Finn Dixon & Herling LLP is proud to announce that we have achieved Mansfield Certification for midsize law firms.
The goal of Mansfield Certification, which is facilitated by Diversity Lab, is to increase and sustain diversity in law firm leadership through a science-driven method that embeds accountability, transparency, and knowledge sharing into the firm’s talent practices. The Mansfield Certification program sets benchmarks to measure whether law firms affirmatively consider at least 30% historically underrepresented lawyers—female lawyers, lawyers of underrepresented racial/ethnic groups, LGBTQ+ lawyers, and lawyers with disabilities—in all lawyer hiring decisions, leadership and governance roles, equity partner promotions, and formal client pitches and meetings. We believe that with diverse leadership comes more inclusive and equitable decisions that reflect the needs of our diverse workforce for the benefit of our attorneys and clients.
Managing Partner Christopher Craig stated: “Finn Dixon & Herling is pleased to have reached this significant milestone. We are committed to building a team that reflects the diversity of our clients and communities, which we believe will bolster our ability to continue to provide innovative counsel and exceptional service.”
Chairperson of the firm’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Committee Deirdre Daly stated: “We are proud to have achieved Mansfield Certification and found that the program has fostered deeper ongoing conversations about how to make our firm’s governance as equitable and transparent as possible.”
Finn Dixon & Herling’s attaining Mansfield Certification recognizes the structural changes and actions the firm has taken over the last 18 months to diversify our leadership by broadening the slate of talent considered for internal leadership roles and increasing transparency with written and accessible advancement processes and role descriptions. Whenever our leaders make a decision about whom to appoint or elect to leadership roles such as our Management Committee or Strategic Planning Committee, we proactively consider a broad pool of talent including lawyers who are historically underrepresented in the legal profession. The same inclusive decision-making takes place when we recruit new talent, build client pitch teams, and nominate lawyers for leadership roles and internal committee appointments. As part of Mansfield, we also work to ensure that our processes for advancement and job expectations and qualifications for leaders at the firm are transparent and accessible. The Mansfield framework also helps ensure that we approach succession planning for the next generation of leaders in an inclusive, structured, and intentional manner consistently across our practice groups.
Our participation in the Mansfield Certification program has bolstered our commitment to championing diversity in leadership in all areas of the firm. Mansfield compels us to be more intentional about DEI considerations in our hiring, advancement, and firm practices by providing specific and measurable goals to meet. Mansfield has been useful in creating space for conversations around internal processes that impact how we retain and advance diverse talent. The outcomes from Mansfield have been significant. For example, over the past 18 months, our recruiting efforts tracked that almost 60% of those considered for positions at the firm were historically underrepresented lawyers. And for elections and appointments to firm governance roles, 75% of those considered were historically underrepresented lawyers.
Finn Dixon & Herling remains committed to fostering diversity and equity in our leadership and in the broader legal community. We look forward to participating in the next round of the Mansfield Certification program.
Today’s announcement by Diversity Lab of the firms that achieved Midsize Mansfield Certification is available here. More information about the Mansfield Certification program is available here.
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