A Framework for Recognizing and Overcoming Implicit Bias in the Legal Profession
-min.avif)
Maureen O’Neill is the Senior Vice President of Strategic Engagement. Drawing on more than 25 years of experience providing dedicated client service as an attorney and consultant, Maureen engages with Consilio’s customers to ensure a best-in-class client experience. She works cross-functionally across the company to develop and deploy best practices that embed Consilio’s commitment to service excellence, and to deliver the highest levels of quality and value. She seeks opportunities to create differentiating moments for clients—from bespoke educational sessions to loyalty programs to peer networking events—to foster client satisfaction and loyalty. Maureen also serves as Consilio’s Diversity & Inclusion Officer. She leads the development and implementation of the company’s strategies, policies, and programs for ensuring a diverse, inclusive, and equitable workplace.
Summary
If you’re human, you have biases. There’s no way to change this—the human brain is evolutionarily wired to take shortcuts in our decision-making. In the modern world, these shortcuts cause all of us to have implicit or unconscious biases around race, gender, and other inherent characteristics of our fellow humans.
The important question, then, isn’t whether you’re biased; it’s what you’re doing about it. That applies equally to individuals and to the organizations in which they work. This paper explores how implicit bias affects the legal profession and what law firms and corporate legal departments can do about it.
In this Whitepaper
- What implicit or unconscious bias is
- The impacts it has in the legal industry
- Systemic responses to implicit bias
Key Insights
- The importance of bias interrupters
- The value of objective criteria
- The potential impact of the Mansfield Rule
Summary
If you’re human, you have biases. There’s no way to change this—the human brain is evolutionarily wired to take shortcuts in our decision-making. In the modern world, these shortcuts cause all of us to have implicit or unconscious biases around race, gender, and other inherent characteristics of our fellow humans.
The important question, then, isn’t whether you’re biased; it’s what you’re doing about it. That applies equally to individuals and to the organizations in which they work. This paper explores how implicit bias affects the legal profession and what law firms and corporate legal departments can do about it.
In this Whitepaper
- What implicit or unconscious bias is
- The impacts it has in the legal industry
- Systemic responses to implicit bias
Key Insights
- The importance of bias interrupters
- The value of objective criteria
- The potential impact of the Mansfield Rule
