Retention efforts are key to firm diversification.

A willingness to accept diversity is not enough. Firms also must commit to strong, recruitment and retention efforts. if the numbers, of minority partners are going to increase, according to Jason Murray, president of the Miami Chapter of the Black Lawyers Association.

Murray was one of a number of speakers at the recent All Bar Conference on Diversity who said firms must create and foster mentor relationships and pay close attention to work assignments. given to their minority lawyers to make them feel they are highly valued by the firm. If minority lawyers aren't trained and given the opportunity to perform on significant legal matters, they will seek out other firms that will appreciate their talents.

"If' you don't open up and receive people and see them for what they bring to you, you are losing out on quality," said Wilhelmina Tribble, a former public member of the Bar's Board of Governors.

Citing "Women in the Law: Making the Case," a new study sponsored by the law schools at Columbia, Harvard, Michigan, Yale, and the University of California-Berkeley, Tribble said people of color now make up three percent of partners and 12 percent of associates in U.S. firms, and minority associates are more likely to start and remain at firms where there are other partners of color.

"Perception is everything and many minorities won't even consider going to firms if there are no other minorities," Tribble said.

Ray Carpenter, partner in charge of minority hiring for Holland & Knight, seconded that, saying it took 15 years of making offers to minority graduates in Florida to finally get a minority lawyer to accept an offer to work for the firm.

"People don't go where they do not see somebody who looks like them," Carpenter said. "And that was what was happening for a lot of years at Holland & Knight."

Carpenter said diversity is distinguished from affirmative action in that it is a choice made by the firm. He said it was firm patriarch Chesterfield Smith who decreed that Holland & Knight should look like the community it serves and also draw talent from that community.

Black Lawyers

Murray said while women and Hispanics are making inroads toward partnerships, isolation, lack of mentoring, and the lack of challenging job assignments are significant obstacles still faced by black lawyers at major law firms in Miami.

Murray said while a recent National Association for Law Placement study found 16.34 percent of partners at major Miami firms are women...