K&L Gates Names Pittsburgh Partner as 2017 Leadership Council on Legal Diversity Fellow

Pittsburgh - Global law firm K&L Gates LLP has selected Pittsburgh litigation partner Nicholas Ranjan as its 2017 representative to the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity (LCLD) Fellows program.

Launched in 2011, the LCLD Fellows program works to identify and train high-potential attorneys from diverse backgrounds in order to foster diversity at the leadership levels of law firms and corporate legal departments.

Ranjan focuses his commercial litigation practice on energy, oil and gas, arbitration, class action defense, and appellate litigation matters. He represents natural gas operators, pipeline companies, non-operating interest owners, and drilling and completions companies in a wide range of litigation, as well as counsels energy clients in crisis management events including on-site response and investigation efforts, insurance and cost recovery, and litigation management. Ranjan has litigated in state and federal courts on a variety of class actions and handles a number of other complex commercial disputes and appeals. An arbitrator for the American Arbitration Association (AAA), he serves individually and on panels concerning commercial, oil and gas, consumer, and other disputes.

A member of the firm’s global diversity committee, Ranjan serves as both the pro bono coordinator and chairman of the diversity committee for the firm’s Pittsburgh office. He is active in leading diversity initiatives within the firm and throughout the community, which earned him the recognition of a Leadership Excellence Award from the Pittsburgh Leadership Conference.

“I’m honored to be selected for this position, and look forward to the invaluable experience of serving as an LCLD Fellow on behalf of the firm,” said Ranjan.

K&L Gates’ membership in LCLD is just one of many programs designed to promote greater diversity and inclusiveness throughout the firm and profession. K&L Gates was recently named a “Best Place to Work for LGBT Equality” by the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), having earned a top rating of 100 percent in HRC’s Corporate Equality Index survey for the past seven consecutive years. Additionally, the firm recently has been recognized by Lockheed Martin for its commitment to inclusion and diversity, was honored as a top achiever by Microsoft’s Law Firm Diversity Program, and was ranked among the best UK companies for LGBT employees by the 2017 Stonewall Workplace Equality Index.

“Nick has been a tireless advocate for diversity at our firm and in the legal community at large,” stated Thomas Smith, administrative partner of K&L Gates’ Pittsburgh office. “He was instrumental in establishing the K&L Gates/University of Pittsburgh Law School Diversity Fellowship, which has been widely acclaimed as one of the first such scholarship programs. He is also part of the team that has spearheaded the Pittsburgh Legal Diversity and Inclusion Coalition, which will bring together law firms and corporate legal departments to improve diversity in the legal profession in the Pittsburgh region. We are proud that Nick will be representing the firm as an LCLD Fellow.”

LCLD is an organization of more than 265 corporate chief legal officers and law firm managing partners committed to creating a diverse legal profession. The LCLD Fellows program has trained more than a thousand attorneys since 2011.