Reply to Saber rattling about law firm diversity hiring

Forum Index » Jobs and Careers

Reply to "Saber rattling about law firm diversity hiring "

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][b]Don’t care about Title VII.[/b] Don’t care about the feelings of the aggrieved white kids, or the whining about systemic blah blah blah.

However, I do need competent, workhorse associates. And I’m tired of being saddled with juniors who need remedial writing courses directly out of law school, four different mentors, and monthly check-in meetings for “supportive feedback” while they’re 40% utilized and doing crap work.

The DEI invincibility cloak is 100% a real thing. It is discussed regularly among partners. If this whiny little MAGA backlash helps us course correct even a little back toward sanity I’ll happily embrace it.   [/quote]

Can you please explain the logic of this to me? Because I see my colleagues seem to feel this way, and I don't get it. Why are we not living up to the level of compliance we would recommend to our clients?[/quote]

My not caring is probably different from most/many others.

But in a nutshell:

1. Not my job. I’m neither an employment lawyer nor the firm GC. I also have no role regarding our compliance with anything other than professional ethics in my own practice. Eye on the ball.

2.  More esoteric, but I’m an old school outlier cranky libertarian who would put freedom of contract above most anything else, so don’t much care about coercive federal statutes. It’s the law of the land, fine; if it came to a vote, sure I’d vote yes someone should make sure we’re able to reasonably take the position we are complying. Which in most any sector means you do roughly what others are doing and avoid any lone wolf practices that attract attention. ([b]One such practice would be to assert Title VII be deployed in defense of white law students.[/b]) [/quote]

Not sure I follow. Are you saying complying with Title VII to make sure you're not favoring one ethnic minority would be deploying it in defense of white law students? And that it would be exposing the firm to liability to comply? [/quote]

Not PP, but my answers-

The way to enforce title VII is through lawsuits, and in order to bring a lawsuit there would need to be an injured party to "defend."  So yes, lawsuits brought against race-based preference in hiring would be deployed in defense of white/non-minority law students.  Policy changes that a firm makes to avoid such a lawsuit is the same thing, one step removed.

To change policy now would indeed be an outlier position (for now) and would attract attention and draw lawsuits, based in part on an implicit admission that past practice was wrong, and increase liability.[/quote]

I was the “nutshell” PP and, yes, this. Though I’d be less concerned about the “implicit admission” re: past practices. The bigger problem is the press and interest groups will burn your law firm to the ground, not to mention you would 100% have a massive internal mutiny.

No firm is going to adopt some kind of affirmative “we don’t favor POC/URM” policy because doing so would expose us to Title VII liability from aggrieved white law students.

Get real. There are fun masturbatory academic exercises and, then, there is running a business that makes hundreds of millions or billions of dollars. We’re engaged in the latter. [/quote]

“Get real”? That’s what firms need to do. The lawsuits are coming. [/quote]

You’re totally delusional. The nutshell poster is 100% correct. You just don’t understand the biglaw business model if you think this is somehow going to become a new front in the culture war. It’s in nobody’s interest. [/quote]

Famous last words. This IS the next front because there are orgs, donors, and plaintiffs who want it to be.

I won’t pretend to know how the opinions will come out, but if you can’t see the storm on the horizon I can’t help you. [/quote]

Who? Because I don't believe it. And if you are qualified enough to be at a law firm participating in the clerk/interview process at these top law schools, where are your damages?

Any org or law students that files a lawsuit based on this is a poison pill forever more.[/quote]

+1. Remember the ex-Breyer clerks suing Jones Day for sex discrimination because it’s stereotypical to give women longer leave than men after having a baby? https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/jones-day-ex-associates-lose-sanctions-bids-law-firm-bias-case-now-2023-07-10/[/quote]

I do remember (I read the whole complaint when it was filed because it was so salacious) but I’m confused about what that example proves. She still has the job she left JD for and he is clearly still welcome in biglaw, in a counsel role, which is consistent with his claim that he planned to be the primary parent. Sounds like they suffered no consequence at all. [/quote]

[b]Point is, did it cause some huge culture reckoning or is it now basically about whether JD fired the one guy for legit reasons?[/b] Some firms went to gender-neutral leave and moved on. If someone sues about some dumb 1L diversity job, firms will quietly make the “diversity” group so large that it’s bulletproof legally (as many/most firms already have - LGBT, first gen, vets, immigrant, whatever) and then the lawsuit will just become about the individual weirdo who sued and whether they can possibly claim damages. The whole thing will be a nothingburger in the larger scheme of things.[/quote]

My firm quietly changed its policy to be gender neutral after this case was filed and I know it wasn’t the only one. [/quote]

Yeah, hence the very next sentence I included after the part you bolded.[/quote]

If firms actually change their hiring practice in the way you say, that would be a significant change. They’ve always made the claim that diversity doesn’t just mean being URM but that’s not what happened in practice. [/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics