Diversity: Baker & Daniels LLP

OUR GOAL
At Baker & Daniels LLP, we intend to move past the diversity "dialogue" and take active steps to ensure that we employ attorneys, other professionals and staff of diverse backgrounds and to provide those individuals with the opportunity to succeed, grow and flourish within our law firm.

OUR COMMITMENT
Baker & Daniels LLP, founded in 1863, is a full service law firm of 370 professionals. We serve a significant and diverse group of clients who possess diverse work forces and constituencies. As part of our demonstrated commitment to provide unparalleled client service, we understand that having diversity as a core value and encompassing a diverse group of talented professionals, staff, and vendors is paramount to effectively serving and partnering with our clients. Diversity is an important element in the Firm's strategic plan. To that end, Baker & Daniels has an active internal Diversity Committee which serves as the centerpiece of our commitment to support and promote diversity in all aspects of our management, administration and operations. The Committee is chaired by a member of the Firm's Executive Committee and includes a diverse group of attorneys and professionals representing differences in ethnicity, gender, background, lifestyles, culture, disability, and viewpoints. With the full support of Firm management, the Diversity Committee oversees our strategic plan on diversity issues and is held accountable by Firm management for tangible and measurable results. With diversity being a core value of the Firm, we are committed to the recruitment, retention, and advancement of attorneys and staff of diverse backgrounds.

OUR ACTIONS
Recruitment
Diversity is embedded within our recruiting and hiring practices. Attorneys of color and women attorneys serve and have served on our Recruitment and Retention Committee. We recruit at law schools with strongly diverse student bodies, including Howard University, and encourage law school faculty and recruitment offices to identify minority law students for summer clerkships with Baker & Daniels.

Minority Recruitment At Law Job Fairs
Baker & Daniels LLP also seeks minority law students for summer clerkships from its active participation in minority job fairs, including the Cook County (Chicago) Minority Job Fair, National BLSA Midwest Regional Minority Recruitment Job Fair, and Legal Career Fair sponsored by the Harvard Black Law Students Association.

Joint Summer Clerkship Program
Baker & Daniels and Eli Lilly and Company, a prominent Indianapolis-based Fortune 500 corporation, have collaborated to recruit law students from Howard University and other law schools for a dual summer clerkship program at Baker & Daniels and Lilly. This joint collaboration allows us to attract minority law students to either corporate or law firm careers in Indianapolis.

Hudson-Holland Internship With Indiana University
Baker & Daniels LLP has collaborated with Indiana University and its Hudson-Holland Scholarship Program to provide a paid summer internship program for undergraduate students who have a demonstrated record of academic success and an interest in attending law school. Our goal is to maintain contact with these students from the time they intern with Baker & Daniels throughout their law school career, with the hope of encouraging them to enter private practice in Indiana.

Participation In And Support Of Gateway To Diversity Program
Baker & Daniels LLP is a participant in and recruits law students from the "Gateway To Diversity" Program -- a program that links Indiana's legal employers with minority law students and Indiana CLEO fellows to enhance the diversity of law students in Indiana's legal community.

Support Of Minority Corporate Counsel Association (MCCA)
Baker & Daniels LLP is both active in and a financial supporter (Platinum Sponsor) of the Minority Corporate Counsel Association (MCCA).

Support of Washington, D.C.-Based "Street Law" Program
Baker & Daniels LLP is a financial supporter of the Washington, D.C.-based "Street Law" Program -- a program in which lawyers and law students in various cities mentor inner-city high school students who have expressed an interest in a legal career.

Retention
Baker & Daniels LLP understands that success is measured not only in the recruitment of attorneys and professionals with diverse backgrounds, but in their development, advancement, and retention. It is for that reason that we have established a Development and Advancement Subcommittee within the Diversity Committee to address and structure initiatives on these important issues.

Quarterly Reporting
The Diversity Committee reports to Firm management quarterly on its initiatives and progress. Periodic updates are also published on the Firm's website.

Practice Group Accountability For Diversity
Practice Group Leaders are evaluated, in part, based on their demonstrated commitment and efforts to the recruitment and retention of attorneys from diverse backgrounds within their respective practice groups.

Support Staff
Diversity in our support staff is equally as important as diversity among our attorneys. We seek and will continue to seek diversity in our support staff by recruiting through "non-traditional" employment referral sources and agencies.

Minority Vendor Program
Baker & Daniels LLP has a minority vendor program and seeks to partner with vendors that share the Firm's commitment to diversity. Our vendor program includes both minority and women-owned businesses.

For further information about our Diversity Program, contact Greg Utken, Chair of our Diversity Committee, at gjutken@bakerd.com.