Glass ceiling for female lawyers – Prestigious jobs in law firms are a male domain – News
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Over 60 percent of law students are women – and have been for years. But at the big law firms they are hardly to be found in the management floors. Today’s Women’s Lawyers’ Day will draw attention to the problem facing the industry.
A survey of the largest Swiss law firms from 2021 shows that careers are mainly made by men. The proportion of women among newcomers is around 50 percent on average, but at the partner level it is only 15 percent. Even higher up, among the supposedly managing partners, there are hardly any women in Switzerland.
Women have to prove themselves more
Simone Nadelhofer made it, she is a partner at Lalive, an international law firm based in Geneva, Zurich and London. It’s often more difficult for women, she says. “It is assumed – perhaps also unconsciously – that women are less ambitious,” says Nadelhofer. There is also a lack of role models for young women, so the rise is more difficult.
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Simone Nadelhofer is a partner at Lalive, an international law firm based in Geneva, Zurich and London.
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Lawyers say that this imbalance in law firms is noticeable in everyday work. For Johanna Keller with a reason to leave her former office. “You feel under pressure because all bosses are men. I was more sure, I had to work harder to be seen, »says Keller. Today Keller works as a lawyer for the construction company Kibag.
Like Keller, many women leave the big law firms in order to work “in house”: “They switch to the legal departments of companies, banks and insurance companies or to the administration,” says Dario Ramon Buschor, an independent law firm consultant. In many law firms, however, there is a growing awareness that they are letting too many female talents go. “We cannot afford to do without some of the well-qualified people,” says Lalive partner Nadelhofer.
Talk to women about promotion opportunities
And there is increasing pressure from customers to write in mixed teams, even at law firms. As an employer, the law firms should therefore allow flexible working hours and part-time work. After all, women in particular still step back as soon as children are born – at an age when they would have to give full throttle for a career in the law firm. “We also have to talk to women’s promotion opportunities and sensitize all hierarchical levels to the issue of equal rights,” says Nadelhofer. A rethink that could be worthwhile. Studies show that mixed teams are more successful.