It Was a Very Good Year

• Author: Hilarie Bass
• Pages: 8-8

8 || ABA JOURNAL AUGUST 2018

PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY OF THE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT

President’s Message || By Hilarie Bass

It Was a Very Good Year

Research on long-term careers for women tops President Bass’ achievements

As a woman pract icing in

big law for more than 25 years,

my initiative, Achiev ing Long-

Term Careers for Women in Law,

which focused on why women

continue to leave the legal profes-

sion, hit home. Although women

have been graduating from law

school in roughly equal num-

bers as men for decades, their

career paths are qu ite di erent.

Twenty years after law school,

when lawyers should be in their

most productive years, far t oo

many women have not reached

the same success as men, and

close to half have left the profe s-

sion entirely.

There are many theories a nd

anecdotal ev idence as to why

women are leaving, but anec-

dotes don’t change policies,

data does. So this ye ar, the ABA

funded research on lega l careers

of women lawyers, includ-

ing surveys, focu s groups and

studies focused on the long-term ca reer trajectories of

women lawyers. We investigated the issues fa ced by

women lawyers over the age of 50 and women lawyers of

color. We hosted two national summits with le aders of

the profession – at Harvard L aw School last fall and at

Northwestern Pr itzker School of Law in June.

The fi ndings will be released in the comi ng months,

but early analysis shows res ults for women were dramati-

cally di erent from their male colleag ues. We learned

that the reasons for the exodus of women from the pro -

fession are many, including success fatigue, i mplicit bias,

lack of work-life balance, sexua l harassment and discrim-

ination. Our surveys found:

• 45 percent of women lawyers report ed that they

had been denied proper acces s to business development

opportunities bec ause of their gender.

• 58 percent of women lawyers reported t hat they had

experienc ed demeaning comments , stories or jokes.

• Nearly 60 percent of women lawyers report ed that

they had been mista ken for a lower level employee.

• Approximately 30 percent of women lawyers rep orted

that their gender a ected their ability to ac hieve salary

increases or bonuses, desir able assignments and access to

sponsors.

Focus groups h ighlighted stor ies from women law-

yers who felt they were used as a d iversity token in

a client meeting or had cred it

for work they had done stolen

by a male colleague. Too many

women lawyers said they oft en

felt like Lucy and Ethel on the

candy assembly line from “I L ove

Lucy”: stuck w ith workhorse

assignments, expe cted to solve

systemic problems and given

unrealistic t ime expectations.

Many women in their 50s with

an impressive body of work told

us they felt invisible with in their

law fi rms. Younger women associ-

ates complained about receiv ing

less important as signments that

did not allow them to advance.

Exper ienced women attorneys

describe “success fatig ue,” a feel-

ing of always having to work

harder to achieve the same level

of success as men.

Implicit bias also plays an

important role in expla ining

many of these dispar ities. Many

people do not believe they have

biases, and when they are c alled out on it, they rational-

ize their conclusions to justif y their behavior. But our

studies found implicit bias is a major fact or in explaining

the di erences in compensation and elevation between

men and women in the legal profession.

Incidents of sexual hara ssment only add to the mix,

compelling women to leave.

The goal of the initiative is to m ake empirically based

recommendations for legal employers to help create envi-

ronments that allow women attorney s to achieve their

full potentia l. This will inevitably enhance t he likelihood

that women will not only reac h the highest levels of prac-

tice, but also that they w ill remain in the profession. The

recommendations coming out of this st udy will provide

legal employers strategies to m inimize or eliminate gen-

der based implicit bias in hir ing, elevation and compen-

sation decision s.

We must do a better job of making ou r profession

more hospitable to women and attor neys of color.

Success may take a whi le, but we will have made real

progress when the average hardworki ng woman is as suc-

cessful as t he average hardworking man.

Although my year is over, work on these importa nt

issues will conti nue. And I cannot think of a better stew-

ard for the ABA than i ncoming President Bob Carlson. I

wish him ever y success. Q

Follow President Bass on Twitter @ABAPresident or email abapresident@americanbar.org.