Tackling diversity at top law firms

Jack Cinquegrana

When Jack Cinquegrana, an Italian-American lawyer from Boston's northern suburbs and a partner at the firm of Choate, Hall & Stewart LLP, took over as president of the Boston Bar Association last year, he quickly established his top priority for the organization: fostering more racial diversity at Boston's top law firms. Cinquegrana, 53, spoke with Globe reporter Keith Reed.

Q. What's changed about the Boston legal community since you started here 30 years ago?

A. Back then, it was an entirely inward-looking community. All the lawyers at the table were Boston lawyers, with Boston-based offices and Boston clients. It was good because it was a small community, people knew each other and were concerned with the civic health of the city; bad because it was still that insular, tough-to-crack leadership layer. Everybody at that table was a white man.

Q. You said Boston law firms past and present are run exclusively by white men, but at the same time, there's been a change in who's running the show. Explain that.

A. The white guys back then all had Brahmin last names, and today there's Cin quegrana and Kaplan. There's a lot more ethnically mixed leadership, but it's still not racially mixed.

Q. For the president of the bar association, how does diversity become number one, above all the other issues the legal community faces?

A. We have headquarters flight, our major employers are getting bought up by outsiders -- who's left to run the conversation about what's good about Boston? One of those groups is us.

So what's our role in the town? That led us directly to the idea of what's wrong with this town that we could affect. It's that it's not as diverse in its professional ranks as it should be. Why is that important? Because that's what draws talent, that's what makes the town healthy.

Q. There is a lot of ethnic diversity in the law schools in Boston. Why isn't that talent staying?

A. If I had the real answer to that, I'd be a lot more successful than I am. People come here, and they look around, and they say, "Where are the people like me?" We bring lots of people into these organizations, churn them up, and spit them out, so as a result we need to do a better job of mentoring young professionals and bringing them up through the ranks.

Q. If the problem is that there aren't mentors for young minority lawyers, how do you create mentors if none of them stays long enough to take that role?

A. We do a lot to make the association more diverse. We have a board that I think is terrifically representative of the racial and ethnic population of the town, the gay and lesbian population of the town, big firm, small firm, little firm, government.

We started to develop contacts at other metropolitan bars. In San Francisco, New York, and other cities, the bar associations sponsor surveys that aren't "How many people of color are in your law firm," but substantive conversations about why you think your leadership ranks aren't as diverse as you want them to be.

Q. What did you learn?

A. If you read the San Francisco reports, the general idea is that we do a terrible job of mentoring lawyers. You've got to remember, law firms are profit-making institutions. Partners in law firms are reluctant to admit people to partnerships who are not viewed as people who are going to make the law firm more profitable.

You can't just snap your fingers and say, "Let's bring in an African-American lawyer and seven to 10 years later, that person's going to become a partner and make this law firm more profitable" if that person 10 years later doesn't have client contacts, hasn't been mentored to get out and do the things that are necessary to bring in business.

Q. That almost sounds like a cop-out by the legal industry, if it's saying we want more diversity, but we're not sure about who can make the firm profitable.

A. That's probably true. In many respects, those partners came in in a different era. After reading these surveys, [it's clear] that we all suffer from subliminal attitudes that make it easier for white people, in the eyes of white people, to become heirs to the client class that will ultimately permit them to become a member of the partnership class. Those are attitudes that have to be changed.