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Women in the Law

Yale Law Women Name Top 10 Family-Friendly Firms

Posted Aug 20, 2009 9:15 AM CST
By Debra Cassens Weiss

Yale Law Women and Working Mother magazine don’t agree on the top family-friendly law firms.

A top 10 list of family-friendly law firms released today by Yale Law Women includes four law firms that didn’t make a top 50 list of best law firms for moms published last week by Working Mother magazine.

The four law firms on Yale Law Women’s list that didn’t make Working Mother’s top 50 are: Arnold & Porter, Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, Mayer Brown and Patton Boggs.

Here is the entire list by Yale Law Women, in alphabetical order:

Arnold & Porter

Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton

Covington & Burling

Jenner & Block

Katten Muchin Rosenman

Mayer Brown

Munger, Tolles & Olson

Patton Boggs

Sidley Austin

WilmerHale

Yale Law Women based its list on a survey of Vault’s top 100 law firms that included questions about percentages of female lawyers, access to and use of parental leave, emergency and on-site child care, availability and use of part-time and flex-time work policies, billable hours and compensation, and alternative career programs. Results were weighted based on a Yale alumni survey about the importance of each category of family-friendly practices.

Some key survey findings, based on the firms that responded to the survey:

• Average percentage of female associates: 45%

• Average percentage of female partners: 16%

• Average percentage of mothers who used the maximum parental leave offered: 92%

• Average percentage of fathers who used the maximum parental leave offered: 55%

• Percentage of firms that offer onsite childcare for regular use: 10%

• Percentage of firms offering a part-time option: 100%

• Average percentage of lawyers working part-time: 7%

• Percentage of firms offering flex-time work outside the office: 88%

• Percentage of firms offering formal “off-ramp / on-ramp programs,” allowing lawyers to leave the firm for a few years and return later: 25%

Comments

1.

Casey
Aug 21, 2009 8:59 AM CST

What is with all the ABA “lists” lately? Who really cares!? As a woman, I tried to care about this article.. but I just couldn’t do it

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2.

WorkingDad
Aug 21, 2009 9:51 AM CST

What is it with only asking women’s opinions?  Apparently, the ABA doesn’t consider fathers part of a family.  The entrenched gender bigotry of organizations like the ABA enforce the stereotype of mothers needing parental leave, chid care, and part-time arrangements than fathers, which leads to men working more than women, allowing the gender bigots to start jumping up and down about a wage gap.  Want to close the gap?  Encourage men to work less.  Such measures would also improve the partner gender ratio.

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3.

da guv
Aug 21, 2009 9:57 AM CST

try cross referencing this list with comparative Divorce statistics and with the number of employed professionals who forego having children—a family—at all. 
Calling big law ‘family friendly’ by reference to these markers is like calling war ‘civiilzed’ because of the Geneva Convention.

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4.

Anon
Aug 21, 2009 10:51 AM CST

I agree completely with #2.  I may not be a father yet, but when I do I plan to balance my law career with my family.  I think a women’s opinion is equally important, but who came up with yale law women as the spokespersons for a top family-friendly firm.

ABA just pandering to their deep pocket donors to spread their name in a positive light.  Any chance the other law school’s graduates (that probably make up a larger % of working moms/attorneys) and their opinions matter ABA?

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5.

Elizabeth
Aug 21, 2009 11:13 AM CST

Why do all of the surveys, measurements etc focus on leave and child rearing issues? Most firms (ok, perhaps some grudgingly) have come to accept that their professional women should have some time off when they have a baby. Of course since compensation is usually measured by productivity and productivity is based on the number of hours that are billed, women end up paying for that leave through diminution in compensation or delayed partnership, etc. The real issues which need to be looked at are whether opportunities are provided to women for business generation/development and leadership. We all know that if you can generate business you can call your own shots.

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6.

Feeling Cynical Today
Aug 21, 2009 11:49 AM CST

This is like having a list of the Top 10 Teacups for Bailing out A
Sinking Ship.

