Diversity issues continue to plague in-house legal teams and outside law firms, according to a new report from Thomson Reuters and Acritas that examines the state of the corporate law department.

The study found that male in-house counsel tend to hire male external advisers and pick women as lead partner in a mere 17 percent of cases, while only 29 percent of law departments require the law firms they work with to provide diversity information.

“It is disheartening to see that law firms and in-house legal teams still struggle with diversity issues,” Lisa Shepherd, CEO of Acritas, a law firm marketing consultancy, said in a written statement.

The report, which analyzed research from the Legal Executive Institute, Acritas, the International Bar Association and the Corporate Legal Operations Consortium, identified “key levers” that legal departments can focus on to be more efficient and successful.

Having gender diverse teams is one key lever. And yet women account for less than 20 percent of law firm equity partners and 25 percent of general counsel, according to the study. The findings also showed that law firms and legal departments are losing female talent at the highest levels due primarily to a hostile work environment and inequality.

Half of women lawyers reported that they had been bullied at work and one in three women lawyers said they'd been sexually harassed, according to research from the International Bar Association. The association found the incidents of bullying and harassment were similar in in-house and private practice.

“And for those women who do get to the top, there is a significant pay gap, both at in-house departments and law firms,” the report states.

Additional highlights from the study include:

Law firm partners cited a lack of project management capabilities as their top criticism of corporate legal departments and 41 percent of outside lawyers said they believed their clients could benefit from effective project management training.

Outside lawyers rated organizational skills as the top trait of a standout in-house counsel. Other prized traits included having the ability to understand business needs and being able to collaborate with outside counsel as equal partners.

Outside lawyers viewed law departments that were early adopters of legal technology or that offered alternative pricing models, for instance, as being 10 percent more effective, according to the study. Meanwhile, in-house counsel gave higher performance ratings across the board to law firms that embraced innovation. 

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