I recently had an opportunity to refer Jordan Furlong to a Law Firm to speak on the future of law practice. Jordan has some unique insights into law firm management, including this article on women in the practice of law. Read the entire article on Jordan's blog, www.law21.ca
"Here’s my theory: women aren’t leaving Law Firms at an abnormal rate. They’re leaving law firms at a perfectly rational and normal rate. It’s men who are staying in law firms at an abnormal rate. Women aren’t the faulty outliers; men are.
When you look at the situation that way, a lot of things start to make sense. Women who enter law firms quickly and accurately diagnose that these are amateurish organizations that employ archaic workflow systems, inept pricing mechanisms, skewed compensation structures, and largely ineffective management, not to mention a whole lotta personal dysfunction. The typical contemporary law firm is nobody’s idea of a good business model, a satisfying workplace, or a solid bet for long-term future success. It shouldn’t surprise us that women abandon this model in droves. The question we ought to be asking ourselves is, why are men sticking with it in greater numbers than should rationally be expected?
Certainly, there are any number of advantages presented to men by the typical law firm model — we created it in our own image, after all. Head and shoulders above all these benefits is the time- and effort-based pricing and reward system. Men continue to shoulder much less of the burden of family and household care than women do, giving them more time to devote to the firm. And since time is the currency of law firm financial success and the measure of law firm dedication, it’s no wonder that men find the environment attractive and rewarding in that regard. The mystery is why we put up with all the other unpleasant, unresponsive and dehumanizing aspects of the model. Why do we accept and endorse a system that delivers exactly one benefit to us (revenue) at the cost of so many other disadvantages to us, to our erstwhile female colleagues, and especially, to our clients?" more
