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Description: There are several aspects of achieving diversity and inclusion in a corporate legal department. These include attracting and retaining legal talent; assuring that all members for the department feel included and free to be their best selves, requiring that your outside counsel firms handling your matters include diverse professionals and using your legal spend to hire women and diverse owned firms to handle company legal matters. Many corporations tout their commitment to diversity, inclusion and elimination of bias but do not follow through with their actions. An area that is often neglected is supplier diversity for legal spending. Some companies exempt their legal departments from the supplier diversity mission, others do a cursory job of seeking diverse owned firms claiming they “cannot find any that are qualified” and others put on flashy programs but do not follow through with actually hiring women and minority owned firms for meaningful work. If you are committed to achieving parity in the legal profession as an inhouse counsel, this course will provide you with concrete strategies to work with some of the best and the brightest lawyers, who also happen to be affiliated with diverse owned firms.
Francine Friedman Griesing is the founder and Managing Member of Griesing Law, LLC, a women-owned and operated law firm based in Philadelphia with offices in Cincinnati and New York. Fran is a valued, strategic advisor to top executives and general counsel at the region’s and country’s largest corporations and institutions. Fran has over thirty-five years of experience representing clients in complex business transactions, high stakes litigation and alternate dispute resolution matters. Her clients include public and closely-held companies, not-for-profit organizations, government entities and executives. After practicing at AmLaw 100 firms and as Litigation Chair for the City of Philadelphia, Fran founded Griesing Law so women could reach their potential in the male-dominated legal field.
Fran has been recognized by Chambers and Partners USA, Best Lawyers in America, Client Choice Guide USA, and Pennsylvania Super Lawyers for her expertise in commercial litigation and employment law. She has also been acknowledged as one of The Philadelphia Inquirer’s Influencers of Law Lifetime Achievers and Diversity & Inclusion Lifetime Achievers, Philadelphia Business Journal’s Best of the Bar, The Legal Intelligencer’s Women of the Year, Ms. JD’s Sharing Her Passion Honoree, ABA Women in Litigation Joint CLE Conference Women Who Inspire Us;and Pennsylvania Super Lawyers’ Top 50 Women Lawyers and is the recipient of the Philadelphia Bar Education Center’s Excellence in Legal Education Award and the American Bar Association’s Excellence in Legal Writing Award.
Fran is a serial entrepreneur, having co-founded Bossible, a marketing and business development consultancy that helps entrepreneurs, professionals, small businesses and diverse businesses build and execute marketing plans that amplify them as thought leaders in their industries, and GriesingMazzeo Leadership, a training and human resources advisor for small, middle market, women and diverse owned businesses and professionals. She is highly regarded as a trailblazing entrepreneur, selected by the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO) and Bank of America as the 2018 Woman Business Owner of the Year and by The Chamber of Commerce for Greater Philadelphia as the 2018 Small Business Person of the Year. She also received the Women’s Business Enterprise Center East WBE Leadership Award. She has been included in Women’s Enterprise Magazine’s Top WBE CEOs, Philly Biz’s Executives of the Year, Enterprising Women Magazine’s Enterprising Women of the Year, Philadelphia Business Journal’s Women of Distinction, Business Philadelphia’s Women to Watch and one of the Governor of Pennsylvania’s Best 50 Women in Business.
Fran is a highly sought speaker and writer and is also featured in “The Road to Independence, 101 Women’s Journeys to Starting Their Own Firms”, published by the American Bar Association. She has taught Business Law, Public Employment Law and Advocacy Skills at Temple University's Beasley School of Law and Fox School of Business & Management and has been a guest lecturer at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Thomas Kline School of Law at Drexel University. Fran is an honors graduate of Binghamton University and the University of Pennsylvania Law School, where she was an editor of the Law Review.
Pam Harper is a seasoned attorney with experience in both the private and public sectors and is a Certified Compliance & Ethics Professional (CCEP) with the Compliance Certification Board. She conducts internal investigations as well as cultural audits and advises clients on risk management and public policy issues. She also provides diversity and inclusion training as well as professional coaching on various topics including sexual harassment, elimination of bias, hiring and firing employees, maternity and FMLA leave, race and gender discrimination, LGBTQ rights and accommodations for disabled veterans.
