Step Up For Diversity | A Project of the Center for Legal Inclusiveness

Take Action To Build An Inclusive Legal Profession

How to Participate

Click on one of the category icons below to report your progress completing CLI’s action items.
Some items are easy and others are more involved. If you do something that is not on the list, report that too.
Report back on your progress as often as you like by completing the form under your category.

Corporate Counsel

Corporate Counsel

Supervising/ Managing Attorneys

Supervising/ Managing Attorneys

Other Attorneys

Other Attorneys

What Can You Do

Step Up For Diversity^TM is a national grassroots inclusiveness initiative for corporate counsel, law firm supervising/managing partners, and other attorneys to take individual actions (small and large) to: 1) help diverse and female attorneys build relationships (to overcome hidden barriers) and 2) incorporate inclusive practices to create a more diverse legal profession.

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This web-based initiative provides a way for you to report (publicly or anonymously) inclusiveness action items you have completed. Your actions, together with others’, will help transform the legal profession.

Top participants will be recognized at the 2012 Legal Inclusiveness & Diversity Summit on May 7, 2012, in Denver, Colorado; receive a free registration to the 2012 Summit with seating at a VIP luncheon table, as well as recognition on CLI’s website and Step Up for Diversity promotions.

How to Participate

· Register and report your progress completing CLI’s action items. Some items are easy and others are more involved. If you do something that is not on the list, report that too.
· Your participation is anonymous unless you choose to make it public.
· Report back on occasion or frequently.

Why Action Is Needed

Eight national research studies have concluded that diverse and female attorneys are (mostly unintentionally but) routinely excluded from career-enhancing opportunities, which contributes to the fact that the legal profession is still the least diverse of all professions.

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Specifically, these research studies confirm that hidden barriers in legal workplaces cause women and diverse attorneys (of color and LGBT) to be marginalized and leave their organizations at higher rates. According to these studies, women and diverse attorneys are more likely to:

· Be excluded from informal/formal networking opportunities,
· Not be integrated into the firm’s internal networks,
· Not receive meaningful work assignments (especially those that help them meet required billable hours),
· Not have substantive contacts with clients,
· Report that many employees appeared to feel uncomfortable around them,
· Be stuck in dead-end assignments,
· Not receive sufficient mentoring or training,
· Receive inadequate feedback and “soft evaluations,” and
· Be denied promotion opportunities.

Fostering relationships and embedding inclusive practices help overcome these hidden obstacles to success.