Holland & Hart trademark partner Andrea Anderson is quoted in the World Trademark Review February 4 article "The policies behind WTR 1000 firms listed as 'Best Place to Work for LGBTQ Equality." Focusing on LGBTQ members of the legal community, the article explores the diversity and inclusion approaches of three firms that received a perfect score of 100 on the Human Rights Campaign 2021 Corporate Equality Index.
The article notes that Holland & Hart's approach ensures that policy is not limited to what is required of the firm by law and strives to create a workplace that greater reflects the community. The firm's equal employment policy protects employees against external treatment, as described by Anderson: "When individuals outside the firm are responsible for inappropriate conduct toward our employees, we take various actions to address the inappropriate conduct and to protect our employees, including termination of the business relationship or limitations of access.”
Addressing the underrepresentation of women, minority, and LGBTQ+ equity partners in most law firms nationally and internationally, and policies firms implement to articulate intentions and concrete action, Anderson comments, “It is not enough to bring diverse lawyers into a firm and ask them to assimilate in a way that loses the benefit of the diversity they bring to an organization. We need to look at how diverse lawyers can uniquely contribute to an organization, not ask them to fit into a pre-existing mold of what a successful lawyer has looked like historically. To really move the needle and bring more diversity into partnerships, the legal industry needs to think outside the box for solutions that disrupt bias and remove the impediments that diverse lawyers face.”
Read the full World Trademark Review article, published on February 4, 2021, here: "The policies behind WTR 1000 firms listed as 'Best Place to Work for LGBTQ Equality' " (Subscription needed)