All you have to do is look at the stories behind these stats:

Female associates 45%/partners 16%. What happened to those 29%?? Did
they just die? Did their brains explode? Have they been kidnapped?
No—they left. Why? Because they’re more stupid then men? Because
they’re more enlightened then men? No—they left because they had kids.

But why not the men? Didn’t they have kids? Well yes.  So why didn’t
they leave in droves? Well men (who presumably make up 84% of the
partners even though they made up only 55% of the associates), only took
55% of max parental leave technically permitted, meaning they got gold
stars from all the inlaws, their children, and even their wives (whom
they met when they were both second year associates at the firm). Even
their firms, since they are family friendly and all, gave them a silver
star with an option to cash in for gold star if it could be demonstrated
that this nonsense would cease after the child/children were six months
of age (leaving 17.5 years before adulthood, but isn’t there someone
else who handles that? Oh yes, but that’s coming later). The men feel
good about themselves and their jobs—and it shows.  The women,
meanwhile, setting off on a path of mixed gratitude and guilt that they
will realize only much later is unending, took 92% of the max time
officially allowed (they KNEW it was a trick; but their husbands had to
get back to work and what kind of mother would you be anyway?)
Unofficially, they were sent directly to mommiedom. Along with their
teacups. They feel like failures, their children wonder why mommies are
so freaked out all the time, and their husbands are just glad there are
still second year associates at the firm . . . .

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7.

B. McLeod
Aug 21, 2009 12:55 PM CST

Or, maybe they really were more enlightened than the men.  As a postulate, it fits the data just as well as “mommiedom.”

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8.

christina
Aug 21, 2009 9:54 PM CST

#6- so true.
But really, who really goes to work at these firms thinking, “This is great.  I want to work here because it’s so family friendly!”  I’ve never heard of these firms but I’m assuming they are all BigLaw BigDeal BigEgo FatPaycheck firms.  And hey, that’s cool, we have student loans to pay, but let’s be honest.  You don’t work there to have “work/life balance.”  Or to have an opportunity to be a better parent.  You work there for the $$$$$$.

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9.

hadley v. baxendale
Aug 22, 2009 11:01 AM CST

These are the most telling pair of stats:
• Percentage of firms offering a part-time option: 100%

• Average percentage of lawyers working part-time: 7%

Firms offer benefits and accomodations; the lawyers don’t use them; the outsiders continue to dump on the firms because it appears that women are being mistreated.  Drawing that conclusion from the composition of partners is like concluding that if a state has more cocaine use and high percentage of lawyers, that lawyers do more cocaine.

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10.

Jon Garvey
Aug 23, 2009 11:43 AM CST

Who cares?  Fathers and mothers share the responsibility of raising children and raising income.  Who cares what “Yale Law Women” think?

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11.

Joyce Krutick Craig
Aug 23, 2009 7:12 PM CST

The disparity between the number of women in the firms and the number who are partners show that the only thing that has changed since I became a lawyer in 1969 is the number of women in the profession.  The mindset of the MEN running the firms remains the same.  No matter how good a lawyer a woman is she is apparentently just tolerated and hired because the firms have to show they are not discriminating. 

Let’s get real.  Both men and women should be taking care of the children.  Both should be using the flex time provisions and maternity/paternity leave to do so.  However, everyone knows that if an attorney takes the leave he/she will loose out, on a partnership, on a bonus, etc.  So, the attorney bites the bullet, hires a nanny and doesn’t take the leave.

It is time to stop making lists like this, and start focusing on which firms are “family frendly” allowing both men and women to lead normal lives, and not forcing associates to work 80 hour weeks in order to be on track for partnership.  I the doctors could do it with respect to residents’ hours, we certainly can!
The work product of all lawyers would improve substantially if they had more time at home with their families and friends.

Hon. Joyce Krutick Craig
U.S. Administrative Law Judge (Ret.)

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12.

Alan Sheketovits
Aug 24, 2009 4:27 AM CST

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