Celebrating The Next Generation of Women Lawyers

Today, on international women's day, we at New Perimeter would like to celebrate the next generation of women lawyers. We have the privilege of working with law students across the globe, and everywhere we work we are pleased to encounter equal – and often greater – numbers of female students. The female law students with whom we work are inspirational – they are strong, smart, capable and confident women. They are frequently the most vocal and engaged students in the class. They are also forthcoming about the significant challenges they face in pursuing a legal career and their fears about how to balance a career and a family.

In Zambia, where New Perimeter and lawyers from Boehringer Ingelheim teach a course on legal writing and analysis to undergraduate law students, the female students specifically requested an extra session focused on work-life balance. They wanted to hear from all of the women lawyers on the team about their career paths and how they manage to juggle multiple, competing demands. Some students confided in the instructors about their families’ lack of support for their career ambitions and the weight of societal expectations for women to make domestic life a priority. The students listened with rapt attention to an international group of four highly accomplished DLA Piper and Boehringer Ingelheim lawyers describe their professional histories, including the obstacles they encountered and the challenges they continue to face and overcome. Although the women came from different countries and cultures, their experiences and advice were universal.

In Kosovo, New Perimeter has been working with the Kosovo Bar Association on strategies to increase the number of women entering into and remaining in the legal profession. Only around 11% of licensed Kosovar attorneys are women. Like in Zambia, Kosovar women face intense societal pressure to focus on domestic pursuits.

The challenges facing our colleagues in Zambia and Kosovo are not confined to a particular region. In the United States, women have been enrolling in law school in near equal numbers as men for the past two decades. However, according to the American Bar Association Commission on Women in the Profession, women make up only about a third of practicing lawyers in the United States, 17% of equity partners in law firms and 21% of the Fortune 500 General Counsel.  While women are entering law schools in greater numbers than men in the UK, they only comprise 18.8% of partners at Magic Circle firms. The same is true in Australia, where according to the Law Council of Australia, 63% of those entering the legal profession are female, yet women represent only 46% of the practicing profession and 19% of senior positions in large law firms.

Within our global offices, DLA Piper has created LAW,  the Leadership Alliance for Women, an internal network dedicated to help retain women lawyers at the firm and develop them into future leaders. LAW's key areas of focus are mentoring, skills training and networking.

Of course, law students in many of the underserved regions in which we work face significant additional obstacles unrelated to gender. They may go to school in buildings with no heat or air-conditioning despite extreme temperatures; they may travel long distances to attend classes, taking multiple forms of public transportation or walking; they may have very limited means to pay for their education and limited prospects of securing a paying job after graduation because of a tight legal market. These additional factors make the dedication and determination of the students we work with all the more incredible. They are smart, funny, ambitious and optimistic.  Despite the challenges they face, they are immersing themselves enthusiastically in their studies, and they are determined to pursue successful legal careers and to help change cultural expectations about a woman’s role in society.

There remains much room for women at the top of the legal profession in most regions in the world. This stark reality makes it all the more important for women lawyers who have succeeded to share their collective knowledge and serve as a source of motivation and inspiration to junior lawyers and law students. The wisdom and experience of successful women lawyers transcends boundaries and cultures. We at DLA Piper and New Perimeter are thrilled to have the opportunity to play a small part in supporting women lawyers and law students across the globe and in working to close the gender gap in the legal profession.