THE first woman to be appointed managing partner of a top-30 law firm, Sharon Cook, has called for an end to golf days and football games as the dominant form of client entertainment.

Ms Cook said in a speech last week that the number of women in top jobs in the law was "woeful" and won't change until the culture changes.

These cultural changes included not arranging 8am and 5pm meetings, rewarding the "24/7 mentality", thinking positively about working remotely and allowing phone-ins to meetings.

"Not entertaining (clients) solely through golf days and attendance at State of Origin matches," was another key point that should change to redress the imbalance, she said.

"In many offices the work ethic is measured by hours in the office and that plays into the hands of ambitious males," Ms Cook, managing partner of Henry Davis York, said in her keynote address to the Women in Law Leadership Summit at the Sydney Harbour Marriot Hotel last week.

The "24/7 work ethic" that exists in some law firms disadvantages women who "are often more efficient, less ego driven and less inclined to stay in the office until the early hours of the morning."

In 2010 at the biggest firms, 23 per cent of partners were women while 17 per cent of partners were women in the mid-tier and small firms, she said.

"(These statistics are) a considerable improvement from 30 years ago ... but given the huge numbers of women coming into the profession these stats are woeful.

"The main reason I believe that after 30 years not much has changed is because the culture of our working environments has not changed ... women who have succeeded have done so in spite of the culture, not because of it," she said.

"We need to treat the advancement of women the same way we would treat any other business imperative ... we need a vision and a strategy and we need to measure it."