Episode 32 – Trish McLellan, LawCare’s Director of Engagement, talks with Trustees Rachael O’Connor and Kayleigh Leonie about the reverse mentoring project, how it differs from traditional mentoring, and the benefits it can bring to the legal sector.
They share insights from the recent reverse mentoring project (run by LawCare in collaboration with the University of Leeds and funded by the Michael Beverly Innovation Scheme) in which aspiring and junior lawyers from a range of minoritised and under-represented backgrounds mentored those responsible for trainee recruitment and organisational wellbeing within participant law firms.
They also describe how the project aimed to spark meaningful conversations in the profession around the connections between diversity, inclusion and wellbeing, and our hopes for the outcomes to support the development of training for junior lawyers to better embed positive wellness and inclusion practices
More about Rachael and Kayleigh
Rachael O’Connor is an Associate Professor in Law at the University of Leeds and a non-practising solicitor. She is passionate about diversity, inclusion and wellness both in legal education and the profession, and has led on wellbeing and inclusion strategies and interventions for law students. Her research expertise focuses on reverse mentoring as a diversity and inclusion intervention, as well as co-designing interventions with stakeholders and participants. Rachael has won prizes in the higher education sector for her work on reverse mentoring.
Kayleigh is a solicitor specialising in employment law and has undertaken research, written articles and published best practice guidance for employers on supporting the wellbeing of their employees on behalf of The Law Society of England and Wales.
Find out more about the reverse mentoring toolkit
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