Leading ladies

Positive discrimination for men? Only in Turkey. Legal Business analyses a legal market where female commercial lawyers almost always top the class

The UK’s legal market has never been an easy place for female lawyers. This became abundantly clear in the 2009 LB100, which charts the UK’s top 100 law firms by revenue. Among these firms only 22% of the partners and 17% of the equity partners are female. Given that the overall percentage of female lawyers is 47%, it is hardly encouraging to see that only 37% of those promoted to partner in 2008/09 were women. These statistics do not make good reading for young British female associates, particularly if they are working at one of the Major City or Global Elite firms, where the percentage of female partners is 18% and 16% respectively.Some might well be tempted to ask what they can do to improve their chances of becoming a market-leading commercial lawyer. One surprising answer is: move to Turkey.

It isn’t what one might expect from Turkish commercial law firms but, when it comes to gender balance, they make their UK counterparts look positively backward.

‘People perceive this country to be quite conservative when it comes to equality in the workforce,’ says Yes¸im Bezen, a partner at Bezen & Partners (where two of the three partners are female), who also spent six years at Clifford Chance. ‘Obviously looking at the country as a whole, yes there is still inequality in certain regions of Turkey. In the bigger cities where people live, especially when you have parents who are already educated, that perception changes drastically.’

A glance at mergermarket’s top five domestic firms for 2009, in terms of value and volume of Turkish deals, confirms this. Some 32% of the partners at these firms are female, while a remarkable 59% of all the lawyers are female (see table on page 68). Turkish firms are significantly smaller than the average western European commercial firms, but the ratio of women to men in Turkey is impossible to ignore.

There is still a considerable drop off between the number of female partners and associates, but the Turkish legal market as a whole has undergone a significant demographic shift over the past decade or two, and the partner level is still playing catch up.

‘When you compare the situation with our colleagues in the UK and the US, the ratio will be even more surprising in the next couple of decades, as the working environment will continue to change to the benefit of women,’ says Hergüner Bilgen Özeke partner Senem I˙s¸men, who heads the firm’s technology, media and telecoms practice group. ‘It more or less happened over the last 15 years. When I started 14 years ago the proportion of women was about 35%, now it is almost 60%. We interview new graduates and understand that the picture is even more interesting at the law faculties. We have interviewed law students who are claiming that almost 85% of their class are women. When you look at this generation of lawyers, you will see that there will be far more women at partner level.’

Looking beyond the numbers, the prominence of established, female, market-leading lawyers is also very apparent. AtPekin & Bayar Law Firm, one of the mostwell-regarded corporate firms in the market, both name partners, S¸efika Pekin and Selin Bayar, are women, while Hergüner name partner Ayse Bilgen is also female. At Pekin & Pekin, one of Turkey’s largest corporate firms, its respective corporate and dispute resolution heads Ayça Sevimay and Gökben Dirican are both women. It is a similar story at Paksoy, another top-rated corporate finance firm, with the respective corporate and finance heads Elvan Aziz and Halide Çetinkaya. Meanwhile, half of the top partners at Cerrahog˘lu Law Firm, one of Turkey’s largest firms, are female.

This balance has found its way into some of the international firms based in Turkey. At White & Case it has even had something of a global impact – it is perhaps fitting that the only woman on White & Case’s global executive committee is Asli Basgoz, a Turkish lawyer who is widely considered a pioneer for female attorneys in Turkey. The name partner at White & Case’s Istanbul-based affiliate Akol Avukatlık Bürosu is also a woman, Meltem Akol. Denton Wilde Sapte’s 29-lawyer relationship firm, Güner Law Office, is – surprise, surprise – run by a woman, Ece Güner.

Commercial edge

The year 1986 was a key one, not just for female lawyers in Turkey, but also for the Turkish corporate market as a whole. This was the year that foreign investment laws were changed, allowing international investors to take a 100% holding in Turkish companies, rather than just 49%. Foreign direct investment increased almost overnight.

‘At that time, high school graduates like me with foreign languages weren’t generally interested in practising law,’ recalls Serap Zuvin, name partner at Serap Zuvin Law Offices, where four out of five lawyers are female. ‘The law was perceived as being at the courts all the time, where you had to mingle with the judges. After the change in legislation, more English-speaking advisers were required in the market. I was interested because I had a good lycée education, my English was good, and I was interested in commercial life.’

