Originally interviewed in 2022 for the Marcus Evans IP Law Summit.
Braxton Davis, Executive Director, National Council on Patent Practicum, and Associate General Counsel, Patents, Meta|Facebook, discusses the lack of diversity in the IP law profession, the systemic barriers preventing women and people of color from entering the field, and how law firms and in-house counsel can help build a stronger pipeline of diverse talent.
“Most law firms are aware of the need for diversity on their teams, but they have not necessarily stepped up. Injecting gender, cultural, ethnic and background diversity will ultimately help firms have a more diverse team, and be better equipped to reach out and relate to a more diverse client base,” says Braxton Davis, Executive Director, National Council on Patent Practicum, and Associate General Counsel, Patents, Meta|Facebook.
Davis was a speaker at the Marcus Evans IP Law Summit 2022.
In general, minorities have more difficulty accessing finance, educational experiences, resources and mentors. To become a patent prosecution attorney, you need an engineering or science degree, to pass the patent bar, a law degree, and to pass a state bar. Minorities do not have access to the same opportunities as their non-minority counterparts to achieve that.
In addition, young women and minorities do not see many people like them showing that it is possible. There are a multitude of hurdles they need to overcome.
There are also more systemic issues. Are law firms willing to hire women and minority candidates? Are they willing to provide the mentorship, guidance and professional resources needed for them to progress to partnership status?
Around 52 percent of those going into law school are women, but only 20 percent in the patent profession are women. Less than two percent of patent prosecution attorneys in the US are African American, yet we make up around 12 to 13 percent of the population. Traditionally, we have not been afforded the same opportunities, and that is why there is such a disparity within the patent profession.
First, we need to incentivize more women to actually acquire science and engineering degrees, which are typically male dominated. Women have to see more women doing that, to have that relatability. We must provide women the same opportunities.
To some extent, law firms do not hire women because they wrongfully assume they will start a family at some point and devote less time to the firm, whereas men get the benefit of the doubt. This attitude has resulted in fewer women making it to associate level, and even fewer making partner.
Most law firms are aware of the need for diversity on their teams, but they have not necessarily stepped up. They say they will hire more diverse candidates, but their recruitment practices have not changed.
Usually, they do not want to invest time and resources training candidates from the ground up, so they end up hiring laterals from other firms. Diverse hires just shift from one firm to another, which does not increase the number of individuals entering the profession. That is where the system is flawed.
Law firms do not want to hire and train when they know another firm will poach those individuals in a few years.
As in-house counsel, we have the opportunity to push boundaries and tell firms we need to see more diversity. At the end of the day, law firms do what their clients want.
The National Council on Patent Practicum has a unique program whereby it partners with corporate entities to train and develop women and minority engineers and scientists, so they can hit the ground running when they are presented with opportunities from law firms that want to increase diversity.
This creates a pipeline of diverse technical specialists that do not have to go to law school to enter the profession. Thus, recruiting and training at a lower level organically increases the numbers within the profession by leveraging law firm resources and partnering with corporate organizations such as Meta.
This cuts against the training issue, where law firms say they cannot find trained candidates, and addresses all the pain points, excuses and reasons why law firms have not supported diversity efforts 100 percent.
We all have different life experiences and come from different backgrounds, and it is the same with any client base. It is incumbent upon firms to have a diverse team to further aid clients in solving their problems.
Every patent practitioner will approach an inventive idea differently. Therefore, the future of our society is dependent on IP counsel prioritizing diversity.
If everybody looks the same and does the same things, we will lose out on many technological advances and opportunities, thus stifling innovation.
The organizations and law firms that do not prioritize diversity will ultimately become dinosaurs, while those who do will flourish and blossom in the profession.
In short, patent practitioners need to be more diverse in order to relate to and advocate for a diverse client base.
"We all have different life experiences and come from different backgrounds, and it is the same with any client base" - Braxton Davis
View Braxton Davis on Linkedin here.
Find out more about the next edition of the IP Law Summit here.
For more information, please contact: Kyriakos Xenophontos, kyriakosx@marcusevanscy.com