Women in Law Firms

I'm going to use a little of my day off to write a post on something I got angry about while we were still in interviewing mode: my experience of interviewing as a woman at a law firm. No, I don't mean gender-discrimination exactly. I think that firms have made great strides towards gender equality. But, I noticed that they're most interested in a specific kind of woman . . .

I am in a committed long term relationship and I (usually) wear a symbol of that on my left ring finger. Before we started interviewing, an engaged friend told me that she wasn't planning to wear her engagement ring out of an abundance of caution. I thought that was ridiculous, and didn't take off my ring . . . until I realized that not only was no one giving me call back interviews, the interview seemed effectively over after my interviewer noticed my left hand, and I was getting a lot of very probing questions about how committed I actually was to working in a firm (one gentleman even asked me if I was considering leaving the workforce at any point). So, I took off my ring, got some call back interviews, and moved on with my life.

I don't want to go too far - it's totally possible that this just happened by chance, or that I improved after my first round of interviews, etc. Still, I noticed while doing call back interviews at the firms themselves how few female associates had kids and how many of the female partners with kids had toddlers and were in their forties. I also have a friend who is visibly pregnant, and who is a law student at a different but equally "good" school - and who got no job offers at all.

I totally understand the thinking that goes into not wanting to a hire a married/engaged woman. It's probably more likely she'll leave for maternity reasons, and also possibly less likely that she'll actually come to the firm since 2-career couples have more trouble committing to one geographic area. In a tough economic climate, firms want to take no chances. But that leaves me in a tough spot this summer. What am I supposed to do for the 10 weeks I'm interning at a firm? Not wear my ring? Not mention my S.O. at all, even though we'll be living together?

All of the above made my life more difficult, but didn't make really made angry. The part where I blew up was when I found out that my male friends who are married (and some of whom have kids) had no problems at all when interviewing. Rather than being a liability, marriage was an indication of responsibility and stability.