Survey Summary

“Women Lawyers and Obstacles to Leadership”   
Mona Harrington and Helen Hsi,  MIT Workplace Center—

(Boston- April, 2007)- Massachusetts law firms do not generally assume responsibility for the need of their lawyers to take time for their families. The result is an exodus of women from firm practice and an extremely low number of women among equity partners—the present ratio being 17% women, 83% men. These conclusions emerge from a recent report of two MIT Workplace Center surveys tracking the career paths of nearly 1000 women and men in Massachusetts firms over a five year period.

The specific findings of the surveys show that women and men enter law firms in essentially equal numbers but women leave firm practice at every pre-partner level at a far higher rate than men—more than 30% for women and less than 20% for men. The primary reason, far above all others, is the need for more time for family than the firms support. And this reason is borne out by what these women do when they leave. They do not opt out of the workforce. Nearly 80% move to workplaces that do allow the time they need, even if they are working fulltime.

The survey also shows the promise of reduced hours as a means of solving the time-squeeze problem. 47% of women with children practice part-time at some point, and those who do stay in their firms longer than women with children who work full-time. But the promise is unfulfilled because those who take part-time are likely to be penalized later. They are less likely to make partner than those who are able to stay full-time.

The need for time to care for families does not have the same effect on men working in the firms, in spite of the fact that their family ties are greater than those of the women. A higher percentage of men in firm practice marry. They marry earlier than their female colleagues. They have children earlier. They are more likely to have more than one child, and they have more children overall. But only 3% of men with children use part-time for family reasons. Most, if they use flexible work arrangements at all, opt for adjusted work hours, shaping the work day to drive children to school or attend their activities. They do not cut their work time as women do to assume wider family responsibilities.

Behind these statistics is a prevailing neo-traditional division of family responsibility. Nearly 70% of the men with children are with spouses or partners who have a lesser commitment to their own careers, and are therefore able to provide family care. The opposite is true for the women lawyers with children. Their spouses or partners have an equal or greater commitment to their own careers so both partners are under a time squeeze. Typically, it is women who decrease work hours and—in the firms—encounter  undependable support for reduced-hour schedules or for periods out of the workplace.