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Like Justice Ward, the medallist in my year, I started life as a lawyer, fresh out of Sydney University, in 1982 - almost 30 years ago. I have been a lawyer ever since then other than two 6 month breaks for maternity leave. I am now the Managing Partner of Henry Davis York, a commercial law firm with 55 partners and more than 400 staff. Our turnover in FY11 was over $100m. So what has happened over the last 30 years in relation to the advancement of women in the legal profession?

There has been change.

• There are many more women in our profession. Looking at some of the very useful demographic data in the Law Society of NSW's Advancement of Women in the Profession Report (Report) being released here today we find that in 1998 (over 20 years ago), only 20% of solicitors in NSW were women. In 2010 it is almost 46%. There are more than 5 times the number of women lawyers than there were in 1998: 2,000 women in 1988 compared to 11,000 of us today.
• Female solicitors have made real inroads in the Government sector and the corporate sector. 
• Women can confidently wear trousers to work! At the launch of this Thought Leadership Initiative, Justice Ward reminded us that when we started as lawyers "there was an unspoken rule that women did not wear trousers to the office (lest there be a need to race up to court where one might not be "seen" if so attired)". 
• Flexible work practices have been introduced. After I had been in practice for 8 years I gave birth to my first child. That was in 1990. Eleanor is now 21. It is interesting looking back to see how different things were such a relatively short period of time ago. There was no maternity leave: paid or otherwise. I had to resign from Mallesons and cash in my superannuation in order to help fund my time off work. 7 months later I returned to Mallesons having negotiated the first part-time working arrangement by a solicitor with that firm. Mallesons was open to my then radical proposal of working 3 days a week. However, just to check that it wasn't a folly on their part or mine, I was put on a trial period of 6 months. Of course, it worked beautifully. Like many employers after them (including me now), Mallesons discovered that a solicitor working 3 days a week is so focused and keen to work that she does almost as many billable hours as a full time solicitor and gets paid for only 3 days. It is great business.
  In 1997, I was appointed a part-time partner at Henry Davis York. This was the first time a major law firm had specifically appointed a part-time partner. So unusual was that appointment at the time that it was reported on in articles in the Sydney Morning Herald and the Financial Review.
• There have been other important changes over the last 30 years. There are, of course, many more positive female role models in senior positions than ever before. Many of them have been consulted by the Law Society for the Report. One of the most interesting has been the arrival of political correctness. At least we now know not to make sexist remarks about women in the workplace or be openly critical about flexible work practices. However, what some of our colleagues actually think, say in private and do, can be a very different thing!

So, there has been change, but to my surprise and the surprise of many of us, there has not been much change in relation to the advancement of women in law firms.

In 2010 only 23% of partners of large law firms - that is, firms with 40 or more partners - were women.In the mid sized firms - that is law firms with between 11 and 20 partners - only 18% of partners are women.In law firms with between 5 and 10 partners only 17% are women.And women only account for 23% of sole practitioners.

These statistics are a considerable improvement from 30 years ago. I can still remember the watershed appointment of the first female partner - Robyn Chalmers - Mallesons in 1984).

They are also an improvement on 5 years ago (as the Report tells us). But given the number of women in practice, these statistics are woeful.

There are few female managing partners. I am the only female managing partner among the biggest 30 firms in Australia.
I am talking about law firms. The statistics are worse for female barristers. On the other hand, they are better for women in the judiciary and women in senior inhouse and senior government legal roles.

Today I will be focussing on law firms which is the world I know best. So what is the challenge in law firms in terms of the advancement of women?

I don't believe that the problem with law firms begins 2 years into employment, as it does in many other professions and occupations. There is a healthy number of women in law schools, as lawyers in law firms and as senior associates and special counsel in law firms. The challenge is how to get more women into partnership to retain senior women in law firms in fulfilling, challenging roles.

1. Why are there so relatively few women in senior roles in law firms?

I think there are three main reasons.

1.1 Choice

For me, feminism was and is all about equality and choice. We don't owe the sisterhood a duty to succeed in the corporate world. We do have choice and women are entitled to exercise it.

Female lawyers may choose to be the stay at home mother and homemaker. They may choose not to become partners of law firms. There are plenty of good reasons to avoid that! They may choose to pursue an entirely different career. What is important is that -

• Women lawyers have the same opportunities as men to progress to senior positions if they want to; and
• Their "choice" is not the result of obstacles to advancement in the legal profession such as discrimination or the absence of flexible working arrangements.

1.2 Attrition

The second reason why there are so few women in leadership roles is because of the attrition that occurs in the context of child rearing. It just gets too hard - no matter what flexibility the workplace offers. I have watched it happen. Most of my female friends at law school expected to combine motherhood and a career and to be in the workforce until retirement. Next to none of them have done so. At some point (and I have noticed that the birth of the third child is often the straw that breaks most camels' backs) they have chosen to abandon their careers in favour of the undeniable joys of motherhood, generally citing the difficulties of a two career family.

