"Our most valued resource is our people."
-- Pepper Hamilton's vision statement
Pepper Hamilton LLP is committed to advancing diversity, and we work continuously to expand and promote opportunities for all Pepper people.
In addition to ensuring that the firm is an attractive and fair place to work, we take seriously our clients’ commitment to diversity by making every effort to assemble appropriate project teams that accommodate their diversity requests and requirements.
Pepper is a limited liability partnership in which women and minorities hold ownership interests. Applicants are hired without regard to their age, race, gender, sexual orientation, color, religion, national origin, place of birth, non-job-related disability or any other legally protected status, and once employed by the firm, individuals are treated without regard to any of these criteria. We offer benefits to same-gender domestic partners of our employees, and we were one of the first firms in the nation to do so.
Recognizing that diverse characteristics and talent enhance any organization, and that a national law firm must reflect our many different cultures and ideas, we actively recruit and encourage the hiring, training and promotion of women and minorities.
Internal Programs
In 2003, Pepper launched a diversity initiative to enhance the firm’s commitment to the hiring and retention of minority lawyers. The firm engaged a nationally prominent diversity consultant to survey the firm’s minority lawyers, both current and alumni, to assess our strengths and shortcomings as a firm in which minority lawyers can reach their professional potential and achieve personal and professional satisfaction.
Using what she had learned as a springboard for discussion, the consultant facilitated diversity workshops for members of the firm’s Executive, Associates and Hiring committees, and all department, practice group and office heads. The workshops heightened the participants’ appreciation of the variety of backgrounds, personal characteristics and skills that contribute to a successful business and professional organization, and that need to be consciously cultivated for Pepper to flourish.
At an annual firm meeting, the consultant spoke about the role of diversity in the Pepper workplace to all of Pepper’s lawyers, paralegals and senior managers, and she conducted a diversity workshop for non-lawyer staff.
Pepper has since created a Diversity Committee, which works to better serve our clients, the firm and the communities in which we work and live by promoting greater diversity in the firm.
The Diversity Committee recommends strategic initiatives to recruit, support and retain attorneys from diverse backgrounds, and promotes participation in activities supporting diversity in our communities and in conjunction with our clients.
As part of our diversity initiative, Pepper has established a mentoring program for all minority associates, which includes training for mentors and protégés, and regular meetings of the participants for comparing notes on best mentoring practices and monitoring the program’s progress. This program has been expanded to all associates.
We also believe that good mentoring and networking occur outside of the law firm, and we pay dues for minority bar association memberships.
Also in 2003, we started Pepper WIN!, our Women’s Initiative, which is a program to recruit, retain, promote and support our women attorneys. We sponsor several WIN! programs each year, including training for communication and marketing skills, and provide opportunities for informal mentoring from other, more experienced women attorneys.
Leadership in the Firm
Our attempts to search out, recruit and encourage promotion of women and minorities have rewarded the firm and the individuals involved. The firm elected its first female partner in 1960, well ahead of most major law firms. In 1992, we were one of the first large firms to elect a woman as executive partner, and, in 2007, we elected a woman to chair our Executive Committee. We are one of only a few firms in the nation with a woman chief executive.
Female partners serve as the firm’s General Counsel and the firm’s Professional Responsibility Counsel.
Women lead our Detroit and Orange County offices and the firm’s practices in antitrust, commercial litigation, pharmaceutical and medical device litigation and counseling, insurance, investment funds, media and communications, real estate and tax.
Women and minorities also serve on the firm’s managing committees, including the Executive Committee, the Management Committee and the Finance Committee.
Women and minorities are leaders in firm administration. Senior administrative positions held by women and minorities include director of administration, director of associate relations, director of communications, director of information services and technology, director of library and research services, director of office services, director of professional recruiting, and director of user services.
Pepper paralegals, managers and staff represent a diverse group of dedicated professionals; more than half are women or minorities or both.
