It’s our people that make the difference
Our partners and attorneys are highly qualified and highly experienced to advise you in all areas of Intellectual Property law. We advise start-ups, SMEs, and multinational corporations and ensure that your inventions, brands and designs are expertly protected.
At AA Thornton we strive to be an inclusive organisation in which every employee can bring their whole self to work. To meet this goal we have an active Diversity and Inclusion Committee who work on ways to break down the barriers that may prevent talented individuals from seeking a career within the IP profession, and to review existing policies and challenge established ideas. The firm strives to create a working environment where everyone can thrive.
A number of AA Thornton Partners have now decided to make personal pledges to actively promote and strive for equality, diversity and inclusion within AA Thornton and within the IP communities that we contribute to. The commitments include the below which have been developed within the IP Inclusive Senior Leaders’ Diversity Think Tank:
AA Thornton Partner pledges already available to view:
AA Thornton Partner Mike Jennings commented:
“By making a public pledge and acting on it, I hope to increase my contribution to the excellent work already being done by many of my colleagues.
AA Thornton’s Diversity & Inclusion Committee has representatives from a wide range of roles and levels within the organisation, including partners. They are helping us learn to be better allies for under-represented groups, and to improve our policies and procedures. We are definitely improving: we provide unconscious bias training, including for all managers and partners. We use objective selection criteria and name-blind tests in early stage recruitment selection procedures, and we work with charities such as the Sutton Trust and the IP Inclusive organisation to support their outreach programmes. AA Thornton also has mentoring and buddy schemes, to ensure that trainees and attorneys have a trusted friend to speak with one-to-one (separate from their line manager).
I am proud to be a Partner of AA Thornton, a firm which recognizes that each individual can be a driver for positive change and that diverse teams make better decisions. Several colleagues are setting me a fantastic example through their contributions to diversity and inclusion, but I believe I can personally do more to support their initiatives. Those of us in privileged positions have a significant role to play as we work towards greater diversity, inclusion and equality.”
The AA Thornton Partners are grateful to IP Inclusive for leadership on diversity and inclusion issues (particularly to Andrea Brewster) and to all those within AA Thornton who contribute towards better enabling colleagues to bring their whole selves to work.
