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Across the Pond, Recruiter-Law Firm Smackdown Over Who's Responsible for Diversity Problems
Across the pond, powerhouse London-based law firm Eversheds and law firm recruiters are duking it out in a public dispute over who's to blame for lack of diversity in the legal profession, reports The Lawyer.com. At a conference on diversity last month, Caroline Wilson, Eversheds' head of diversity, accused recruiters of “getting away with murder” by not monitoring race, gender or sexuality. But recruiters defended their practices, retorting that if "the law firm market is not a diverse one, that is due to the recruitment systems put in place by the law firms themselves.” In most instances, firms request job applicants from traditional universities rather than considering candidates from a broader academic base. Recruiters also charge that Eversheds is looking for a scapegoat for lack of diversity now that clients like Tyco are pressuring the firm to increase the number of female and minority partners.
Thus far, most of the commenters fault the law firms. Writes one:
This must be the start of the 'silly season' for news. How on earth are recruitment companies supposed to manage the diversity of the law firms they serve when it is the law firms who make the final decision as to who they recruit?
Another commenter says that the problem lies with the firms, but also runs deeper, beginning with the educational system itself:
I am a black solicitor and law lecturer who has sort of reached the age where I can say I have seen it all before. I think Eversheds' policy is good - even if it is tied to the demands of a powerful client. However, I agree with the recruitment agencies that law firms are primarily at fault. But I also blame universities and some students. There has long been a bias towards white middle class recruits etc, and frankly it is not going to go away. However, the problem can not be laid entirely at the door of law firms. There are considerable problems at the education level. It remains the case that most of the better known law firms and central government tend to take trainees, pupils or qualified lawyers from old universities rather than the new. In my experience the latter is where most ethnic minority candidates will have obtained their degree. There remains a considerable amount of snobbery about degrees and A-levels and the like (class, your postal code and your grades) and where they are obtained....I also think that some students (black and white) need to do a bit more research about their proposed university. Some universities may be cheaper and nearer to home, which of course is an issue in these days of loans and the credit crunch, but if a university's services are poor and its reputation is dire (whether or not the reputation is deserved), you will have wasted your money, however little, you think you have spent.
As for me, I can't understand how firms can blame law firm recruiters for failing to identify women and minority candidates, when firms never sought out these candidates to begin with -- and may very well have rejected them had they been suggested by recruiters.
Posted by Carolyn Elefant on June 9, 2008 at 12:57 PM | Permalink
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