Women's Leadership
Pryor Cashman's Women's Leadership Initiative (WLI) is dedicated to the strategic retention and advancement of women attorneys in the firm. The Initiative provides a platform for women attorneys at all phases of their careers to engage in professional training, mentoring, business development, and philanthropy. Pryor Cashman and WLI are committed to creating a culture that inspires women attorneys to develop as leaders, both in their profession and the world at large.
From hosting educational sessions on how to read balance sheets and securing financial freedom to self-defense classes and more personal sessions around sexism and bias in the workplace, this close-knit group meets monthly (typically during lunch) to develop formal and informal structures for women of all levels to thrive in the highly nuanced legal partnership structure. In many cases, these relationships have deepened into informal mentor/mentee relationships where women can align with others outside their department to confidentially garner advice and share strategies on how to elevate their brand and their careers. The program has been lauded by legal pioneer and consultant Deborah Farone, who mentions the program in her recent book. As she noted in a recent Legal 500 interview, “Speaking with the incredible people at Pryor Cashman who run their women’s program and having the chance to sit in on one of their sessions was very special. Dyan Finguerra-DuCharme and her partners are role models for focusing on what matters.” Farone lauds Pryor as an example of how “firms need to go beyond placing words on their website” about its commitment to diversity and women. Farone notes Pryor Cashman as a “firm that does an outstanding job with its women’s initiative.”