1.3 The male prism

The third reason why there are so few women in leadership roles is because they don't overcome the obstacles to promotion caused by the male prism of leadership.

In law firms (and elsewhere) men are generally the decision makers for promotion and they view candidates through the male prism of leadership - consciously or unconsciously. Women do not always shine in this prism, especially when they are stereotyped.

Examples abound.

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  • In the male prism, numeracy is king. The female stereotype is that we are not good with numbers. That translates for many male decision makers as a lack of business acumen.
  • In the male prism other skills are not so highly rated especially what men like to call, pejoratively, "soft skills" such as the all important people skills - team work, collegiality, team building, mentoring, nurturing .....
  • Often men don't think that women "play the game". We are not aggressive and strategic in the office. We don't play office politics. We don't develop strategic relationships in the workplace. Men don't rate the often inclusive and collegiate style of a woman, but instead consider it a sign of weakness and a lack of ambition. 
  • In the male prism the way a woman communicates is inferior. Direct, exaggerated and aggressive communication is the norm for our male colleagues. A woman's language is often out of place. Men love to talk about "kicking his head in", "slaughtering him" and "wipe the floor with him". Women don't generally speak like that. And we say a lot more! Women's daily word usage has been estimated to be nearly three times that of men. Such verbosity can be seen as incompatible with leadership imperatives such as decisiveness and expediency.
  • When a female leader expresses or shows emotion, it is most likely to be read as inappropriate and unprofessional, not suited to a leader. When a male like Bob Hawke shares a moment of weakness, men (and many women) see it as authentic. When Hillary Clinton sheds a tear, people are sceptical, if not downright critical. 
  • The 24/7 work ethic disadvantages women, both those with and without children. Women are often more efficient, less ego driven and less inclined to stay at the office into the early hours of the morning. For some, of course, there is the imperative to go home to one's children. In many offices, work ethic is measured by hours in the office and that often plays into the hands of ambitious males. 
  • Add to this the stigmatisation of flexibility - that is, the predominantly male view that you can't really be serious about your career if you want to work part time, and one wonders how women ever get into senior positions at all!

2. What can be done?

Elizabeth Broderick - the federal Sex Discrimination Commissioner - talks about 3 kinds of barriers to women achieving leadership positions which I find a good way of organising my thoughts on this subject. Liz talks about -

• Structural barriers.
• Belief barriers.
• Workplace barriers.

These barriers need to be overcome in order for women to succeed.

2.1 Structural barriers

There are many of these and I don't have time to talk about them in any detail today. The most significant is the cost and availability of childcare. We have the most expensive childcare in the world.

Other structural barriers include the absence of parental leave (although this is getting better); support for flexible work practices; and how to encourage and facilitate women re-entering the workforce.

2.2 Belief barriers

Women need to change the way we think. Men expect power to be part of their lives. They expect to succeed. Women are more circumspect and less confident. We have to stop doubting ourselves so profoundly.

Ralph Norris likes to tell this story. When a senior leadership position is advertised, it might state that there are 10 competencies required. A male candidate will look at the ad and say "Well, I meet 3 of the competencies. I might as well give it a go". A female candidate will look at the ad and say "I only meet 8 of the competencies and so I won't apply for the job". Or the woman presents at the interview and focuses on what she can't do rather than what she can do.

2.3 Workplace barriers

In my view, the main reason why is it that after almost 30 years not much has changed and why women are still not achieving partnership in law firms is because the culture of the working environment has not changed.

In most law firms (not Henry Davis York - and I'll talk about that in a minute) those relatively few women who have succeeded have done so in spite of the culture, not because of it.

Hannah Piterman's study titled - "The Leadership Challenge - Women in Management" (a one year study of women in the Australian corporate environment), concluded that many women have succeeded by relying on "compliance" and "patronage".

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  • Compliance - women have adapted to the corporate straight jacket and adjusted to the dynamics of the male dominated cultural environment
  • Patronage - women have managed to develop strategic relationships with more senior people in their organisations (generally men) who have sponsored them into leadership positions.

The point is that, to generalise, women have not been successful because they have changed the culture. Instead, they have worked out how to achieve within the culture.

Until the culture changes in law firms there will continue to be relatively few women in leadership positions.

3. How can we change the culture - and, in particular, what I referred to before: the male prism of leadership?

There has to be a structural change.

Westpac did this 15 years ago when Bob Joss arrived and said "where are all the women?". He set about making structural change within Westpac. Now Westpac has a good number of women in leadership positions (not as many as they would like) and with Gail Kelly as the CEO.

Ralph Norris did the same at CBA.