Cüneyt Yüksel, name partner at YükselKarkınKüçük Law Firm, which is currently in merger talks with DLA Piper (see page 21), agrees: ‘In the past, law was seen as going to the court, collecting debts or helping criminals. The business environment was not so strong and there wasn’t much business law involvement. This changed. Also, there are more lawyers in front of the press, so this becomes attractive for students. Ten or 15 years ago there were only six law faculties in Turkey, and now there are 65.’

While this change in the business community has led to an increase in male commercial lawyers as well, certain social factors have disproportionately favoured women. Foremost among these was the general increase in Turkish women going into higher education, where there is now an equal mix between male and female students in the majorcities. There is also the fact that Turkish women want to forgetheir own careers.

‘The female lawyers have really worked hard and finished their scholarships,’ Paksoy’s Aziz says. ‘By the time they get married they don’t have this dream of a prince charming coming and taking them out. They are very conscientious and career oriented and they want to be valued for themselves, and that value isn’t attached to being the wife of some successful businessman.’ For many of these women, a career in law was one of the best options.

‘My sister wanted to be an engineer and was one of seven women in a class of 160,’ says Arzum Günalçın, a female partner at I˙s¸men. ‘Law is perceived as a more secure profession. It is a system that is predefined. Even for the conservative parts of Turkish society, a daughter becoming a lawyer is an acceptable thing.’

‘It can assure a well-paid career and you can work in a neat and clean environment,’ Senem I˙s¸men says. ‘There are some culturally excluded areas of work. It isn’t very common in Turkey for women to opt for engineering jobs. The medical profession is also hard because you are supposed to do two years of mandatory work in a city that you can’t choose, which isn’t very attractive from a woman’s perspective.’ I˙s¸men adds: ‘Since Turkey isn’t a very homogenous country, culturally or educationally, it poses more of a risk for a woman to be sent to an eastern rural village. Girls who want to study at college want to exclude those risks.’

Another factor favouring women, at least in the early stages of their careers, is that they do not have to go into military service, which is compulsory for all young Turkish men.

‘When I finished law school, my boss chose me over a male because the men have the problem of military service,’ says Burcu Çelikçapa-Bilgin, one of two female name partners at the three-partner shipping and aviation firm Erçin Bilgin Bektas¸og˘lu. ‘After university, if men don’t have a postgraduate study, they have to join the military. This means that after graduating, the female lawyers are one step ahead.’

The perceived pressure on Turkish men to be the breadwinner has also had a bearing on how they fare at the larger commercial law firms. The alternative option of becoming sole practitioners, particularly in more traditional areas of litigation, is therefore more appealing.

‘Even for the conservative parts of Turkish society, a daughter becoming a lawyer is an acceptable thing.’
Arzum Günalçın, I˙s¸men

‘After law school, at 22 they have military service, then they go to work,’ Zuvin says. ‘There isn’t much time for a man to spend five or six years working underneath a mentor at a big firm and get experience. He has to be making money, so litigation is easier to do quickly. Then you only spend six months at the courts and six months with a lawyer. After that anyone can have a Bar licence.’

The lure of becoming one’s own boss is also something that seems to be more appealing to Turkish men than it is for women.

‘Women don’t really have big egos like men do,’ Aziz says. ‘I found women, and also myself, to be more suitable to working as a team member rather than a sole practitioner. We have fewer problems working in the hierarchy of the office. We’re all colleagues, but obviously you have to work in a hierarchy. At a junior level, women have less problems taking instructions from their senior associates or partners, but my experience has been thatthe men aren’t so keen.’ Aziz adds: ‘We have a lot of male lawyers, but when they havean opportunity to go in-house, or start up by themselves, they don’t think very long-term. They really go for the title. I’m not sayingit doesn’t happen, but it is very rare infemale lawyers.’

Tolga I˙s¸men, the name partner at I˙s¸men, backs up this view. ‘Men will move around a lot more,’ he says. ‘There are tonnes of small law firms established by impatient male, mid-level lawyers. Even now, if you have a little bit of cash and a bit of courage, you can set up a law firm.’

Early days

That isn’t to say everything is balanced in favour of Turkish female lawyers. While commercial law does tend to favour women, this is still a small fraction of the overall Turkish legal market. By the end of 2009, 10,841 (29%) of the 36,930 lawyers registeredto the Turkish Bar Association were female, which is significantly less than the 44% with practising certificates in England and Wales (as at 31 July 2008). In the Istanbul Bar Association, 34% of the registered lawyers are female, which is a rise from the national figure, but is still quite low.

