ABOUT OUR FOUNDER

Patrick Cliett, Photographer

Deborah Epstein Henry is the Founder and President of Flex-Time Lawyers LLC, a national consulting firm advising law firms, corporations and lawyers on work/life balance and the retention and promotion of women attorneys.

With a mailing list of thousands of lawyers and legal employer representatives, Debbie has facilitated over 100 Flex-Time Lawyers LLC chapter meetings in New York and Philadelphia, providing attendees with career guidance, support, education, networking opportunities and information to effect change.

Debbie is trained as a commercial litigator but the principal focus of her time today is as a consultant. She focuses on the issues of work/life balance and attorney retention, with a particular emphasis on retaining and promoting women lawyers. She has extensive experience in the following areas:

• Consulting to law firms, corporations and thousands of individual lawyers on flexible and reduced schedules, work/life balance, business development, women's initiatives, re-entry and women's issues generally.
• Speaking in public forums around the country, including law firms, law schools, conferences and events.
• Running a chapter organization and facilitating over 100 chapter meetings on work/life balance and women's issues in New York and Philadelphia since 1999.
• Providing recruiting services to employers who are seeking lawyers working flexible and reduced schedules and lawyers seeking such placements.
• Serving as an ongoing resource, writing articles and fielding inquiries from the press, lawyers and legal employers about how to live a more balanced life and thrive as a professional.

Debbie and Flex-Time Lawyers LLC have garnered press coverage from NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams, The New York Times, National Public Radio's Morning Edition and Radio Times, Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, The National Law Journal, New York Law Journal, ABA Journal e-Report, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Newsday, Philadelphia Business Journal, XM Satellite Radio, The Legal Intelligencer, Working Mother, Los Angeles Daily Journal, Diversity & the Bar, The Philadelphia Lawyer, The San Francisco Recorder, The Pennsylvania Lawyer, Daily Report, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, The Bencher, The Scarsdale Inquirer, Workforce Management, The Southampton Press, The Woman Advocate, Big Apple Parent and Philadelphia Bar Reporter.

In September 2006, Flex-Time Lawyers LLC and the New York City Bar Committee on Women in the Profession released "The Cheat Sheet," the ultimate guide to selecting, creating and ensuring a woman-friendly employer. Debbie was the principal author of "The Cheat Sheet" and developed the concept to empower women law students and enable them to become another competitive pressure point to effect change and improve the status of women in the legal profession. “The Cheat Sheet” is also a resource for lawyers, law schools, law firms and other legal employers seeking to assure women’s retention and advancement.

Flex-Time Lawyers LLC has also teamed up with Working Mother magazine to conduct an annual national survey to list the Best Law Firms for Women and release statistics and trends on work/life and women's issues in law firms. All firms that participate in the annual survey receive a scorecard that provides a snapshot of how they stand on work/life and women's issues. Firms can also purchase a more extensive benchmarking report, providing them with an invaluable tool to improve the status of women in the future. For more information about the Best Law Firms for Women initiative, click here .

Additionally, Debbie released in late 2007 a new work/life methodology she developed called FACTS that has received national recognition through The New York Times. FACTS stands for Fixed, Annualized, Core, Targeted and Shared Hours and it enables lawyers to meet firms' economic demands and the ever-changing demands of the market while also satisfying lawyers' work/life balance needs within the billable hour.

Debbie is the former work/life columnist for Diversity & the Bar (the publication of the Minority Corporate Counsel Association). She is an Advisor to the “Hidden Brain Drain” Task Force for the Center for Work-Life Policy which has released several Harvard Business Review articles focusing on the retention and promotion of women and people of color. Debbie is a consultant to two New York State Bar Association Special Committees -- Balanced Lives in the Law and Lawyers in Transition. She was named a 2007 "40 Under 40" by the Philadelphia Business Journal and a 2004 "Pennsylvania Lawyer on the Fast Track" by American Lawyer Media. Debbie received her B.A. in Psychology from Yale University and her J.D. cum laude from Brooklyn Law School. Following law school, she clerked for the Honorable Jacob Mishler in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York. Debbie is married and the mother of three boys, ages 12, 10 and 6.