Leading legal training provider, Kaplan Altior, has announced the launch of its inaugural diversity and compliance course programme this October.
Following the inclusion of ‘Diversity in the profession’ on the SRA Risk Outlook for 2018/2019 and with 2019 set to mark 100 years of women in law, Kaplan Altior highlighted the need to address the risk of diversity and compliance issues in the legal profession. As such, it is bolstering its service offering to match this need, with the first course set to take place on October 29.
This announcement follows recent SRA research into diversity in law, which demonstrated that women still fall behind in most senior roles within law firms. As of 2017, women make up 48% of all lawyers in law firms however, in the largest firms, just 29% of partners are female.
Figures also remain low for representation in other areas, including the BAME community, who make up 21% of lawyers and also for legal professionals with disabilities, who made up just 3% of the legal industry, marking key areas for improvement for the industry as a whole.
Speaking of the launch, head of Kaplan Altior, Jody Tranter said: “We’re incredibly excited to be launching our new courses this Autumn. Diversity and compliance are key areas across any business but are two main areas for consideration for law firms in order to improve access to services, ensure that the administration of justice remains fair and effective, and also to allow talented individuals to become solicitors, regardless of their backgrounds.
“We believe that diversity is a key factor to the successful functioning of law firms, and any business as a matter of fact, and ensures the ongoing relevance of the legal profession, which is why this course is so important.”
The new course programme will be available entirely online through Kaplan Altior’s bespoke Live Online system. With online learning helping to increase retention rates by 60% and with previous Kaplan Altior delegates achieving a 96% pass rate through this system, it’s set to be an effective learning platform to help support and nurture diversity in firms.
Jody continued: “At Kaplan Altior, we understand that the landscape of the legal industry is continuously changing and as trainers, we must be adaptable and ahead of these trends to best serve individuals and firms as they continue to enhance their development. This is one of the reasons we chose to make the course available entirely through Live Online. This will help to ensure that this course will be accessible to all and will not require additional travel time or expense, whilst still achieving optimum results.”
Course content promises to help practising solicitors to understand what is meant by diversity in the profession, why it’s important and how to identify areas for improvement as well as developing strategies to achieve better diversity within their firm.
Further compliance courses, which will tackle the other risk areas identified by the SRA Risk Outlook, will be announced over the coming months. For more information about the upcoming courses and to book your place, visit: https://altior.co.uk/
