Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
McGlinchey is committed to fostering equity through diversity and inclusion in our firm and across our profession.
We know that representation of diverse voices empowers every member of the McGlinchey Family to do our best work and provides us with a rich and rewarding workplace. Our goal is to create a law firm culture that reflects the increasing diversity of the clients and communities we serve. We are proud of our deep roots in some of America’s most diverse cities, and we honor the broad range of backgrounds and perspectives that form the fabric of our firm. We celebrate our employees’ differences across race, gender, ethnicity, disability, and sexual orientation, and we strive to treat our lawyers and staff fairly.
We are committed to attracting, recruiting, mentoring, and promoting diverse attorneys and staff through involvement in minority job fairs and diversity clerkship programs, as well as our own Diversity 1L Scholars Program.
In 2021, McGlinchey’s new Managing Member, Michael Ferachi, launched the #McGlincheyForward initiative, designed to face the rapidly changing legal industry, our clients’ needs, and our internal operations for the next five years, and beyond. #McGlincheyForward focuses on 5 pillars: change, culture, empowerment, growth, and gratitude. The move towards improving equity within the firm is a major component of the #McGlincheyForward initiative.
The firm recently named our first Chief Diversity Officer, charged with two focus areas: internally, broadening the spectrum from which we identify and recruit candidates to the firm, and becoming Mansfield Certified (a distinction which verifies whether law firms have affirmatively considered at least 30% diverse candidates for leadership, equity partnership, formal client pitch opportunities, and senior lateral positions); and externally, intentionally hiring and patronizing diverse and equitable vendors and partners, making meaningful economic contributions to the local economies where we live and work.
In September of 2021, McGlinchey joined some 70 other law firms participating in the second iteration of the Midsize Mansfield Rule. The Midsize Mansfield certification process, modeled after the version for larger firms, has been fine-tuned to boost diversity in leadership for firms with smaller lawyer populations, single office locations, and leaner firm leadership structures. The certification period for the Midsize Mansfield cohort is 18 months to provide sufficient time for the participating firms to take action on hiring, promotion, and leadership transition activities. Learn more.
McGlinchey prides itself on its involvement with the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity (LCLD) since the organization’s founding in 2009. The firm is a 2021 recipient of LCLD’s highest honor, the Compass Award, and has been named a “Top Performer” by LCLD every year since 2018, a designation reserved for the most active LCLD Member Corporations and Law Firms. A McGlinchey attorney has participated in the LCLD Fellows program, which aims to identify, train, and advance the next generation of leaders in the legal profession, every year since 2010, and the firm sponsors an attorney each year to participate in the LCLD Pathfinders program for diverse, high-potential, early-career attorneys at LCLD Member organizations.
In 2021, the firm joined the LCLD’s Leaders at the Front program. Leaders at the Front is meant to capture the urgency and opportunity that the racial justice movement has created over the past year. By encouraging those in leadership positions to commit themselves to change, LCLD has urged its member organizations to create actionable pledges and plans to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts in the legal profession. Other organizations that have made pledges through the program include Capitol One, General Motors, and Fannie Mae.
Leadership
Our commitment to diversity is reflected within the highest ranks of our firm:
65% of our firm employees are diverse
43% of our attorneys are diverse
50% of our Associates and Of Counsel are diverse
56% of our Senior Professional Leadership team are diverse
40% of our Policy Committee members are diverse
50% of our Office Managing Attorneys are diverse
The firm’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee, comprised of attorneys and professionals across our footprint, oversees our efforts to recruit and retain diverse lawyers and professional staff and create an inclusive environment enabling all of our employees to succeed. The Committee holds monthly firm-wide meetings that are open to all lawyers for discussion of diverse topics and issues. The Committee also works closely with our Recruitment and Associate committees to enhance both the recruitment and retention of diverse lawyers.
Our attorneys and professional staff dedicate their time and talents to improving diversity outcomes in the legal profession as members and leaders within a number of diversity-related organizations, including:
- Louis A. Martinet Legal Society, Inc.
- National Bar Association
- Federal Bar Association
- Women’s Professional Council of New Orleans
- Diversity Law Institute of the Litigation Counsel of America
- Association of Law Firm Diversity Professionals
- New Orleans Legal Diversity Collaborative
We were a proud sponsor of the study underlying the provocative, landmark treatise, “Visible Invisibility: Women of Color in Law Firms,” published by the ABA Commission on Women in the Profession.
Programs and Affinity Groups
The firm’s Affinity Groups support our culture of inclusion: