Sixty-five general counsel from major companies in the U.K. and Europe have signed a statement calling for law firms to push harder for diverse ranks.

So far, GCs to have signed up span the GC 100, the European GC association, and the Cac 40 (the French FTSE equivalent). 

The initiative is being spearheaded by Shell GC Donny Ching, Unilever chief legal officer Ritva Sotamaa, Anglo American group general counsel Richard Price, BHP Billiton group general counsel Caroline Cox, and Vodafone group general counsel Rosemary Martin. Mary Mullally from Executive Peer Networks was also heavily involved in facilitating the statement (below).

Ching told Legal Week: “The idea is that the GCs who are signed up to it will send the statement to their legal advisers, along with the message that they'd like the firm to be having more conversations on diversity, and that they'd like to work together with the firm on these initiatives.”

However, Ching added that “nice words and a letter to a law firm [are] not going to change anything,” saying that follow-up work is being planned in order to turn intent into action.

One action the group is working on is identifying the best initiatives for diversity used by law firms to create a “menu” of options Ching explained.

“The GCs can then sit down with their law firms and discuss how the firm can work on or introduce the best initiatives from there.”

The group will also collaborate with law firms to facilitate flexible working options for lawyers who have experienced a significant life change, offering secondment schemes for lawyers to move in-house on more flexible hours for one or two years.

For example, a woman who has just returned from maternity leave could move temporarily to an in-house role to work with one of her clients in order to work fewer hours and on a more flexible working model that in-house departments are more able to offer.

In January this year, more than 170 GCs from U.S. companies signed an open letter to law firms, which was followed by a raft of U.K. GCs saying they would support a similar initiative in their country.

Last month, a joint venture project between Thomson Reuters' Transforming Women's Leadership in Law (TWLL) and legal research platform Acritas posted the preliminary results of an investigation into the effectiveness of diversity initiatives used by law firms.

Ching said the group will look to collaborate with TWLL to ensure no overlap in their work.

“The mere fact that the law firms know we are working on this,” said Ching, “has already triggered quite a few emails and reach-outs about what different firms are doing for gender diversity.”