The litigation side of the market is also underpopulated by women, although Pekin & Pekin’s dispute resolution head, Gökben Dirican, says this is improving. ‘When you consider the number of women judges, thereis a huge increase in that field,’ she says. ‘Inthe past it wasn’t very common to face a woman judge at the higher level, but in the Istanbul commercial court there are many more female judges.’

For the more senior lawyers, the early days posed a challenge. ‘I commenced my legal career in 1981 as a trainee in one of Turkey’s most important shipping law firms,’ says Seyma Inal, who now runs her own nine-lawyer shipping firm, Inal Law. ‘In that year there were only three or four shipping firms in Turkey, and I think I was maybe the second woman in the shipping market. Of course it was very difficult. First of all I was very young. The world was different, especially the shipping world, which was very male dominated. I had to work very hard.’ For Inal, the tables have certainly turned, especially since her nine-lawyer firm now has just one male lawyer. ‘It’s definitely not easy for him,’ she laughs. ‘I can’t imagine the conversation.’

Zuvin recalls how the early stages of her career presented some awkward moments.‘I remember even at the meetings in those years, out of respect to my mentor I didn’t want to give my business card to the clients before he did. At the end of the meeting I gave my business card and they were shocked that I was an attorney. They thought I was a secretary.’

While that may no longer be the case, there remain certain hurdles for modern Turkish lawyers to overcome. ‘Clients will always feel more comfortable with a man at the table,’ Günalçın says. ‘If it’s a meeting, the majority of the clients are men. They don’t have a problem with women, but with a female lawyer they just feel less comfortable. They can’t curse, they can’t relax, but apart from that I’ve never had a problem.’

‘Obviously managing clients here is more difficult than managing clients in London,’ Bezen adds. ‘Sometimes I have meetings with my clients where I really have to tell them off. Sometimes they won’t concentrate enough. It is difficult for a female lawyer to do that, especially when your clients are male executives in very senior positions.’

In sectors like shipping law, there are other more practical issues. ‘In our sector you go onboard vessels where the crew are all men, so it may be difficult,’ Çelikçapa-Bilgin says. ‘If there is a collision and you have to go to the vessel to interview the crew, we prefer to send a female and a male lawyer together, rather than a female lawyer alone.’

Family ties

As with their counterparts in the UK and elsewhere, there also remains the overwhelming issue of how to juggle the dual roles of being a successful lawyer and a mother. For the law firms, in particular, it is an issue that will need to be addressed, especially given the high proportion of female lawyers.

‘We will need to find creative ways to involve working mums in the business,’ says Senem I˙s¸men. ‘Right now, 60% of our workforce is female, and it isn’t just us. I see some of our competitors going to 70%. All of these are young women who will probably be planning families in the next five to ten years. It is acknowledged by law firms that some plan will have to be put into place so that we don’t lose the best lawyers. The home office approach or maybe the part-time working approach could start to be put in place.’

Improvements in technology and the ever-present BlackBerry help on a practical level, but working mothers in Turkey also benefit from certain cultural differences. ‘The family ties are very strong,’ Bezen says. ‘You can have a kid and rely on the grandparents to look after the grandchildren more than you would in Western societies. There is also more of a nanny culture here than you have in London.’

‘We have interviewed law students who are claiming that almost 85% of their class are women.’
Senem I˙s¸men, Hergüner Bilgen Özeke

‘I know some lawyers who have taken time off after giving birth,’ Aziz says. ‘Most of them have started working again after a few months. At that point those close family ties come into the picture. It’s very common to have a grandparent or a maid in the house. Domestic help is comparatively cheap in Turkey.’ Most estimate that the costs of a live-in nanny are around $600 to $700 a month.

Where this leaves the minority of male commercial lawyers remains to be seen, especially since some firms report that around 80% of their job applications come from women. The imbalance has prompted steps that would seem unthinkable in the UK. ‘All applicants more or less have similar qualifications, but women outnumber male applicants,’ says Senem I˙s¸men. ‘Sometimes we feel we have to try positive discrimination, even ifthere are better candidates fromthe female side.’

Even male partners concede that female lawyers make better employees. ‘For some reason or another, the CVs of female colleagues tend to be more qualified than those of the males,’ says Fethi Pekin, managing partner of Pekin & Pekin. ‘Maybe culture has a significant effect on this. They seem to be more successful than their male colleagues and they tend to work harder.’ Given that 54% of Pekin & Pekin’s workforce is female, it would probably be unwise of him to say otherwise. LB