Bar Association Hires Man To Tell Women Attorneys How To Balance Their Lives

Warning: Mansplaining ahead!

Bar associations, despite their waning popularity, can still be a wonderful resource for lawyers. There are often useful CLEs and networking opportunities that can be difficult to find in other venues. But that doesn’t mean all their events are picture-perfect models of what legal events should be.

Take for example an event scheduled for next week at the Chicago Bar Association Alliance for Women committee meeting. They have a guest speaker scheduled to talk about “five ways women can rule the legal marketplace and still have balance in their lives.” Which sound like something perfectly on brand, until you see the speaker is a man, Steve Fretzin. As an Above the Law tipster noted, this just reeks of “mansplaining.”

Now, it’s perhaps possible that despite presenting as a man Fretzin has done a lot of research about gender dynamics or diversity in general and has a wealth of information to share specific to women and the workplace. So, despite the bad optics I went to Fretzin’s website and it turns out he has written a book — The Ambitious Attorney which promises to give tips on increasing a lawyer’s book of business. Which… okay. And then I trolled through a year of his blog posts and nary a mention of gender or diversity. So yeah, this guy might well have a wealth of information but none of it appears related to the thorny and complex issues of gender politics and work / life balance — what the event is supposedly about.

If the Chicago Bar Association wanted Fretzin to speak to its members about networking or building a book of business — things he writes extensively on — that’s fine. But trying to shoehorn him into an event about women and work / life balance seems awkward at best and offensive at worst. Next time you want to have someone speak on women’s issues, maybe hire a woman.

The Alliance for Women reached out to Above the law with the following comment:

The leadership for the Alliance for Women responds to your article regarding our upcoming event. Since its founding almost 30 years ago, the Alliance for Women has been working within the Chicago Bar Association to advance the interests of women in the legal profession and the larger community and to bring together the talents of its members to implement strategies that effect change.

Your article inaccurately characterizes our upcoming program in several respects. First, the Alliance for Women is an organization that is run by women for women. Contrary to your suggestion, this event was not organized by men to “mansplain” to us. All of our events are richly enhanced by active participation from our membership and are designed to facilitate a dialogue. Second, your article incorrectly suggests that the Alliance “hired” a male speaker to tell women how to balance their work and life and not merely how to better market their practices. The focus of the event is legal marketing, and we selected a speaker, Mr. Steve Fretzin, who recognizes that both women and men face unique challenges in this area. Third, although the Alliance for Women’s leadership and membership consists almost entirely of women, we are not an exclusionary organization and we seek to partner with male allies to advance our mission. Furthermore, the event is open and promoted to all members of all sexes from the greater bar association.

Notwithstanding our disappointment with the inappropriate description in your article, we look forward to hearing Mr. Fretzin’s perspective based on his years as a legal marketer, coach, and business development expert.

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headshotKathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, and host of The Jabot podcast. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).

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