Maurice Blackburn Lawyers’ commitment to championing gender equality has today been publicly recognised by the Workplace Gender Equality Agency, which has named the law firm an Employer of Choice for Gender Equality for the third consecutive year.
The highly sought after citation, awarded to 119 recipients this year, recognises gender equality is increasingly critical to an organisation’s success and is viewed as a baseline feature of well-managed and leading organisations.
Maurice Blackburn is one of 19 law firms that received the citation this year. The accreditation is for workplace commitments in areas including leadership, learning and development, gender pay equity and flexible working arrangements.
“As a firm committed to fairness and justice for our clients, we are proud to be recognised as a fair and just place of work, especially for women,” says Maurice Blackburn CEO Jacob Varghese.
More than 77 per cent of the firm’s 1095 workforce are women, and 75 per cent of employees promoted in 2019 were women. At manager level, this figure rises to 80 per cent.
Among its many commitments to gender parity in the workplace, Maurice Blackburn:
- introduced measures to reduce the gender pay gap, including development of one consistent and transparent classification structure for employees in comparable roles and a target for like-for-like gaps to be within -2%/+2% by this year
- continued with 50 per cent female representation on its board, with four of the seven positions held by women
- supported 105 women (9.6% of workforce) and three men to access the 18-weeks’ full pay primary carer leave, with continued superannuation payments while receiving the Federal Government’s paid parental leave
- empowered more than 70 per cent of the workforce to access extensive flexible work arrangements, such as flexible and compressed work hours, working from home, and job sharing, and officially included these flexible work arrangements in annual performance appraisal discussions for the first time
- ensured at least one female at same or senior level to the hiring manager was involved in interview panels for talent sourcing, and continued to insist on equal gender representation on panels at events.
“This is the first time the accreditation has been for a two-year period. We are delighted to have our efforts to date recognised, and we continue to work on ways to address the gender equality and pay gap where it still exists.”
