Clifford Chance

GCD&I draws together leading General Counsel to promote inclusion and diversity. With more than 130 signatories from across the business spectrum, GCD&I has developed a series of consistent metrics designed to measure and report on diversity. The next steps include driving their adoption, thereby enabling in-house and law firm legal teams to be more representative.

“We recognised in-house teams have a role to play in driving D&I in the legal profession, whether that’s through how they address it within their own teams or how they instruct and engage law firms,” says GCD&I consultant Mary Mullally. “When we looked into how we could do this on a practical level, what also became clear was we needed a more uniform way of requesting D&I data from law firms.”

GCD&I has helped to establish common ground with our clients and peers on which are the right metrics to track, representing efficiencies versus bespoke approaches and data-gathering exercises that can and do vary from one client and one context to the next. As a responsible business and client-centric firm, we have embraced how GCD&I has helped improve internal awareness of why inclusion is so vital to our clients and the specific data points around diversity that clients value.

Provided it’s used in an informed way, data is a vital enabler of comparison, as Donny Ching (now former) Chair of GCD&I and (now former) Legal Director, Royal Dutch Shell, explains: “We use many law firms, so a consistent set of data we can use to compare them gives us a transparent view of how they are making progress. But the data is only one part of the equation. What we really want to achieve is that firms use the data to drive the right conversations and engagements and to drive improvements. Our approach is about assessing where things are now, what needs to be improved, what actions need to be taken and how we can help.”

Tiernan Brady, the firm’s Global Director of Inclusion and a member of the working group that designed the metrics, adds: “The GCD&I forum is a brilliant initiative that brings together law firms and our clients to advance diversity and inclusion across the profession. We have been active supporters of the group from its inception. The metrics allow us to work together to decide what questions we should be asking each other if we are to really drive change and to develop truly collaborative bilateral relationships with clients. It has also allowed us to develop more efficient practices and stronger principles around sharing data whilst respecting the privacy of our people.” 

The GCD&I initiative is not just about measuring the data; it involves discussion, review and analysis of the data to assess whether progress is being made and, if not, trying to understand why. Ultimately, it’s about helping the entire profession become more diverse and inclusive.

In June, Clifford Chance in Frankfurt hosted GCD&I's flagship event for Germany. Watch highlights from the event below.