Meridian Lawyers Limited is an incorporated legal practice.
Meridian Lawyers provides legal services in Insurance, Health Law, Corporate & Commercial Law, Workplace Relations & Safety and Commercial Litigation and Dispute Resolution.
Meridian acknowledges that there is work to be done in reducing gender pay gaps and biases and in the career progression of women in our business. In the reporting period, Meridian acquired an insurance practice with more than 60 additional lawyers, and several senior male principals with large established practices. This growth has contributed to the gender pay gap at the upper quartile.
We are pleased to report that Meridian meets the optimal level for gender pay gap for the average total remuneration across three quartiles which covers 75% of the firm’s employees. For the gender pay gap for total remuneration, we are pleased to report that Meridian meets the optimal level for two of the quartiles and in the third quartile, the result was a 6% gender pay gap in favour of women which was an improvement by 14%.
Reducing the Gender Pay Gap
Meridian is genuinely committed to gender equity in our industry and across our organisation. We recognise the importance of actively managing our overall gender pay gap, particularly at senior levels. Our initiatives include:
- A rigorous remuneration framework that is used to evaluate performance using specific transparent criteria which reflects financial and non-financial performance and business contributions
- Continuing to ensure our hiring and promotion practices are free from bias, and involve standardised criteria focused solely on merit and qualifications
- Offering clear pathways and transparent criteria for career progression and promotion to senior roles
- Promoting flexible work practices and a hybrid working model to support our employees’ diverse needs
- Offering parental and carer leave provisions to provide greater flexibility in our employees’ careers, helping us to retain, support, and attract a diverse workforce across all roles and levels of seniority; we are pleased to see that our program is being embraced by our male staff members highlighting a positive shift towards shared caregiving responsibilities in our workplace
- Investing in leadership development and mentoring programs, with a focus on identifying and supporting high-potential female talent; our initiatives have successfully led to a higher percentage of women being promoted to senior roles compared to men reflecting our commitment to fostering gender equity in leadership
- Endorsing the Law Council of Australia’s Gender Equitable Briefing Policy
- Supporting Women Lawyer Association memberships
- Promoting diversity and inclusion initiatives as part of Meridian’s Diversity, Inclusion, Community Engagement & Environment (DICE) Committee
Meridian’s commitment
Meridian is dedicated to transparency and continuous improvement in addressing gender pay gaps in our organisation.
Despite the challenges posed by our significant growth and the onboarding of new team members during the 2023-24 reporting year, our commitment to promoting female representation has resulted in encouraging developments.
We remain focused on fostering a workplace where all employees are valued and compensated fairly.