|
Making it work: Women in law roundtable |
|
|
|
|
Page 3 of 3
CHOWN: I am interested in networks, as well, internally because networks, and particularly male networks, are the best source of information that leads to power in law firms. So, when women aren’t part of these — they aren’t going out golfing with their practice group head, they aren’t getting a little bit of information about the next great brief that is coming on, and “Why don’t you go on it? I think, we have to internally in law firms figure out how to get women the same information. And maybe we have to do that more mechanically. If men understand the path to partnership because they have been coached by a male mentor, women may not have that if their mentors are less senior and other females. So, can we give them that information, to, simply, even the playing field?
ROTHSTEIN: Well, I think professional associations, for me, had been a huge entrée into the profession more generally, and even sort of the broader legal business community, for sure. And I think women can compete very successfully in any number of professional organizations without really much difficulties. And all joking aside, if you are young, you still don’t have kids, you are the least bit athletically inclined and interested, take up golf, for God’s sake.
ON ASSERTING YOURSELF
CRONK: [T]he definition of leadership in law firms, in particular, often comes with a constellation of characteristics that relate to taking charge and seeking opportunities, being independent. And so, in not asking for those opportunities, you are undercutting yourself in many ways by, you know, being held up against the standard that you are not demonstrating those qualities. So, it can hurt you.
MORAN: It is tricky for women to exercise that right, in a way. As you said it, you don’t want to be seen as pushy. I think women that do that are more likely to be seen as pushy, and it is more likely to be seen as problematic for women. So, I think you actually walk a bit of a fine line trying to assert yourself and be seen as someone who is capable of being in a more leadership position without being seen as pushy, aggressive, offensive. . .
ROTHSTEIN: I think men struggle with it, too, for sure. But I think women have to think about a whole bunch of things that men don’t have to think about that incredibly complicate the equation. To become effective leaders, to become respected, liked, admired leaders, I think, is really difficult. And I think it is everything about our presentation that doesn’t equip us very well for that job in the end.
CRONK: Women are not tolerated in our professional community or in the business community if they are strident or cold. And both of those things are seen as real character flaws in women, and the public simply doesn’t accept them. Whereas in men, different labels are attached to them. And some of what we are seeing in the popular press right now about what is happening on the political stage in the U.S. is a reflection of exactly those things. So, women have to be, assertive, confident in their abilities, but they cannot be offensive to their male or female colleagues.
I think women undersell themselves all the time They don’t have the same degree of confidence as their male counterparts have. So, the result of that is you can take five peers in a room, and it is the women who will be saying, “Why am I here?” It is the men who are saying, “Why aren’t I at the head of the table?” And they make a real mistake in forgetting that they have leverage, and underselling themselves.
SWANSBURG: [I]t is such a fine line between being seen as a leader and being seen as a troublemaker, I think. And you really walk that tightrope, I found, every day of trying to raise your hand and ask for the opportunities without being labelled a whiner or a troublemaker or not a team player.
ON SELF-IMAGE
ROTHSTEIN: I spend a lot of time with female clients in senior positions telling them not to begin those difficult conversations with an apology, and women just have to stop that. That has been a very difficult lesson to learn. But women start by apologizing for all the things they don’t know, and they didn’t do, and they can think of, and so on. And it does not create the reaction they are seeking, it creates quite the opposite one.
MORAN: It is a sense of humility that can be appealing, and I think actually can work to bring people on board. But it is very, very tricky. You have to be very careful not to undercut yourself.
CHOWN: I was just going to say that I remember, as a young litigator, the women in our group noticed that every time the men came back from court doing a motion, they would say, standing in the middle of the hall very loudly, “I was great. I really killed the other side.” And women will come back and say, “What a lucky break. I don’t believe I slid that one through.” So, it was all about accident and luck. . . . I remember we said, “Okay, the next time we go to court, we are going to come back and stand in the middle of the hall, and go, ‘I was great.’” What was amazing is we all found that sort of uncomfortable.
SWANSBURG: I remember learning about the victory lap, and there were a number of mostly senior men who, if they won in court, would walk around the halls and tell everybody about it. Women never did that.
ON RELAXING/COPING
ROTHSTEIN: I really believe a vacation . . . as soon as you have one, you plan the next. So, I think that is really, really important. I do think it is important to find some other passion in your life if you can. Sometimes a partner, sometimes a hobby, whatever else it is. And for everybody who finds exercise any kind of an outlet, it is obviously a really good and healthy way to round out one’s life. Like everything else in my life, there are periods where I have been exceedingly good at it, and there are periods, like recently, where it is not a part of my life at all.
CHOWN: I would add to that friends. I think it is very important to maintain a network of friends that are not your work colleagues. And sometimes, under pressure, we mistake our work colleagues for our friends, and you may be lucky and have a few work colleagues that actually morph into being friends, but I think it is very important to have an exterior network of people that you can turn to, you can cathart to, you can have fun with, you can laugh with, but they are separate from those you are working with on a very intense basis, on a day-to-day plane.
MORAN: I think you need to be a bit daring with your personal life, as well as with your professional life, because we all live in worlds like, I feel like I could work 24/7, and I have to be a bit courageous to say, “I am not going to. I am going to go away in the summer. I am going to have a holiday. I don’t care if all the other deans work all the time, all summer. I am not going to work all summer, and I am not going to work all weekend, and I am going to be able to do it.”
CRONK: I think friends are enormously important, and I think you have to have continuing contact with people who are outside of the legal world because it is a barometer of reality, whether you are a judge, whether you are a practitioner, whether you are in the academy. It is a very insular world. It is really easy to believe that law runs everything in life, except the legal world. And, of course, that is hugely untrue. And people with a whole lot of common sense who aren’t related to the law can bring you down to earth real easily.
|
|
|
|
|
