Sidley Bows to Pressure on Mandatory Arbitration as DLA Piper Digs In
Sidley Austin pre-emptively nixed a requirement that associates and staff sign mandatory arbitration agreements. But despite a Harvard Law School group now launching a #DumpDLA campaign, DLA Piper is defending the practice.
November 28, 2018 at 02:50 PM
4 minute read
Another Big Law firm is backing away from mandatory arbitration agreements for employees amid renewed pushback on the provisions from a Harvard Law School student group.
Sidley Austin said Wednesday that it will no longer require summer associates, associates or staff to sign mandatory arbitration agreements that prohibit them from suing over workplace issues such as harassment and discrimination.
Sidley's move goes further than Kirkland & Ellis, which last week dropped such agreements for summer associates and associates, but did not say it was abandoning the practice for staff. Kirkland was directly targeted by the Pipeline Parity Project, a coalition of Harvard law students that aims to end discrimination in the legal profession. Employing the Twitter hashtag #DumpKirkland, the group urged classmates to boycott the firm during the upcoming summer associate recruiting season unless it did away with mandatory arbitration, calling such agreements coercive.
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