Are Women Penalized for Being the First to Volunteer in the Workplace?

This very interesting NY Times opinion piece (and the studies is cites) is a must read for human resources personnel and members of management involved in making promotion decisions.

A short overview of the argument:

"Women help more but benefit less from it. In keeping with deeply held gender stereotypes, we expect men to be ambitious and results-oriented, and women to be nurturing and communal. When a man offers to help, we shower him with praise and rewards. But when a woman helps, we feel less indebted. She’s communal, right? She wants to be a team player. The reverse is also true. When a woman declines to help a colleague, people like her less and her career suffers. But when a man says no, he faces no backlash. A man who doesn’t help is 'busy'; a woman is 'selfish.'" (link)

The Legal Diversity Crisis - Why Are Black Lawyers Underrepresented at Top Law Firms?

From the New York Times and The American Lawyer - the more you think about it the more disturbing these numbers are:

"Black lawyers accounted for 3 percent of lawyers at big firms last year, a percentage that has declined in each of the last five years. And the proportion of black partners at such law firms remained stagnant at 1.9 percent during the same period, according to the 2013 diversity scorecard published in the June issue of The American Lawyer." (link)

The black population of the United States is currently 13%. 

As previously discussed (here and here), subconscious biases likely play at least a part in these dynamics: 

"Blacks lag behind in the top tiers of the law, according to the American Lawyer, because unconscious racial bias can influence the types of assignments and the relationships between and among employees. That can hinder black lawyers from advancing to the highest slots, it said."  (link)

As explained in The American Lawyer:

"What still is lacking, many black lawyers and diversity directors say, is a broad commitment by individual white partners to ensuring the success of minority lawyers, and particularly black lawyers. Recent research has painted an alarming picture of the continuing presence of unconscious racial bias at firms. The research confirms what a lot of black lawyers have known all along: It's not enough to recruit more black associates if you don't deal with pervasive bias." (link)

As explained by a black female ninth-year associate at a midsize firm:

"'You are deemed worthy of receiving the keys when you are liked, and you are usually liked by people who can relate to you or perceive you as similar to themselves,' a black female ninth-year associate at a midsize firm says, asking not to be identified because she is up for partnership. Black lawyers, she adds, 'would more often than not say that they were not able to bring their whole selves to work and therefore grew tired of the ruse and moved on, or they brought their whole selves to work and found themselves ostracized and alienated.'" (link)

The American Lawyer article points to a study similar to one previously covered here (regarding email responses by professors at top colleges):

"In late April, law firms were roiled by a study that shows in the starkest terms yet how implicit bias remains pervasive. The study, by Nextions, a law firm diversity consultant and leadership coaching firm, found that supervising lawyers were more likely to perceive African-American lawyers as having subpar writing skills.

In its study, Nextions inserted 22 errors, including minor spelling or grammar errors, factual errors and analysis errors, into a research memo written by a hypothetical third-year litigation associate. The memo was then sent to 60 partners who had agreed to participate in a writing analysis study. Half got a memo identifying the author as African-American; the other half, a memo noting that the associate was white. The hypothetical black associate got a significantly lower score on average than the hypothetical white one. Partners, regardless of their race or gender, had more positive things to say about the work of the white associate, and found fewer mistakes on average in the paper."  (link)

Of course, that is not the only dynamic at play:

"Interviews with two dozen black lawyers, in-house counsel, diversity experts and academics, plus our exclusive law firm surveys, suggest a variety of causes. Most agreed that pressures within law firms that began during the recession have made partnership both a more difficult and less attractive proposition for black lawyers. Meanwhile, the pipeline has narrowed. As firms keep associate classes smaller, fewer black lawyers are moving into firms; the black law graduates who are tapped by elite firms continue to be a small group of high-ranking students from first- or second-tier law schools. Finally, a mid-2000s push by corporations to compel their outside counsel to diversify has receded, displaced by concerns over law firm pricing."  (link)

The American Lawyer article highlights some of the efforts some law firms are taking in response to these issues, including revisiting hiring and evaluation systems:

"In the meantime, firms such as Schiff Hardin, Littler Mendelson and Reed Smith have begun taking steps to address both unconscious bias and structural impediments to black lawyer advancement. These steps echo in practical ways those recommended by the American Bar Association's Presidential Initiative Commission on Diversity in 2010 in its report summarizing its findings after a year of hearings on the issues." (link)

The full American Lawyer article is available here and is a very thorough and thoughtful piece.

