KMR LAW GROUP, CHICAGO LAW FIRM FOUNDED BY THREE AFRICAN AMERICAN WOMEN

Unfortunately we don’t get to see too many African-American female lawyers, or many lawyers of African American descent at that. However, Keli Knight, Yondi Morris and Jessica Reddick are three young women who are out to break the mold. All three ladies came together to start their KMR Law Group located in Chicago, IL. And it all started with one tweet.

Each woman had her own fair share within the law field, but it was Morris’ frustration that helped jump-start everything. While working as a contract lawyer at a particular law firm, she had been told by a partner, “Okay, slave, get back to work.” Being the only African American in the office there was no reaction from anyone else inside of the office. Expressing herself on Twitter, “I need to start my own firm.” Knight and Reddick responded to her tweet and as they say, the rest was history.

It was reported last year by law professor Deborah L. Rhode that 88% of lawyers are white and only 33% of the partners are women. When Knight, Morris and Reddick formed KMR, African-American females only made 2.44% of the law firm associates in the Chicago area.

At KMR Law Group they like to do things differently than the typical firm, and sometimes work outside of the office. “We take a lot of meetings all over the city, and we like to meet with clients in their spaces so that we can get a sense of the culture of the place. It helps us do our work better. When we meet just us, we meet at each other’s houses or we meet over brunch. We didn’t want to be chained to our office,” said Morris. They also like to show what an attorney can be like, so they do a lot of volunteer work in the schools within the community.

Founded back in 2011, the ladies are doing an amazing job breaking barriers and showing that African-American women can do anything they can put their minds to. Morris said, “We have to make our presence known in a room. There are preconceived notions not only about women and African Americans, but also about young people. We’re all in our early thirties. We’re not traditional attorneys, so sometimes we do have to do a little extra to prove ourselves. We studied hard. We’re here for a reason.”