LAW FIRM VALUES INNOVATORS
A Clarion Call
RODERICK PALMORE
Leadership Council on
Legal Diversity
Minneapolis
Palmore’s challenge pushed law firms to increase diversity in their ranks.
ACKERMAN + GRUBER
OTS OF LAWYERS SAY THEY’RE INTERESTED in a diverse
workplace. But Roderick “Rick” Palmore had the vision and
initiative to take steps to advance that goal. In 2004, when
“It was a very bold step,” says Robert Grey, the former president of
the American Bar Association. “Those firms that chose not to [use diverse teams] might find their work shrinking.” (Grey is now executive
director of another Palmore creation, the Leadership Council on Legal
Diversity.)
Palmore, now the general counsel of General Mills Inc., didn’t col-
lect data on how firms responded to the initiative, but the move got
people’s attention. Anecdotally, Palmore heard from minority lawyers
that it helped their careers. “They told me they had opportunities they
wouldn’t have otherwise received,” he says. “That kind of evidence
alone was worth the effort.”
Five years later, Palmore decided that a different approach was
needed. Instead of having GCs lecture law firms, he wanted the two
L
groups to work collaboratively. “My conclusion was, if we’re going to
make the kind of change and progress we want to see, we have to get
beyond the accusations and finger-pointing stage,” he explains. After
bringing more than 100 lawyers from law firms and companies together
for a frank discussion on diversity at a 2009 meeting in Scottsdale, Arizona, Palmore and a small group of general counsel created the LCLD
to advance diversity in the profession. Today 70 companies and 138 law
firms are members. Among its offerings for minority law students and
lawyers is a mentoring program for accomplished midlevel lawyers who
aspire to top leadership positions. Nearly 450 lawyers have participated.
Palmore says it’s too soon to quantify results, but participants and their
employers have been enthusiastic.
“[Palmore has] arguably had a bigger impact over the last 15 years
than any other single individual on the way large law firms think about
diversity,” says Microsoft Corporation general counsel Bradford Smith,
who will become chairman of LCLD in September. “His creation of the
Call to Action really put diversity on the agenda for large law firms in
a way they could not ignore.” With the creation of the LCLD, Smith
says, Palmore took his mission a step further by creating a vehicle “to
translate that original vision into concrete reality.”
The American Lawyer | August 2013 33