Subconscious Bias: College Professors at Top 250 Colleges More Likely to Respond to Emails From White Males

Whenever people get into a debate about the need (or lack thereof) for anti-discrimination laws I am always fascinated. 

While I firmly believe that anti-discrimination statutes are incredibly important the fact that some people disagree with me is not surprising at all. 

However, what I find fascinating are the reasons people give for disagreeing with me. 

What I have often found is that, while people in the abstract are against discrimination, and agree steps should be taken to oppose it, they tend to refuse to accept the notion that, however high-minded they may be, they too are susceptible to subconscious biases.

The result is a vague resistance to discrimination, but with an equally vague resistance to some of the measures used to fight subconscious biases that result in discrimination - including disparate impact civil rights statutes. 

These statutes provide that, even where there is no intentional discrimination, a protected group can still be subjected to discrimination because a policy has a disparate impact on that group -- and where the defendant cannot qualify for an exception -- for example in the employment law context where that policy is not job related and/or consistent with business necessity -- the policy will be found to be discriminatory.

These disparate impact statutes have been one of the best vehicles for addressing subconscious biases because they provide a methodology to remove the policies that may (often inadvertently) exacerbate the effects of such biases. 

To help underscore the importance of the above point I will provide a series of posts that address the application of subconscious biases in a variety of employment and other contexts.

The first, although not strictly an employment matter, is what I think was an ingenious demonstration of this issue.

A study sought to determine how professor response rates to emails from students varied based on the gender and ethnicity of the student.  The result, unfortunately, unsurprisingly, was that professors were significantly more likely to ignore emails from female students and/or students of color and respond to emails from white males (based on the usual gender and/or racial association of the name):

"A group of researchers ran this interesting field experiment. They emailed more than 6,500 professors at the top 250 schools pretending to be the students. And they wrote letters saying, I really admire your work. Would you have some time to meet? The letters to the faculty were all identical, but the names of the students were all different."

. . .

[W]hat they found was there were very large disparities. Women and minorities [were] systematically less likely to get responses from the professors and also less likely to get positive responses from the professors. Now remember, these are top faculty at the top schools in the United States and the letters were all impeccably written."  (link)

In short, "[w]hite men were more likely than women and minorities to receive a reply in every discipline except the fine arts, where the bias was reversed.” (link)

Business schools should take particular notice of this study:

"The business field showed the greatest disparity — 87 percent of white men received a response; compare this to only 67 percent of women and minorities who got a reply. Other disciplines such as computer science, engineering, and math also showed a significant bias against female and minority students." (link)

One of the most interesting aspects of the study is that Asian students experienced the greatest negative bias:

Previous studies of academia have shown a positive trend with Asians in higher education institutions.  Not this time.  “Among private university faculty the response rate for white men was 29 percentage points higher than for Chinese women — the greatest disparity observed . . . .” (link)

The researchers also found that "the greater the professor's salary, the greater the difference in response rate between white men and minority students." (link) Indeed, “[f]or every 13,000 increase in salary, . . . [there was a] drop of 5 percentage points in the response rate when compared to Caucasian males.” (link)

This study is a good illustration of why it is important for tools such as the civil rights statutes, and specifically their disparate impact provisions, are such important aspects of any effort to continue to address the effects of subconscious biases. 

At least for now, the substantive equality, and ability to equally access opportunity, for all Americans, other than white males, depends on them.

You can read the complete study here and listen to coverage on NPR here.