Female Telecom Lawyers Not Fully Represented at Law Firms

Women have been at least half of law school graduates for two decades, outnumbering men in recent years, and are 36% of lawyers at law firms, according to the National Association of Law Placement. But they lag behind men in attaining senior ranks in those firms. A 2019 National Association of Women Lawyers survey found women are 20% of equity partners, 30% of nonequity partners and 47% of associates.

Communications Daily surveyed 18 law firms with telecom and communications practices; seven responded, with an average female partnership of 30%

At the FCC, 49% of the bureau chiefs and division heads are women, we found. Within such leadership and ranked by the respective bureaus, female bureau and division bosses comprise 67% at Media; 63% for Enforcement; 60% Wireless; and half of International and of Wireline. The Public Safety Bureau is 25%, and Consumer and Governmental Affairs is 22%.

Wiley reported 35% of partners in its telecom, media and tech practice are female, plus 43% special counsel/of counsel and 73% of associates. Ten percent of Squire Patton’s telecom partners are women, as are one-third of its associates; the team has 30 lawyers. Akin Gump reported 43% of its telecom team are women, with 30% of its partners female, 57% senior counsel and 54% associates. At Fletcher Heald, 36% of partners are women, 33% of equity partners and 50% of associates; overall 20 lawyers focus on telecom.

All the associates on BakerHostetler’s telecom team are women, while 8% of partners are women and 17% are counsel/of counsel. Mintz reported 29% of its telecom partners, both the team’s of counsel lawyers and 80% of its associates are women. At Lerman Senter, where all 17 lawyers focus on telecom, 25% of equity members, including the managing member, are women, as are half of nonequity members, one-third for of counsel and 100% of associates.

Covington & Burling communications and related partnership is equally divided by gender, and it reported the associate population is 59% women; the full team is 50% women. WilmerHale, Faegre Drinker and Cooley declined to answer our inquiries, while other firms didn't acknowledge our requests for data. “Telecommunications is not a primary practice area for us,” said a WilmerHale spokesperson.

Ten of FCBA’s 16 officers and executive board members are women. Only the state and local practice committee co-chairs are all men. Forty-four percent of the association's co-chairs are women. FCBA diversity committee co-chairs are 55% women, while diversity pipeline co-chairs are 64% women. FCBA didn't provide the percentage of women in its total membership.

FCBA under President Natalie Roisman is focusing on female lawyers in telecom and tech, as well as more diversity in general. A January 2020 summit on women in tech sold out to 150 women, she said. The 2021 event will be a series: Jan. 29, Feb. 25 and March 25. And don’t expect the organization to have all-male panels. It’s not “acceptable when we have an all-male panel … [or] an all-white panel,” said Roisman, partner and director of social responsibility at Wilkinson Barker. “When the choice is move forward with this all-male panel, or add gender diversity to a panel, we’re going to do whatever we can to add diversity. … It’s not true there’s a lack of women who can speak credibly on any topic that the FCC is going to deal with.”

Pipeline

NCTA Associate General Counsel Svetlana Gans, FCBA diversity committee co-chair, pointed to “three P’s”: pipeline, professional development and promotion. Law school graduation rates demonstrate women are in the pipeline but not necessarily getting professional development and promotions. “Some firms support women more than others,” she said: Women “have to work harder to prove themselves.”

FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel dismissed the “pipeline problem.” That “absolves too many of us -- male and female -- from making a real effort in the present to expand opportunities and diversify leadership. Everyone can be a sponsor, be a mentor, be someone who brings someone else along,” she emailed.

There’s an “in-built network bias that comes from people reaching out to people they know, and typically they don’t include networks of women,” said Wiley’s Josh Turner, FCBA's immediate past president. Men must “actively promote the careers of people around them who are subject-matter experts but don’t have the platform that you have,” he said.

Many we interviewed said outcomes are better when women’s and diverse voices are in the room. “Women are half of the labor force and responsible for the majority of consumer purchasing decisions,” Rosenworcel said. “When you have more women in senior roles, you develop more policies that match up better to what people on the front lines need,” said Roisman. “Having diversity at the decision-making process gives a better sense of what consumers want,” Gans said.

“You need a woman” on pitch teams, said Baker Botts’ Maureen Ohlhausen. “So many in-house lawyers are women. They want to see female voices be part of the law firm that’s serving them.”

Not herself an attorney, Mignon Clyburn as an FCC commissioner met with numerous lawyers. Before meetings, she often asked, “Who’s on the team? What are your numbers?” Just by her questions, she said, “they knew enough to bring someone in who did not look like the classic white man.”

Several women said a competitive law firm culture can make it more difficult for women to advance. Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council CEO Maurita Coley remembers the “ole boys network” of her early law firm days, a culture she said has changed but not enough. “A lot of times women don’t want to engage in some of the sharp elbows required to establish yourself in law,” she said. Firms need to be more intentional about “legacy clients” so retiring male partners are “cutting women into the deal,” not turning their whole “book of clients” to one, probably male, practitioner, she said. Gans said transparency sometimes is lacking on pay scales.

Left Out

Wilkinson Barker’s Rachel Wolkowitz is the lawyer who didn’t get the project because the client didn’t want to work with women. “There were no women to say the ask from the man was not acceptable,” said Wolkowitz, an FCBA diversity committee co-chair. That’s unlikely to happen today, she said. But “it’s still a steep mountain to climb for full equity and inclusion.”

A former FTC member, Ohlhausen cited the “echo.” That's when a woman’s byline is placed second to a man’s, whose ideas take precedence even though a woman may have said or written something first. “How could I be the echo when I wrote it first?” Ohlhausen asked. “You had this article, and you talk about ideas I wrote about, but you never cite my work. You cite men’s work that is the follow-on to my work.”

Women are often in a double bind, Ohlhausen said: “If you’re a woman, you’re presenting a women’s viewpoint and you should agree with all other women.” If women disagree with another woman, “it’s personal between them.” When the FTC briefly had an all-female commission, “someone said, ‘it’s the ladies’ book club.’ Is there any cognate for men?” she said. Women can’t disagree with one another without men viewing that as “cattiness or bitchiness or reverting to the stereotype that women can’t get along,” Roisman said. “We need to be able to have a substantive disagreement with one another without fear that a man who is at the table will call it a catfight.”

Leipzig’s Dominique Shelton said it's hard to “tease out” whether she was told she didn’t look “like a lawyer” because she’s a woman or because she’s Black: “I have always been in the work context somewhat of an anomaly because not that many people look like me.”

The COVID-19 pandemic made “the mountain more difficult to climb” for women who often have primary family responsibilities, said Wolkowitz. Shelton sees a positive: Law firms are recognizing that “a lot of what we do can be done from home … We don’t need to be on planes two-three times a week.” It’s not true only for women, but men coming out of law school also want more time away from work, she said. “I have seen the practice evolve. It’s great for families; it’s great for the work environment.”