Female associates co-create an equitable pathway to partnership
Professional services firms around the world are struggling to increase the diversity and inclusion of their cultures, and advance women and other underrepresented people into leadership - especially partnership - positions.
Our client, like their competitors, had been working for sometime on the advancement of women. They were succeeding in hiring male and female associates in equal numbers, but women were still greatly underrepresented in leadership.
Many members of the existing leadership team were skeptical that the problem was one that could be fixed without making substantial changes to the fundamental structures of their practice. However, their office was under pressure to increase efforts in regards to female representation. They engaged the Tidal Equality team (then called Women’s Work Institute) to work with their female associates in a Wave, where we would listen to and learn from the experiences of these women toward a better understanding of the barriers they faced on the pathway to partnership.
First, we consulted female associates through an anonymous qualitative, anecdotal Insights Questionnaire. In any context where various power dynamics are at play, candid perspectives are difficult to achieve unless anonymity is prioritized. In this case, it was key that the associates share with us their experiences and perspectives unfiltered and unfettered by the complexities of personnel politics. With anonymity guaranteed, we asked the associates to share with us their experiences as well as their perspectives on the barriers preventing them from achieving their full potential at the firm.
In our analysis of their responses, we were able to uncover new insights about how work allocation, work visibility, and the value ascribed to certain types of work were limiting women’s access to success. Further, we learned women were disconnected from a true understanding of how partnership decisions were being made and why. Female respondents also pointed to several new opportunities they could see that existed for the firm in regards to business development that were currently being overlooked. Their perspectives offered a new lens into the firm’s core strategy.
When we engaged the female associates in the strategic design portion of the Wave, we equipped them to articulate in more detail the tactics the firm could act on that would be to the benefit of the firm’s business as well as in regards to the advancement of their female talent. These tactics were numerous and designed to be actionable.
When the Wave Insights Report was presented to firm leadership, some members took it upon themselves to begin actioning tactics within days. In the short term, the firm implemented a tactic co-created by female associates that would see a more equitable distribution of business development opportunities and learning opportunities that were of relevance to partnership decisions.