I, Peter Shields, personally commit to the following:

Personal Commitments

• I will use my platform as the firm’s Managing Partner to advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion across aspects of our firm. My current leadership team consists of seven individuals, five of whom are women, and one individual that is racially diverse. I will lead by example to encourage other firm leaders to be intentional and strategic in developing their leadership teams.
• I will encourage the firm’s governance committees and broader partnership to integrate DEI into all aspects of operations and client delivery at the firm.
• I will meet regularly with clients (including LCLD member clients) to find opportunities to partner and collaborate to advance our respective diversity efforts as well as the careers of diverse lawyers within our respective organizations.
• I will meet quarterly with the firm’s Affinity Group leaders and DEI Committee Chair to discuss their observations, feedback, and opportunities to ensure that Wiley is a place where all leaders can thrive and belong and identify 1-2 action steps from each session.
• I will use my voice as leader in the fight against systematic racism and lack of diversity in the legal profession.

Organizational Commitments

• As a founding member of the Law Firm Antiracism Alliance, we will continue to use our firm’s platform to provide leadership and financial support to advocate for systemic change in the areas of diversity, equity, and inclusion.
• We will define, promote, and advocate for policies and practices that focus on access to business opportunities, professional networks and organizations, and financial influence to attract and retain diverse talent. These practices will include implementing unconscious bias and anti-black racism trainings, among others.
• We will remain committed to budget for pipeline programs and recruiting initiatives, ensuring yearly increases, and promoting executive sponsorship of each Affinity Group by a member of Executive and/or Management Committee.
• We will implement a plan to ensure that a percentage of diverse attorneys that receive billing credit on the firm’s top 5 client maters by practice group grows over the next two years.
• We will continue to champion our firm’s efforts to provide real-time feedback and provide opportunities for our diverse talent to participate in mentorship, sponsorship and leadership development programs tailored to underrepresented Wiley members.
• We will ensure that partner and associate compensation is tied to DEI efforts, particularly instructing Practice Group Leaders to consider the assignment of diverse attorneys as either billing attorney or responsible attorney on client matters and ensure that diverse attorneys receive specific credit in the compensation process for their contributions if they are not the billing or responsible attorney.
• Wiley will recognize Juneteenth as a firm holiday and will continue to promote action and education related to racial and social justice issues.
• We will continue to pursue Mansfield Rule Certification and use Mansfield’s criteria to create more opportunities for hiring, leadership, and promotion for historically underrepresented attorneys.