Who We Are

Q&A with Madeleine Motion, Global Head of Inclusion, Diversity & Belonging at Ashurst

Karen Davies

What has your career journey looked like so far?

I started my career working in public relations and did both agency and consultancy work for a few years.

In 2016, I joined the media team at Herbert Smith Freehills. While I was in that role, I completed my master’s degree in public policy, with a focus on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI), human rights, and the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

With my academic background, and the work I’d done as the Chair of the firm’s LGBTQI+ Network, I had the opportunity to move into a full-time role as D&I Manager, APAC. I also became the firm’s first non-legal secondee when I spent time advising a big mining client.

After some time spent working in the tech and media sectors, I had the opportunity to apply for the position of Global Head of Inclusion, Diversity & Belonging at Ashurst. From my time in the legal sector, I knew Ashurst had a fantastic reputation for diversity and inclusion. So I applied, joined in March 2023, and haven’t looked back since. It’s a great role and I work with an exceptional team.

What’s been your experience at Ashurst?

The firm’s leadership understands that our work in Inclusion, Diversity & Belonging (IDB) is essential to the firm’s DNA and how it operates. They also appreciate that it creates a significant commercial advantage.

One of the reasons I really enjoy doing IDB work at Ashurst is that people at all levels of the firm, and in all the places we do business, understand its importance because of the intrinsic link between IDB, equity and access to justice. Lawyers are inherently drawn to those concepts, which is why I think law firms have led the way in many areas of the IDB space. For example, Ashurst led the legal profession in introducing its Family Leave Care Policy to create a more equitable environment for its lawyers. Before that, those sorts of policies had mostly been seen in the tech sector where they were positioned as employee ‘perks’.

Have there been any interesting challenges or surprises?

I’ve been happily surprised by the volume of IDB conversations I have every day and the number of people who benefit from, and support, our IDB work. For example, earlier this year we launched a new global IDB hub. It’s already had nearly 26,000 views, which shows just how much Ashurst’s people are engaging with this topic.

Our challenge is in the nature of the work itself, because people around the world have different views of what IDB means, and need different supports and interventions. We’re focused on listening to our global leaders and getting feedback from around the world to build a cultural competency that works for everyone.

How impactful are IDB initiatives?

Fostering an environment that is welcoming, inclusive and respectful of all backgrounds and perspectives is the cornerstone of our values and the foundation of our success. At Ashurst, inclusion, diversity and belonging are at the heart of everything we do – including making a positive impact on the world around us.

IDB initiatives help create fairness and high performance at Ashurst by giving our people the opportunity to demonstrate their full potential. They also contribute to achieving a cultural competency that’s critical for our business, as well as boosting productivity, engagement, inclusion, diversity of thought, wellbeing, attraction and retention – to name just a few benefits.

At an individual level, IDB initiatives can also have a significant, positive impact on people’s lives. Earlier in my career, I arranged a disability network meeting. I encouraged one of my colleagues to come along, which he did gingerly. He had stopped wearing hearing aids when he was at school because of the bullying he had experienced. He told me he’d never been in a space like that network meeting and started wearing hearing aids shortly after that and became comfortable talking about them. That small decision to come to a meeting led to a profound change in his workplace experiences and wellbeing through the discovery of a community and a group of colleagues with whom he could belong.

What are Ashurst’s IDB priorities for the coming year?

At the start of 2024, we launched our Global IDB Strategy, which outlines our commitments to action across our inclusion priorities – people, clients, capability and collaboration. The plan also has two underlying guiding principles – accessibility and intersectionality.

Essentially, our first principle is about ensuring that everyone has access to participate fully in their work and thrive at the firm. To that end, we are focussing on supporting people with disabilities and addressing social mobility issues. One exciting initiative in this space is our recently launched Global Accessibility Toolkit, which includes tools to enhance accessibility in digital, client engagement and career advancement experiences.

Our second guiding principle is to improve intersectionality through our processes and work. Intersectionality describes the way that two or more attributes of a person’s identity intersect to compound their advantage or disadvantage. For example, women of colour, or people with disabilities who have social mobility issues may be impacted by this intersectionality. We can help address this in many ways, including by looking at the type of data we collect regarding promotion and progression. So, for example, rather than just looking at how women are progressing or how people from ethnically diverse communities are progressing, we will be able to assess the rates of promotion and access to quality work opportunities for women from ethnically diverse communities.

Another priority we have is continuing to work on tackling structural and interpersonal racism across the firm. We are undertaking initiatives like racial literacy training and building anti-racism tools. We also are creating more avenues to make space for everyone to speak up when they experience this behaviour.

What role do law firms play in creating a more equitable future?

Justice and access to justice are fundamental attributes of a more equitable society. As a law firm, Ashurst has a very important role in achieving that because we are part of the justice ecosystem in partnership with our clients. We are committed to the same ideals and face the same challenges, so it becomes easier when we work with our clients to make progress.

How have attitudes towards diversity and inclusion in the workplace changed during your career?

I have noticed a big shift in people’s attitudes because they understand IDB better now, and I spend much less of my time overcoming cynicism and scepticism.

There’s no doubt we’ve come a long way in the IDB space, but it’s not a linear journey. That’s why it’s important to keep focussing on fairness and sustainable and equitable high performance at Ashurst, to clearly identify the impact of our work, and to link it back to our business objectives.

Market recognition for Ashurst’s IDB work

 

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