeeded and assess which solutions will be best suited to your firm.

The goal of this report is to ensure that your firm can become a leader in ensuring diversity and an example of best practice in establishing successful Women's Initiatives.

Contributors:

• Weil Gotchal & Manges LLP;
• Mallesons Stephen Jacques;
• Orrick;
• Freehills;
• Eversheds LLP; and more...