Stinson to Participate in Mansfield Rule 3.0 Certification Process

09.30.2019

Stinson LLP is excited to announce that the firm is participating in the certification process for the 3.0 iteration of the Mansfield Rule. The goal of the Mansfield Rule is to boost the representation of diverse lawyers in law firm leadership by broadening the pool of candidates considered for these opportunities.

The 12-month program requires participating firms to track and analyze talent pipelines and hiring practices to ensure that diverse attorneys are being considered for promotions and open positions. In order to gain certification, participating firms must consider a candidate pool that is made up of at least 30 percent diverse attorneys, complete surveys and data collection requests, and engage in community building and knowledge sharing with other participating firms. New for this version, Mansfield 3.0 will include attorneys with disabilities as well as women, attorneys of color and LGBTQ attorneys as part of the diverse candidate pool.

"We're very excited to be pursing the Mansfield certification process," said Ann Jenrette-Thomas, Stinson's chief diversity and inclusion officer. "The firm has long been committed to hiring and promoting diverse attorneys and staff. We hope that participation in this process will meaningfully advance the dialogue on promoting diverse candidates and allow us to gather data that will help us to continue diversifying our leadership ranks at Stinson."

The Mansfield Rule is named for Arabella Mansfield, the first woman admitted to the practice of law in the United States 150 years ago. It was a winning idea from the 2016 Women in Law Hackathon hosted by Diversity Lab in collaboration with Bloomberg Law and Stanford Law School. It was inspired by the NFL’s Rooney Rule, which requires every NFL team to interview at least one minority candidate for head coach vacancies.

This process builds on Stinson's continued commitment to diversity and inclusion. Most recently, Stinson was recognized by the Women In Law Empowerment Forum (WILEF) as a 2019 WILEF Gold Standard Firm. Stinson was also named as one of the best law firms for female partners in Law360's annual Glass Ceiling report, recognized by the Women's Foundation of Greater St. Louis' Women in the Workplace as a top-scoring employer on their 2018 Employment Scorecard, and received top marks in the Human Rights Campaign's 2019 Corporate Equality Index. Stinson was also recently recognized by Working Mother on their 2019 Best Law Firms for Women list.