An addition to the Booker Prize long-list in 2020, I can see why “Such a Fun Age” by Kiley Reid was well received by critics and book worms alike. “Such a Fun Age” explores inter-racial relationships, specifically drawing on the relationship between an upper-middle class white woman (Alix) and her young African American babysitter (Emira). The book mocks the pursuit of ‘wokeness’ by the Caucasian characters while addressing themes of fetishization and tokenism along the way.

I am pleased to share a recent survey on compensation. Before we dig into the stats, we’d like to thank the CBA-WLF for commissioning a survey to consider partner compensation; a laudable project aimed at considering whether there is disparity between partner compensation by gender. At the time the survey was commissioned, no other survey existed in Canada directed at law firm compensation. The CBA-WLF Compensation Survey Report can be found here. Due to sensitivities related to disclosing individual wages, even if expressed as a percentage of total income, the study focused on the factors considered in determining compensation. The survey had a 42% response rate of 27 firms. On average, the firms that responded had 49 partners of which 30% were women. Female lawyers made up about 38% of participating firms so the partnership ratio is slightly lower but…

Moderator: Kim Jakeman, co-founder, LiL & Partner, Harper Grey Panelists: Alexandra Mitretodis, Associate, Fasken Pamela Meneguzzi, Senior Counsel, Government of Canada Rose Keith, QC, Advisor, LiL & Associate Counsel, Harper Grey Dionne Liu, Associate, Harper Grey   Kim:  Good morning everyone. I’m so excited to be monitoring our third Life in Law panel discussion! We’ve brought together both senior and junior female lawyers today to explore whether there is a prevalence of unconscious bias by women against women in our profession and if so, what steps we can take to do better. So on that note – welcome!   Alexandra:  Thank you for including me Kim!   Dionne:  Yes, thank you Kim, I’m proud to be here with a few of my Harper Grey colleagues (and some new faces!), and to have the opportunity to take part in this initiative….

Today we are joining people around the world in celebrating International Women’s Day! A significant day that recognizes the need for gender equality, celebrates women’s achievements and focuses on the steps that must continue in order to achieve gender parity.

Dear Seeking Sisterhood: You are not alone in finding it difficult to build mutually beneficial business relationships with women and establishing a strong and successful female network. The reality is that we all have incredible time pressures on us with work, family, friends and often caregiving responsibilities of either aging parents or our own children. We also all develop friendships and relationships outside of our work life and those relationships take care and feeding. Our example of networking business relationships is often what we have seen our male colleagues do and much of that may just not fit within your interests or within the time that you have available for networking. The end result is that women can feel that it is difficult or impossible to build a strong network of business connections. In reality; however, women have a myriad…