Leadership in the Community
Many of Pepper’s minority and women lawyers hold leadership positions outside of the firm. For example:
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an African-American partner is chancellor of the Philadelphia Bar Association; he will lead the 13,000-member association through 2008
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an Asian-American partner is president of the Asian Pacific American Bar Association of Pennsylvania; she will lead the association through 2008
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an African-American associate is president of the Barristers' Association of Philadelphia, which addresses the professional needs and development of African-American lawyers in Philadelphia and the surrounding counties; she will lead the association through 2009
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an African-American partner was the first person of color to serve as president of the Pennsylvania Bar Association; he led the 29,000-member association in 2004-05
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an African-American counsel is vice chairman of the Executive Committee of the Detroit Economic Growth Corporation
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a female partner was president of the board of directors of the Philadelphia Volunteers for the Indigent Program in 2002
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a female partner was president of the Detroit Bar Association in 1995-96
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an African-American associate (now a partner) was the first African-American to chair the Young Lawyers Section of the Philadelphia Bar Association; he led the 5,000-member section in 1991.
One of our associates, an openly gay man, was nominated by Governor Rendell to serve on the bench of the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas and, after being unanimously confirmed by the Pennsylvania State Senate, was sworn into office in August 2007. While at Pepper, that lawyer received the Outstanding Community Service Award in 2004 from PA-GALA (Pennsylvania Gay and Lesbian Alliance) for his work in defending the City of Allentown’s anti-discrimination ordinance. He also received the Michael Greenberg Award for Lifetime Achievement from GALLOP (Gay and Lesbian Lawyers of Pennsylvania) in 2003.
In addition, a number of our lawyers are active board members of minority, women, gay and lesbian, and other bar and community organizations. The list is long and varied.
Historically, Pepper has encouraged and strongly supported its lawyers’ involvement in minority organizations. For example, in 1999, one of our partners co-chaired the National Bar Association’s annual convention in Philadelphia (the NBA represents more than 15,000 African-American lawyers and judges across the country). Pepper provided substantial in-kind support for the convention and sponsored a major reception during the week-long event.
External Programs
Externally, Pepper has funded programs for minorities at the Villanova University School of Law and Drexel University College of Law.
At Villanova, the law school awards two three-year, full-tuition scholarships in the firm’s name to racial or ethnic minorities, based on a combination of merit-based factors and financial need. The firm also is committed, on an ongoing basis, to hiring two Villanova Law School minority students: initially, as first-year summer associates, and then as part-time law clerks during their second or third academic years.
We sponsor Villanova’s annual Martin Luther King, Jr., lecture, featuring a well-known scholar or practitioner as the speaker. Finally, we have funded the Pepper Hamilton National Summer Program for Minority Undergraduates, a six-week, credit-bearing summer program at Villanova for sophomores and juniors from historically black colleges and universities to introduce them to the possibilities of law school and legal careers, and provide a first introduction to legal reasoning and writing.
At Drexel, Pepper is a charter sponsor of The Minority Fellowship Program. We provide a Drexel law student with financial assistance for living expenses and guarantee that student an unpaid co-op position at the firm during the student’s second or third year of law school.
Pepper also regularly participates in and sponsors diversity initiatives such as:
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the American Bar Association’s Women in the Profession Research Project on the Retention and Advancement of Women Attorneys of Color
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the American Bar Association’s National Conference for the Minority Lawyer
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the Philadelphia Diversity Law Group, an organization of law firms and corporate counsel promoting minority lawyer hiring and retention (Pepper is a founding member)
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the Wolverine Bar Association summer associate program, which encourages Michigan firms to hire first-year minority summer associates
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the Dauphin County (Pa.) Bar Association’s Capital Area Managing Partners Diversity Initiative (Pepper is a charter member)
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the annual convention of the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association
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Lavender Law, the annual conference of the National Lesbian and Gay Law Association and the National Lesbian and Gay Law Foundation, which attracts more than 500 practicing attorneys and law professors and 200 law students
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the Philadelphia Bar Association’s Statement of Goals of Philadelphia Law Firms and Legal Departments for the Retention and Promotion of Women (Pepper is a signatory)
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the Philadelphia Bar Association’s Statement of Goals of Philadelphia Law Firms and Legal Departments for Increasing Minority Representation and Retention (Pepper is a signatory).
We participate annually in regional and local minority law student job fairs and other minority recruiting events, and we actively recruit at predominately minority law schools, such as Howard University.
Pepper is dedicated to offering equal and fair employment opportunities, and we work hard to ensure the well-being of our most valued resource – our people.
