{"id":1523,"date":"2018-08-20T06:00:36","date_gmt":"2018-08-20T10:00:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/?p=1523"},"modified":"2018-08-20T06:00:36","modified_gmt":"2018-08-20T10:00:36","slug":"sexual-harassment-spotlight-law-firms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/uncategorized\/sexual-harassment-spotlight-law-firms\/","title":{"rendered":"Sexual Harassment Spotlight: Law Firms"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t<![CDATA[<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-1524\" src=\"http:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Sexual-Harassment-Spotlight-Law-Firms-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Sexual-Harassment-Spotlight-Law-Firms-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Sexual-Harassment-Spotlight-Law-Firms-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Sexual-Harassment-Spotlight-Law-Firms-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Sexual-Harassment-Spotlight-Law-Firms.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/>The revelations keep coming about the pervasiveness of sexual harassment in every type of organization and profession. Not much has changed yet, which is why we have to keep the spotlight focused on revealing and stopping this behavior everywhere. Yvonne Abraham of the <em>Boston Globe<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bostonglobe.com\/metro\/2018\/07\/11\/women-law-paint-picture-harassment\/aKaSdFykUeaFn3aoLX7VGL\/story.html\">reports<\/a> on a new study of sexual harassment in law firms.\nThe new study, conducted by Lauren Stiller Rikleen, president of the Rikleen Institute for Strategic Leadership, for the Massachusetts Women\u2019s Bar Association (MWBA), surveyed 1,200 employees in Massachusetts law firms. Abraham notes that these employees described harassment and bullying experienced between 2010 and 2018\u2014not ancient history\u2014that they felt powerless to prevent. She cites Rikleen as explaining, \u201cIt is a younger person\u2019s problem. Someone more vulnerable to power imbalances is less likely to speak up.\u201d In addition, when employees see the complaints of other colleagues go unheeded, they do not feel empowered to speak out. Survey participants shared some of their experiences in law firms:\n\n\n<ul>\n \t\n\n<li>Unwanted hugging<\/li>\n\n\n \t\n\n<li>Back-rubbing<\/li>\n\n\n \t\n\n<li>Groping<\/li>\n\n\n \t\n\n<li>Kissing<\/li>\n\n\n \t\n\n<li>Lewd comments<\/li>\n\n\n \t\n\n<li>Propositions by men in positions of power<\/li>\n\n\n \t\n\n<li>Comments on women\u2019s clothing or anatomy<\/li>\n\n\n \t\n\n<li>Brushing by women too closely<\/li>\n\n\n \t\n\n<li>Men watching porn on computers<\/li>\n\n\n \t\n\n<li>Attorneys sending or sharing pornographic emails or images<\/li>\n\n\n \t\n\n<li>Demeaning comments on race, religion, sexual orientation, or pregnancy<\/li>\n\n\n \t\n\n<li>Powerful partners, including some women, yelling at and humiliating colleagues, including throwing files and other objects<\/li>\n\n\n<\/ul>\n\n\nThe MWBA report notes that the primary challenge for law firms is, according to Abrahams, \u201cthe obscene gender imbalances in the upper ranks.\u201d Abrahams notes that \u201cEqual numbers of women and men have been graduating from law schools for more than a decade. Yet women make up just 19 percent of equity partners, and 30 percent of non-equity partners, at firms nationally.\u201d In addition to creating more gender balance in the upper levels of management, firms need to make a real commitment to creating safe and respectful workplace cultures. Having a sexual harassment policy is meaningless if managers do not hold staff and partners accountable for their behavior.\nSo much work still needs to be done.\n&nbsp;\nPhoto courtesy of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/navaneethkn\/7161702317\/\">Navaneeth KN<\/a> (<a href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nd\/2.0\/\">CC BY-ND 2.0<\/a>)]]>\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t<![CDATA[]]>\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1523","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1523\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.annelitwin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}