Workplace
Fostering a culture where our people can thrive is a core part of our firm’s strategy for 2024-2027. We want our people to feel empowered to bring their full selves to work and to feel genuinely included, and this continues to be a core priority for us. Over the past year, we have made meaningful progress in advancing our Wellbeing and our Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) strategies.
We believe that it is important to listen to our people and to ensure we take their views into consideration as we continue to work on our firm's culture. To help us do this in 2024, the firm's People Partners and Chief People Officer sponsored the engagement of Gallup, a global thought-leader on employee engagement, to conduct a firmwide survey of our people. This ongoing collaboration with Gallup is over a two-year period and allows us to benchmark ourselves against a database of other organisations, including those in the legal sector. It also allows us to learn from best practices in enhancing culture. Our engagement survey achieved a strong completion rate of over 80%. The results were reviewed by our Management Committee and leaders, and action plans were developed across the firm to focus on two to three key actions that each team could take to address the feedback received. There were also firmwide areas of focus, including the enhancement of our one-to-one engagement and the provision of strong feedback and recognition. A follow-up survey was conducted in March 2025. This served as a check-in point and opportunity for our people to feed back further on progress to date. We are committed to progress and to ensuring that our workplace is an environment where our people can thrive while building successful careers. We will conduct another follow-up survey in 2025 and again in 2026.
Our firm is committed to progress and to ensuring that our workplace is an environment where our people can thrive while building successful careers.
Health and Wellness
We recognise the importance of mental health and overall employee wellbeing. We want to promote and protect our employees in the workplace. An integral part of the support we offer our people is our Employee Assistance Programme (EAP), which provides confidential counselling services, parenting and career coaching, and is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Our EAP also provides access to a dedicated online portal, offering a wide range of tools and resources to support mental, physical, and financial wellbeing. We have a team of trained Mental Health First Aiders onsite at the firm to provide immediate assistance to any colleague experiencing mental health challenges. Over the past 12 months, we have hosted 19 bespoke wellbeing events, while also promoting 32 community events delivered by our external wellbeing partners.
Prioritising mental health has been a central theme throughout our wellbeing initiatives this year. In October 2024, we hosted our annual Health & Wellness Month, which included an Introduction to Mindfulness workshop and focused on how mindfulness can enhance both professional and personal wellbeing. During the month we hosted 12 initiatives, including flu vaccinations, reflexology, massage therapy, a financial wellbeing clinic, and a Menopause in the Workplace workshop. In April 2025, to mark Ibec’s National Workplace Wellbeing Day, we welcomed Brent Pope, rugby television analyst, journalist, and qualified psychotherapist, for a special Mental Health & Wellbeing lunchtime information session. Brent shared powerful insights from his personal journey and offered practical advice for building a more fulfilling and wellbeing-focused life. Through these initiatives and ongoing support systems, we continue to prioritise the health and wellbeing of our people as a fundamental part of our sustainable business strategy.
Pictured: Emma Merrin (Senior Reward & People Analytics Advisor, Arthur Cox), Sarah Murray (VHI) with Brent Pope on National Workplace Wellbeing Day
BYSTANDER TRAINING
This year, we continued to educate our people about unconscious bias to foster understanding, manage biases, and build an inclusive, respectful working environment. Following a pilot in May 2024, in partnership with University College Cork (UCC), we are pleased to report that we successfully delivered over ten Bystander training sessions between September and November 2024, reaching more than 250 of our people across the firm. The sessions were led by Professor Louise Crowley from UCC, and the bespoke workshop-based format created a safe and reflective space for participants to explore how unconscious bias can influence workplace interactions and to develop practical strategies for intervention. The initiative has not only raised awareness, but it has also sparked meaningful conversations about allyship, accountability, and the type of culture we want to build together. As we look ahead, we will continue to offer this training annually with a view to embedding its principles more deeply across the firm.
Pictured: Geoff Moore (Managing Partner), Dr Louise Crowley UCC, Louise O'Byrne and Triona Ferriter (Chief People Officer)
Equity, Diversity and Inclusion
Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) are integral to our firm's values. Over the past 12 months we have continued to develop our action plans to increase opportunities for people from diverse and underrepresented backgrounds, reflecting our clients and community. Our goal is to have a workforce that has varied perspectives to support our commitment to excellence for both our people and our clients.