Law firms have much to learn from the excellent work which has been done at both Westpac and CBA on the advancement of women.

How can structural change be made?

We have to recognise that the cultural change that is necessary won't just happen. I have been waiting to see it happen for 30 years in law firms and - other than in my own firm and a few others - it hasn't. Ensuring that women achieve partnership needs to be seen as business imperative - and treated as such. There needs to be a vision and goals, a strategy, communication of the vision and goals to the whole firm, execution of the strategy and measurement of the achievement of the vision and goals.

Actions might include the following.

(a) Ensuring that the organisation values all the traits of leadership, not just those in the male prism. Institutionalising them through value and culture statements and role descriptions. Partners love to say "she doesn't have the X factor". This is a way of institutionalising gender bias. Law firms have to get away from that. Firms need a clear role description and published desired behaviours and competencies for the position of partner.

(b) There needs to be selection committee from the partnership - comprising men and women - which assesses partnership candidates on the basis of the published desired criteria.

(c) Firms need to ensure gender diversity - indeed diversity generally - on all of their interviewing panels and committees. The governing bodies of law firms, generally boards, need to be diverse including gender diverse.

(d) The rules of engagement in the office need to be changed to reflect working mothers' needs. These include:

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  • Avoiding convening 8am or 5pm management meetings.
  • Not rewarding 24/7 behaviour: debunking the myth of the macho-ness of long hours.
  • Not entertaining solely through golf days and attendance at State of Origin matches.

(e) There must be a genuine commitment to making flexible work arrangements work for both the individual and the firm. This is something we've been focusing on at HDY. Three key things that have been working well for us are:

(i) Firstly, well developed, easily accessible policies and processes have been vital - among other things it assists individuals in compiling a business case for working flexibly and provides managers/partners with the tools for considering and implementing requests

(ii) Secondly, the appointment of a dedicated Flexibility Manager (a senior HR professional) has helped ensure that there is equity of process. She also provides support and coaching for all stakeholders in putting a flexible work arrangement in place and ensuring its continued success.

(iii) Thirdly, and probably most importantly, is creating a culture that encourages honest and ongoing discussions about expectations, challenges, what's working (and what isn't) and career goals.

(f) Allow for off ramping and on ramping. I prefer to think of this as simmering and boiling.

A woman's career will have a number of different stages depending on the path our life takes. There will be times in our lives when we want to have our career on simmer, rather than on high heat. This might be:

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  • When our children are small.
  • If you have to follow our partner to a city or a country where we cannot progress our own career.
  • When we have teenage children.
  • When we have caring responsibilities for parents.

During these times women might prefer to work part-time, or not actively pursue promotion. Law firms must be able to accommodate and appreciate this. We need to recognise that the woman is still an effective and valued worker during these times. When the moment is right, she can turn up the heat on her career and take it to the next stage.

Likewise, law firms need to be more open to the idea of career breaks for women. They need to facilitate women's departure and return to the workforce.

(g) Use metrics: You can't manage what you don't measure.

Firms need KPIs and targets. Leaders have to be held accountable for the promotion of women in their organisations.
Does this extend as far as quotas? In my own firm that hasn't been necessary. It might be elsewhere. I note that in the Report being released today, the Law Society does not advocate mandatory requirements or quotas.

(h) Law firms need to be open to scrutiny to monitor evidence of their success (or otherwise) in promoting women to leadership and to keep them focused on progressing the issue of advancement of women generally.

For the last 2 years we have applied for the Employer of Choice for Women Citation (we were happily successful in 2010 and are awaiting the outcome for this year's submission). However I don't mind sharing with you that we have found EOWA's highly rigorous assessment challenging. They require detailed analysis of your practices and hard evidence of your performance across a wide range of issues from gender pay equity to how the firm demonstrates its commitment to driving a gender inclusive culture. It requires a committed effort to compile the necessary information but absolutely focuses the spotlight on what you do as a firm in this regard and, more importantly, helps identify where you could improve and/or do more. We have found it to be a most valuable exercise and were delighted this year to have been nominated as a finalist at the EOWA Business Achievement Awards for 'leading organisation for the advancement of women (under 800 employees)' based on our 2010 submission .

4. 2 key things

4.1 There are 2 key things that in my opinion need to happen to overcome many of the barriers to women succeeding.

(a) Genuine commitment by the Managing Partner and the leaders of the firm.

(b) Support.

(i) Women need to support women.
(ii) Men need to support women.

4.2 There has to be a genuine commitment to increasing the number of female leaders by the CEO/Managing Partner and the other leaders in the law firm.

This is not an HR initiative. It has to be a business imperative and a strategy to which the leaders of the firm are truly committed. They need to support and drive change.

