Strategy and Momentum
Kutak Rock’s three-year inclusiveness and diversity strategic plan aligns the firm’s organizational systems with firmwide goals.
Development
Development of the plan takes over a year and includes research and analysis of industry best practices and trends, compilation of client interests and questions, and the results of a firmwide survey with participation at over 80 percent. Drafts of the plan are discussed by firm leadership at multiple levels and then approved by the firm’s executive committee.
Goals
The strategic plan’s internal goals center on fostering a culture of inclusiveness, including specific goals for networking, communication, equal opportunity, and compositional diversity. External goals enhance inclusiveness and diversity in the legal profession as a whole including pipeline programming with young people across multiple offices. For each goal, the firm prioritizes tactics chronologically over a three-year period and develops a dashboard with targets, metrics, and progress reports on inclusiveness efforts and compositional diversity.
Results
The development, focus, and support of the strategic plan by firm leaders is an accomplishment in itself. The real accomplishments, however, result from the firm’s long-standing commitment to putting the plan into action. Results range from increased participation in affinity groups and networking educational opportunities to a larger change in our recruiting system.
Kutak Rock prides itself on creating a path to partnership for all attorneys. In 2017, over half of the firm’s new partners were women and 15 percent were members of other diverse groups. Currently, 44 percent of the firm’s partners are women or members of other diverse groups. The firm’s higherthan-average retention rate for women and minority attorneys is also an indicator of the firm’s successfully inclusive culture. In the latest reporting period, Kutak Rock retained 95% of all attorneys identifying as races and ethnicities other than white/Caucasian and 100% of women partners so identifying.