Biglaw

Ropes & Gray Elects First Female Chair

Another woman joins the upper echelon of Biglaw leadership.

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While women are better represented among Biglaw equity partnerships than ever before, those numbers remain woefully low considering we’re sufficiently removed from the 1950s to expect more parity. The bulk of a firm’s partnership went to law school after 1980 at this point — it’s become increasingly difficult to blame gender imbalance on the Paper Chase-era.

And the only thing more rare than a female equity partner in Biglaw, is a female equity partner at the highest levels of firm leadership. The exceptions, like Jami McKeon of Morgan Lewis, Faiza Saeed of Cravath, or Therese Pritchard of Bryan Cave (who we’re sure is excited about her job) are few and far between. We learned just last month that Crowell & Moring booted its female leader after one term, rendering the landscape just a little more sparse.

Ropes & Gray has added another woman to this elite list, announcing that Julie Jones will assume the role of firm chair in 2019, marking the first woman to hold the top post in the firm’s 150-year history. She’ll assume the job from R. Bradford Malt. Per American Lawyer:

The leadership transition coincides with Malt’s reaching the firm’s mandatory retirement age of 65 at the end of 2019. The firm’s policy committee, which acts as its governing board, selected Jones as the firm’s next chair after conducting one-on-one consultations with all of the firm’s partners, according to Malt and Ropes & Gray managing partner David Chapin. Chapin is also due to retire at the end of 2019, and he said a similar process would take place next year to determine his successor as managing partner.

Malt, who has been Ropes & Gray’s chairman since 2004, said in an interview that there was “stunning unanimity” among partners that Jones was the right fit as the firm’s next chair.

The decision to announce the change now affords Ropes & Gray the opportunity to convey a smooth leadership transition, assuring clients and the legal community writ large that Ropes & Gray has a consistent, long-term vision.

On the subject of her election, Jones praised Ropes & Gray for its approach to female lawyers:

“I was always judged on merit. We value intelligence, hard work and commitment—and those things are gender-blind,” she said. “I feel lucky because of the values Ropes & Gray has as a firm, and because we’ve always had strong women leaders and I benefited from that. I feel a sense of duty in that regard. I need to continue to demonstrate our commitment to those core values.”

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Normally, words like “merit” and “gender-blind” must be taken with enormous grains of salt. Not because they don’t represent laudable goals, but because they’re usually disingenuous cudgels used to justify discrimination: “we only have 5 percent female partners? I can assure you we judge only on merit… we neutrally tallied up everyone’s hours and hers were just low that year she took maternity leave!” But Ropes & Gray may be the exception that employs those words honestly. Jones will step in as chair, and another partner, Jane Rogers, will join the firm’s policy committee.

Congratulations to Jones and Rogers on their new roles.

Ropes & Gray’s Next Chair Will Be a Woman [American Lawyer]

HeadshotJoe Patrice is an editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news.

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