The four key pillars of our EDI strategy are:
Our EDI sponsoring partners are Louise O’Byrne and Patrick Horan, who lead the firm’s efforts in implementing an inclusive work environment and each pillar is supported by a partner from our EDI Committee. They are responsible for providing guidance and direction to the relevant sub-committees, which includes representation from our people across all levels in the firm. Delivery of agreed action plans is the key focus of the sub-committees each year. We are pleased to report that over the past 12 months, we have made significant progress across all four pillars.
GENDER
We want to empower women in our firm to reach their full potential in their careers and to increase the percentage of women in senior leadership roles. Our gender initiatives aim to improve gender balance and to support women’s progression to leadership positions in the firm. To ensure the effectiveness of this initiative, we set a target of 40% women partners to be achieved by 2028. As of 30 June 2025, 41% of our partners in the firm are women. In December 2024, we published our latest Gender Pay Gap report, which is available to view here. We will continue to focus on factors driving our Gender Pay Gap, with priority factors being that of female representation at partnership level and managing periods of leave.
As a firm we are committed to formalising and improving the processes for our people to take longer periods of family leave to support the transition between work and home. We have several programmes that support and encourage family leave, including maternity coaching. We also provide extensive support to our fathers through progressive parenting and paternity leave policies. During FY24/25, we are pleased to report that 77 of our people availed of some form of the firm’s family leave – an increase of over 8% on the previous financial year.
We have introduced a new initiative this year to encourage improved and more impactful communication. ‘The Art of Speaking' was delivered by Eoghan McDermott from the Communications Clinic and provided participants with the skills and structures to communicate naturally and impactfully, as well as the ability to think on their feet. The programme consisted of five two-hour modules, and it was delivered in person to 15 participants from various teams and departments across the firm.
In June 2025 we were delighted to be recognised with three awards at the Women in Business Law Awards EMEA, which was held in London. These awards celebrate the achievements of women leaders and the firms that support women in the legal profession across Europe. We received the ‘Career Development Firm of the Year – Western Europe’, the ‘Women in Business Law – National Firm (Ireland) and Sinead Crowley, Of Counsel with our Corporate and M&A Group, was named ‘Rising Star – Corporate/M&A (National) at the awards.
We continue to collaborate with the 30% Club Ireland, which is committed to supporting organisations achieve improved gender balance, and we are pleased to be one of the three co-supporters of the Country Executive for Ireland role at the 30% Club. In early 2025, we participated in the 30% Club Professional Services group survey, the aim of which was to gain insights into why females leave our sector. The findings of this research, which were delivered in May 2025, help us to reinforce our areas of focus around career progression support and progressive maternity leave and family leave policies.
Over the past 12 months, we have also hosted panel discussions with prominent female speakers who shared their valuable and inspiring experiences and learnings. As part of our 2025 celebrations of International Women’s Day, we welcomed Frances Fitzgerald, a current Member of the Gender Equality Advisory Committee to the G7 and a former Fine Gael politician. We were also pleased to host Sarah Benson, CEO of Women’s Aid, one of the firm’s three charity partners, for a very insightful discussion on the work done by the charity to prevent and address the impact of domestic violence and abuse.
We are proud to once again sponsor the Irish Federation of University Women Girls Public Speaking Competition, which took place in March 2025, and we will continue to support the competition in 2026.
41% of our Partners are women
Pictured: Sinead Crowley (Of Counsel, Arthur Cox) and Louise O'Byrne (Partner) at the Women in Business Law Awards in London
Pictured: Frances Fitzgerald, Member of the Gender Equality Advisory Committee to the G7 and a former Fine Gael politician, with Rachel Hussey (Clients and Markets Partner, Arthur Cox) at our International Women's Day 2025 celebrations
LGBTQ+
Fostering a true culture of inclusivity and openness requires a commitment to pro-actively support LGBTQ+ people in our workplace. Our internal LGBTQ+ network, alliance, was founded in 2017 and continues to go from strength to strength. Membership of the network is open to everyone in the firm, both those who identify as LGBTQ+ and their allies. Over the past year alliance has continued to organise numerous internal and external networking opportunities and social events, education, awareness and training for allies, and development opportunities for our LGBTQ+ employees.
