Walking the Legal Tightrope: Solutions for Achieving a Balanced Life in Law

The concern about achieving balance in order to enrich the lives of women attorneys has grown today to become a problem of such proportions that many women now leave the practice of law because they find they cannot achieve a satisfactory quality of life within its strictures. This exodus not only affects the women who abandon a professional position in which they invested hard work, financial resources, and emotional wherewithal to achieve, but also our society in general. The under-representation of women practicing law impacts the culture of the legal profession and the quality of legal services offered to clients. Just as gender bias projects a negative message to clients, under-representation of women in the legal profession sends a message to clients that there is no room for diversity in a historically male-dominated legal profession and serves to negatively impact all women desiring to obtain the assistance of an attorney.