January 30 2001 - A new study of US law school graduates finds that women lawyers are less satisfied with their advancement opportunities than their male counterparts. But providing their female staff with mentors, tgether with some control over the work they do and development and advancement opportunities can help employers retain women. This is the conclusion in Catalyst's study of U.S. law school graduates, "Women in Law: Making the Case".
Susan Black, Vice President of Catalyst in Canada says that "Having a mentor is key," She explains that: "A mentor can be the person who helps you figure out how to get what you want, whether that's a strategy to go after the right assignments that will lead to a promotion or negotiating a flexible schedule."
Catalyst is non-profit organization dedicated to furthering the interests of women in business and the professions. The study sponsors were Columbia Law School, with a special grant from The New York Community Trust-Wallace Reader's Digest Special Projects Fund; Harvard Law School; the University of California-Berkeley (Boalt Hall) Law School; the University of Michigan Law School; and Yale Law School. The study involved over 1,430 law school graduates respondents from the sponsoring schools.
The study extended over the US with a geographically random sample. 64% (922) of respondents were women and 36% (517) men. It included women in government, educations and nonprofits as well as law firms and corporate legal departments.
In general, female respondents were less satisfied with advancement opportunities than male respondents. And women of color were the least satisfied of any group on all aspects.
Over two-thirds of women (67%) and almost half of the men (49%) agreed that the most significant barrier to women's advancement is commitment to family responsibilities. But few male respondents (21%) recognized that women were excluded from informal networks within organizations (compared with a 53% response from women);and just 29% of men saw a lack of mentoring opportunities for women - compared with 52% of female respondents.
Balancing work and personal life seemed to be equally difficult for both women (68%) and men (66%). But women make different career choices. 34% of women have worked part-time. But only 9% of male respondents had done so. However, men are becoming more like women in rating the importance of the work-life balance with 34% of men and 45% of women citing this as a major reason in their choice of employer.
Corporate legal departments do not seem to be any better than law firms in terms of advancement opportunity or work-life balance. 57% of women reported going to work in-house in order to achieve a better work-life balance but 66% said they had not found it.
According to Catalyst President Sheila Wellington: "Counter to what many people believe, this Catalyst study shows that for women, the culture of in-house legal departments is reported to be no more conducive to a balanced personal and professional life than are law firms."
Adding a Canadian perspective, Ron Daniels, Dean of the University of Toronto Faculty of Law, commented:
"The continuing loss of women from the legal profession constitutes a significant and urgent challenge for our country's legal community. Not only does high female attrition raise fundamental concerns over the role of women in society, but it also suggests a significant loss of economic investment suffered by our best law firms and corporations."
Additional information at www.catalystwomen.org