The highlight of the year was undoubtedly the firm’s celebration of Joy in Authenticity as part of June 2025’s Pride Month. We were pleased to support the Dublin Pride Run in the Phoenix Park once again this year. Throughout the month, our alliance Committee organised a wonderful range of celebratory and educational activities that included organised group visits to the National Gallery of Ireland, for LGBTQ+ Focus tours; a Drag ‘N Draw still life art class where the models were drag performers, a very insightful lunchtime discussion event at the firm with Panti Bliss, LGBTQ+ activist, campaigner, author and ‘Queen of Ireland.’ We were also very pleased to exhibit the artworks of Dublin-based queer artist Áine Macken in our building as part of alliance’s Joy in Authenticity month-long series of activities. The highlight of June was, once again, our annual Pride Brunch, held at the firm for all employees and their families and friends ahead of the Dublin Pride Parade.
Pictured: Graham Murtagh (Partner, Arthur Cox) and Geoff Moore (Managing Partner, Arthur Cox); Panti Bliss and Robert Mac Carthy (Partner, Arthur Cox) at our Pride 2025 Art Exhibition
Pictured: Ted Halligan (Trainee), Christopher O'Reilly (Partner) and Robert Mac Carthy (Partner) from Arthur Cox at the 2025 Dublin Pride Run.
Pictured: Arthur Cox staff enjoying Drag n' Draw still life art class
RACE AND ETHNICITY
The firm’s race and ethnicity network, EMBRACE, is dedicated to fostering an inclusive culture where everyone feels a sense of belonging, no matter their background, identity, race, status, or any other circumstances.
Launched in 2021, our EMBRACE Committee continues to work hard to advance diversity and inclusion for individuals from various racial and ethnic backgrounds, both within the firm and in our broader communities. Over the past 12 months our EMBRACE Committee has expanded its reach, strengthened existing programmes, led exciting new developments, and celebrated cultural diversity in the firm. In partnership with UCD’s University of Sanctuary (UoS), we donated €35,000 to support migrants, refugees and asylum seekers as they access education. This collaboration reflects our commitment to inclusion and acknowledgement of the systemic barriers that many face in accessing opportunities in the legal field.
We were also pleased to continue our own ADVANCE mentoring programme, the firm’s award-winning initiative for university students from minority backgrounds. This programme offers our associates in the firm a unique opportunity to support minority university students who are interested in a career in law.
During the academic year 2024/25, we paired 21 students with mentors from Arthur Cox. The programme provided valuable insight into the legal profession and one-to-one support for students. This initiative continues to generate not only a space for listening, but it also helps us to shape our internal policies.
12% minority candidates in our Summer Intern Programme 2025
14% minority candidates in our 2025 Trainee Application Process
A critical part of our EDI strategy is retaining, supporting and developing our minority colleagues. To support this, our reverse mentoring programme took place again this year, where senior leaders from across the firm were mentored by colleagues from racially or ethnically diverse backgrounds.
Pictured left: Sarah J.I. Thompson (Partner, Arthur Cox) with Dr Joy-Tendai Kangere, BL, who spoke about diversity in the legal profession in Ireland, at our ADVANCE Orientation Day.
Celebrating Cultural Diversity
We celebrated several key cultural diversity events throughout the year. These included a Black History Month art exhibition, curated by Laura Twagorauezu on behalf of Umuti Ma, and an inspiring discussion event at the firm with Deborah Somorin, who talked about her journey from being homeless at the age of 13, to going on to become a qualified accountant, author, TEDx speaker and founder of the not-for-profit organisation, Empower the Family. We also celebrated Diwali with an evening of Indian culture and food, and Ramadan was marked with a visit to the Chester Beatty Museum to explore an exhibition on Islamic culture. Eid was marked with a celebratory dinner at Dada restaurant. In February we welcomed Dr. Hannah McGinley, Assistant Professor in Education at Mary Immaculate College, for a discussion on Traveller culture and heritage to mark Traveller Ethnicity Day. In March, we were pleased to participate in the ‘Show Racism the Red Card’ campaign as part of International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. In May we rounded off our EMBRACE series of celebrations for the year on Africa Day with some treats for everyone from West Africa.