Leaders need to do more than pay lip service to the need to promote more women to leadership positions. They need to walk the talk. It is partners' failure to do this which has stopped culture change and slowed the progress of women. You don't have to scratch too far beneath the surface for partners, both male and female, to reveal their concerns about women in leadership positions. They say things like "she's not commercial"; "not tough enough"; "only works part-time", "she's not ready for partnership". Often those kind of comments simply reflect a reluctance to promote women.

4.3 Women need to be supported and encouraged to partnership. Women need to support women.

We will all have experienced women who get into a leadership role and then become more of an obstacle to the success of other women than most men.

Women have to support each other in the same way men have supported each other for centuries.

As Madeline Albright said: "There is a special place in hell for women who don't support other women."

(a) We need to celebrate motherhood

Women should not have to hide the fact of their motherhood. They should celebrate it.

This does not give women carte blanche to bore men (and indeed other women) in the workplace with stories about their children.

We all have to remember that our children and their achievements are really only interesting to their parents and grandparents. They are uninteresting to everybody else and particularly to people who do not have children.

(b) We need to support mothers

Mothers sometimes have to leave the office early to collect their children from daycare or after school care. This gives rise to sniping and criticism. "How come she gets to go home early when I'm still here chained to my desk?".

When a man does the child pick up or, like many of my partners, leaves early once a week to take cricket training for his kid's team they stroll out of his office to the sound of admiring comments from their colleagues: "What a good father", they say and think.

These double standards have to stop.

4.4 Men need to support women

In their excellent publication "Women in Leadership: How smart are you?" Ernst & Young point out that over the last 40 years, interest in gender diversity has surfaced in various forms. "In the 80s it was women talking to women. In the 90s it was women berating men. Now it is men talking to men." I think that's pretty accurate.

We need men to effect the changes, particularly structural changes and workplace changes. It is not just a case of individual women needing men as champions, we need men to champion the cause of gender diversity generally and to increase the numbers of women in leadership positions.

This is why the Male Champions of Change convened by Elizabeth Broderick was so important.

5. The tipping point

The HDY experience is an example of Malcolm Gladwell's tipping point theory. That is, there is a "tipping point" once women account for a significant and powerful minority at senior levels of leadership. The more women in leadership, the more women you will have in leadership.

When I became a partner at HDY in 1997 there were only 3 female partners. We now have 15 female partners, which amounts to 26% of our partnership. We have one of the highest proportion of female partners of any Australian firm. I am very proud of that. Four out of 5 of my Directors of Shared Services are women. Of the 15 female partners, 6 of them work flexibly.

And having so many women in senior leadership positions has certainly not harmed the firm's success. Indeed I would argue that it has enhanced it. Since I became Managing Partner we have had 3 years of continuous revenue growth - 14.5%, 16% and 5% in FY11. We have been named Sydney Law Firm of the Year for the last 2 years. Henry Davis York is a successful, growing and thriving firm.

I believe that senior women at HDY - not just me but all of my female partners and Directors - have changed our working environment for the benefit of women. We have been supported by male champions. Together we have changed the culture of our firm to one which promotes women and genuinely believes in gender diversity, which - I am happy to say - has led to great commercial success.

6. The Report

In talking about male champions, what about Stuart Westgarth, the President of the NSW Law Society? The Law Society Council decided that identifying the barriers to the progress of women and developing strategies to address them should be the major thought initiative for the Law Society in 2011.

Stuart picked up that ball and ran with it enthusiastically and effectively. On behalf of the female practitioners of New South Wales, Australia and probably the world, I say a big thank you. Your wife and your daughters, in particular, should be very proud of you.

Enormous competence, organisation, time and effort have produced a truly excellent Report. Huge congratulations to Kate Potter and Heather Moore, the authors of the Report. Well done, too, Lauren Hann, the Events Co-ordinator for the project.

The Report -

• Contains excellent demographic data and statistical analysis. This will enable us to measure the success of the strategies now put in place to address the problems.
• Gathers excellent information from over 100 participants in roundtable discussions and the panels arranged by Stuart's team.
• Contains insights and information in relation to many, many issues relevant to the advancement of women - flexible working practices, networking, mentoring, and much, much more.

Best of all, for the action oriented ones amongst us, it contains recommendations of what the Law Society can do to facilitate the advancement of women and tips for practitioners and for practices.

These will help all of us, but I suspect, most particularly those in smaller practices and those brave women in sole practices. For example, the Law Society recommends that it -

• Publish information to assist practitioners and employers on flexible work practices.
• Reviews the effectiveness of the Law Society's locum service in providing coverage for absences during parental leaves and other breaks.

What we have learned about the advancement of women over the last 30 years is that change won't just happen. It needs to be driven. The Law Society's Report and recommendations can drive that change and I encourage the Law Society to implement the recommendations and to ensure that the change that needs to happen in fact happens!