In-House Counsel

Bringing Diversity To The In-House World: Get Ready For The 'Legal Department Edition' Of The Mansfield Rule

Which corporate legal teams are willing to hold themselves to these high standards?

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Back in 2017, the Mansfield Rule — an idea named after Arabella Mansfield, the first woman admitted to practice law in the U.S., and modeled after the NFL’s Rooney Rule — was born, creating a system that would encourage Biglaw firms to consider women or minority candidates for leadership roles and promotions to equity partner. Today, the Mansfield Rule has moved in-house.

The Diversity Lab has officially launched the “Mansfield Rule: Legal Department Edition,” which is even more demanding than what is currently required of law firms. The American Lawyer has additional details:

[The Rule] will require participating in-house legal teams to consider at least 50 percent women, minority lawyers, LGBTQ+ lawyers and lawyers with disabilities as applicants for key leadership roles. Legal departments that sign on are also asked to consider at least 50 percent diverse lawyers for outside counsel hires for new or expanded work. …

“We’re really good at pointing the finger at our outside law firms and telling them they’re not doing enough on diversity and inclusion and holding their feet to the fire,” said Michael O’Connor, general counsel of MassMutual, which is one of the eight legal departments that have signed on so far to implement the new Mansfield Rule.

According to O’Connor, this version of the Mansfield Rule will show that corporate counsel are not only “walking the talk,” but that they’re willing to hold themselves to “the same or even higher standards than we are with our outside law firms.”

The certification process will begin on July 1, 2019, and run through June 30, 2020. Thus far, eight legal departments have signed on to be part of this important effort: MassMutual, BASF Corp., Compass Minerals, LendingClub, PayPal, Symantec Corp., thredUP, and U.S. Bank. Other in-house teams are invited to register for this worthwhile endeavor by contacting Leila Hock, the Diversity Lab’s senior innovative and training manager, at leila@diversitylab.com.

The participating law departments are definitely on the forefront of diversity initiatives, and hopefully there’s enough momentum to get the rest of corporate world on board with this incredibly important cause.

Legal Departments Join Law Firms in Applying the ‘Mansfield Rule’ [American Lawyer]

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Staci ZaretskyStaci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

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