Mary Dole
General Counsel
Palm, Inc. was founded in 1992 by entrepreneurs Jeff Hawkins and Donna Dubinsky. The company launched the first commercially successful mobile computing product in 1996, the Palm Pilot and is now a respected innovator and widely recognized leader in mobile computing. The company’s products for consumers, mobile professionals and businesses include Palm® handheld computers, Palm Treo™ smartphones, Palm LifeDrive™ mobile managers, as well as software, services and accessories.
(L to R): Larry P. Tu, Dell, Inc.; Mary Doyle, Palm, Inc.; and Veta Richardson, MCCA
The company’s brief history is dynamic: It was acquired by US Robotics in 1995, and then by 3Com Corporation, before returning to its independent roots as a publicly traded company in 2000. It faced the challenges of the boom and bust cycle for the technology industry in 2000 and 2001, and in 2003 spun off its Palm OS software business and acquired Handspring, Inc. to launch its smartphone product line.
Despite these challenges, Palm’s legal department, led by Senior Vice President and General Counsel Mary Doyle, has become a model of diversity. Six of the department’s 10 lawyers are women, and two are minorities. All of the eight para-professionals and administrative staff are women, 14 percent Asian, and 14 percent African American. “I was immersed in diverse communities from grade school through law school, and I had lots of role models. I saw that the best decisions came from the most diverse groups,” says Doyle, explaining how her commitment to diversity began.
Formal policies and procedures designed to promote diversity are often associated with diversity achievements. However, Palm’s entrepreneurial culture has organically cultivated a diverse, inclusive workplace.
Members of the department take advantage of Palm’s flexible work/life balance policies, including the opportunity to work part-time or from remote locations. Training is provided not only on substantive legal issues, but also on presentation and negotiation skills and other competencies necessary to the success of corporate counsel. Whenever possible, attorneys are encouraged to assume new responsibilities in order to learn a new area of law or functional operation. This classroom-based and on-the-job training prepares Palm’s lawyers to partner with clients, weighing in on key decisions from the beginning.
When hiring attorneys, the department resorts to the web and to old-fashioned word-of-mouth to recruit applicants. Every member of the already diverse staff interviews each candidate and all historically have agreed unanimously on any offer extended. The team emphasizes not only quality lawyering but also business skills and teaming capabilities in its hiring decisions.
Palm’s team looks to similar qualities when hiring outside counsel, and has long-standing relationships with counsel that mirror the diversity of the legal department. Despite its needs in traditionally non-diverse areas such as technology licensing, patent prosecution and patent litigation, many of Palm’s outside counsel are women, including its principal corporate and securities partner and key licensing and trademark counsel, and several are minorities or minority-owned practices, including prominent patent litigators and patent prosecution counsel.
From the November/December 2005 issue of Diversity & The Bar®