Prior to joining Griesing Law, Pam held several executive roles at consulting and financial services firms in the region. Most recently, she served as the Chief Operating Officer and General Counsel for an information technology consulting firm. Pam also held a similar role as Chief Operating Officer and Compliance Officer for an institutional asset firm where she oversaw the firm’s legal and compliance program, subject to the rules and regulations promulgated under the Investment Advisor Act of 1940. In addition, she built a wealth of experience advising clients on public policy, comparative governance structures and foreign investment laws and regulations while serving as a Principal at two other consulting firms. Pam’s public sector experience includes her appointed position as the Deputy Director of Aviation, Marketing & Governmental Affairs for the Philadelphia Airport System where she was responsible for the airport’s government and regulatory affairs as well as air service marketing initiatives.
Outside of the Firm, Pam has shared her business and legal expertise while serving as an Adjunct Professor at Temple University’s Fox School of Management. She is a member of the Society of Corporate Compliance and Ethics Professionals, the National Society of Compliance Professionals and Women Owned Law, an organization dedicated to fostering female entrepreneurship in the legal profession. She also sits on the Board of Directors for the Arthur Ross Gallery and previously held roles on the Boards of numerous civic organizations in the region, including the Philadelphia International Airport Advisory Board, Atwater Kent Museum, the Center for Emerging Visual Artists and International House, among many others.
Pam earned her joint J.D. and M.B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School and the Wharton School. She also received her A.B. from Princeton University where she graduated cum laude.
Jessica Mazzeo began her legal career before graduating high school where she previously held such roles as receptionist, secretary and paralegal at local area firms, including firms listed on the Am Law 100 and 200.
Since the Firm’s inception, Jessica has been a driving force in making it a one of a kind law firm, locally and nationally, that focuses on a collaborative team approach and discourages internal competition that interferes with client service. Her marketing and business development efforts have helped the firm grow its initial client base of only a small handful of clients to now having over 500 clients handling over 1,100 matters for clients which include Fortune 500 companies, small and privately held business, non-profits and entrepreneurs. Jessica has been relentless in her pursuit of building business for the Firm and has a proven track record of effectively assisting Firm attorneys in converting prospective clients into actual clients and Jessica herself has been able to attract clients to the firm. Jessica is an alumni of the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses Program, an intensive twelve week mini-MBA program designed to help entrepreneurs create jobs and economic opportunity by providing greater access to education, capital and business support services. She also completed the Leadership Now development series presented by the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce.
Jessica is Chair of the Diversity and Inclusion Committee of the Association of Legal Administrators (“ALA”), a non-profit organization with over 9,000 members across 30 countries. She is also currently on the Philadelphia Chapter’s Diversity and Inclusion Committee and previously served as the Vice President of Communications, Board Secretary and on its 40th Anniversary Committee and Technology Subcommittee. In addition, Jessica serves as a committee volunteer for the Women’s Business Enterprise Center (WBEC) East and devotes several hours a month to various needs of the organization. In September 2016, the organization awarded Jessica for her efforts by making her a recipient of its Shining Star Award.
Since 2010 when the Firm became a member of the organization, Jessica became actively involved in supporting the National Association of Minority and Women Owned Law Firms (“NAMWOLF”), which is a non-profit trade organization dedicated to promoting diversity and fostering relationships between Fortune 500 companies and outside legal counsel. Jessica has traveled across the country as a staff volunteer for NAMWOLF since 2011 and served as Co-Chair of its Marketing Initiative from 2011-2013 as well as holding many other positions within the organization. As a staff volunteer, Jessica has served as a representative of the NAMWOLF team at the Women Business Enterprise National Council’s National Conference and Business Fair in Orlando, Philadelphia and Austin, to help support NAMWOLF in promoting the organization and its mission to the thousands of attendees.
Jessica played a significant role in the Firm receiving NAMWOLF’s 2013 Law Firm MVP Award which is given by in-house attorneys from Fortune 500 corporations to acknowledge the law firm that has done the most to advance the organization’s mission. This is a particularly notable accomplishment because in doing so she helped the Firm become just the second firm in the organization’s then 12 year history to receive this accolade and there are currently 138 member law firms across 37 states. The award recognizes her passion for the organization and its mission as evidenced by her efforts on its behalf.
 | | Practice Areas: | | Elimination of Bias & Diversity in the Legal Profession | | | Online Media Type: | | Audio | | | Production Date: | | 05/11/2021 12:00 PM EDT | | | Level: | | Intermediate | | | Category: | | Standard | | | Duration: | | 1 Hours, 0 Minutes | | | Online Format: | | Live | | | Course Type: | | Public |
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| | • | Francine Friedman Griesing - Griesing Law LLC | | • | Pamela Harper - Griesing Law LLC | | • | Jessica Mazzeo - Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer of Griesing Law |
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