The Open Doors Initiative
We are pleased to continue our partnership with the Open Doors Initiative as it works to provide opportunities for marginalised members of society through training, education, employment and entrepreneurship.
Pictured: attendees at our EMBRACE University Societies workshop
Pictured: Carolann Minnock (Pro Bono Of Counsel, Arthur Cox) with Deborah Somorin, author and founder of Empower
Pictured: Show Racism the Red Card Campaign
Pictured: Dr Hannah McGinley, Assistant Professor in Education at Mary Immaculate College and Maura McLaughlin (Partner, Arthur Cox) marking Traveller Ethnicity Day 2025
Pictured: Arthur Cox celebratory art exhibition to mark Black History Month 2025
DISABILITY & NEURODIVERSITY
As a firm we acknowledge that embracing differences in individuals and their experiences of the workplace is important for us all. We want to celebrate those with physical disabilities, autism, ADHD, dyspraxia and other neurodivergent or learning differences as these are creative thinkers and problem solvers who enhance our workforce. In March 2024 we launched our Disability and Neurodiversity Committee. Over the past 12 months the committee has evaluated our hiring practices and job descriptions to enhance both inclusivity and accessibility and to ensure that suitable accommodations are provided during our recruitment process. Quarterly digital accessibility training sessions have been provided to both new and existing staff members, and this training has also been incorporated into some of our student work experience programmes. The training sessions covered foundational concepts, relevant legal frameworks such as the European Accessibility Act, and effective strategies for accessible content creation.
We introduced a Reasonable Accommodations Policy for the firm in July 2024, and throughout the year, our committee hosted and contributed to various webinars and workshops that focused on vision impairment, ADHD in the workplace, and the European Accessibility Act in June 2025. In November 2024, we conducted a firmwide survey for the first time on attitudes and culture in relation to disability and neurodivergence, and our plan is to conduct this annually going forward. Our mentor programme operated over the course of the year with an emphasis on the social model of disability, featuring monthly small group discussions amongst our people. Topics explored included unconscious bias, legislative frameworks, universal design, neurodivergence, sensory and psycho-social considerations, physical and cognitive disabilities, and associated social issues. Over 40 participants in the programme reported increased awareness around disability as a result of the initiative.
To ensure our office environment is better equipped and more accessible, work commenced on sensory maps for public areas and a number of office floors. This is part of an ongoing project, in association with AsIAm, to ensure sensory maps are available on all eight levels of our building. Our committee also collaborated with the firm’s Social Committee to ensure that all firm events accommodated our people with disabilities, including the provision of quiet spaces and additional accommodation options where necessary.
Lasting Impactful Partnerships that Support the Community
disAbility Legal Network
We are active members of the disAbility Legal Network in its work towards a more inclusive legal sector. We were pleased to be one of the founding members of the network whose mission is to promote equal opportunities for people with disabilities in the legal profession.
Trinity Centre for People with Intellectual Disabilities
We have been pleased to partner with Trinity Centre for People with Intellectual Disabilities (TCPID) for the past seven years.
Commenting on the impact of our partnership Marie Devitt, TCPID Business Partnerships Manager said:
“Since 2018 the Trinity Centre for People with Intellectual Disabilities (TCPID) and Arthur Cox have developed a lasting partnership rooted in inclusion and opportunity. This collaboration began with a shared vision: to create real pathways to employment for individuals with intellectual disabilities. The partnership has continued to grow each year, with Arthur Cox remaining a committed business partner of the TCPID over the past seven years. The support of Arthur Cox has already led to the permanent employment of two TCPID graduates, demonstrating a real commitment to inclusion and belonging. Securing permanent employment has been life-changing for both of these graduates and for their families. The stability of a permanent role has provided each with a sense of purpose and a pathway for long-term personal and professional growth. We know that having a diverse workforce also brings a richness to any organisation and feedback has shown us that this has absolutely been the case in Arthur Cox. The collaboration between TCPID and Arthur Cox stands as a model for how similar partnerships can really help to create lasting change.”
Looking Ahead
Our focus for the year ahead is to maintain or improve our partner gender balance and to meet our targets for minority candidate recruitment.