Small Law Department Network 2025 Legal Updates
-
Register
- Member - Free!
- *Further discounts may apply once you log in.
-
Contains 2 Component(s) Includes a Live Web Event on 11/17/2025 at 2:00 PM (EST)
Join your fellow ACC members to discuss your challenges of handling being In Transition: interview issues, morale, networking challenges, and next steps.
The journey of career transition can be a winding road, filled with unexpected detours and moments of uncertainty. As ACC members, we understand the unique challenges and rewards that come with navigating this path.
Career transitions present a unique set of challenges and opportunities. Recognizing the shared experiences of our members, this ACC program offers a dedicated forum for those transitioning. Engage with peers to explore common obstacles, ranging from interview processes and maintaining motivation to strategic networking and career path definition. This program aims to provide a supportive and informative space for navigating your professional evolution.
Join the Conversation:
Small Law Department Network Community -
Contains 1 Component(s) Includes a Live Web Event on 11/10/2025 at 1:00 PM (EST)
Even at the highest levels, age bias can quietly shape hiring decisions — from assumptions about energy and adaptability to outdated stereotypes about leadership style.
Even at the highest levels, age bias can quietly shape hiring decisions — from assumptions about energy and adaptability to outdated stereotypes about leadership style. This candid, no-nonsense session tackles ageism head-on and arms seasoned attorneys with practical tools - and the necessary mindset shifts - to navigate it.
Participants will learn how to strategically present their experience as a competitive advantage, sharpen their narrative for modern hiring dynamics, and project the agility today’s boards and search firms expect. Expect real-world advice, blunt feedback, and actionable techniques on everything from résumé positioning, to interview framing, to acknowledging where you may be holding yourself back.
If you’re an accomplished professional ready to get real and reassert your value in a market that too often overlooks it, this session is for you.Join the Conversation:
Small Law Department Network CommunityNina Blackshear
Senior Counsel
Genentech
Nina Blackshear is a Certified Executive and Leadership Coach, TEDx speaker, and attorney who is passionate about helping individuals to realize their full potential, liberated from the frantic, ceaselessly striving posture of “fake it ‘til you make it.” She is always thrilled and humbled to see someone truly recognize their intrinsic gifts and all they are capable of achieving for the first time.
While her practice is inclusive and open to all, Nina focuses particularly on offering a safe space for successful women to overcome limiting beliefs, lead with confidence, and level up to “What’s Next.” If you’ve ever felt unseen, unheard, ignored, overlooked, marginalized, undervalued, unrecognized or “othered” as you pursued your career goals, Nina gets it: she used to be her own ideal client.
Nina understands from personal experience that change isn’t always easy - but it’s almost always worth it. In her career she’s had to shift, pivot and reinvent herself any number of times to overcome obstacles and find her path in roles like corporate attorney, major gifts fundraiser, marketing communications manager, HR employee relations specialist, Realtor, and judicial clerk. While her work has spanned corporate, government, academic, non-profit and entrepreneurial settings, the common thread was always coaching and counseling colleagues and partners up and down the org chart - and around the globe.
Each transformation made Nina stronger and more resilient, increased her emotional intelligence, and resulted in her genuinely unshakeable confidence that she can always meet the challenge of “What’s Next.”
She provides executive and leadership coaching to senior-level and C-Suite clients across industries, and is regularly sought out to speak on an array of topics for workshops, offsite retreats, webinars, podcasts and conferences.
Nina earned her BA in Political & Social Thought from the University of Virginia and her J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law. She also holds a Graduate Certificate in Strategic Communication & Cross-Cultural Leadership from Temple University’s Klein College of Media & Communication.
You can learn more about Nina and all she offers at www.ninablackshear.com. -
Contains 2 Component(s)
Join your fellow ACC members to discuss your challenges of handling being In Transition: interview issues, morale, networking challenges, and next steps.
The journey of career transition can be a winding road, filled with unexpected detours and moments of uncertainty. As ACC members, we understand the unique challenges and rewards that come with navigating this path.
Career transitions present a unique set of challenges and opportunities. Recognizing the shared experiences of our members, this ACC program offers a dedicated forum for those transitioning. Engage with peers to explore common obstacles, ranging from interview processes and maintaining motivation to strategic networking and career path definition. This program aims to provide a supportive and informative space for navigating your professional evolution.
Join the Conversation:
Small Law Department Network Community -
Contains 1 Component(s)
Join the Small Law Department Network for an engaging session designed to help you make the most of your time at the ACC Annual Meeting in Philadelphia. Whether you're a first-time attendee or a seasoned participant, this event will offer practical tips, networking strategies, and insider insights to ensure you leave the meeting with valuable connections and actionable takeaways.
Join the Small Law Department Network for an engaging session designed to help you make the most of your time at the ACC Annual Meeting in Philadelphia. Whether you're a first-time attendee or a seasoned participant, this event will offer practical tips, networking strategies, and insider insights to ensure you leave the meeting with valuable connections and actionable takeaways.
Join the Conversation:
Small Law Department Network Community
Sponsored by:
Allysun Trifunovic
Director of Program Operations
Association of Corporate Counsel
-
Contains 1 Component(s) Includes a Live Web Event on 11/13/2025 at 3:00 PM (EST)
Description to come.
-
Contains 1 Component(s) Includes a Live Web Event on 12/11/2025 at 3:00 PM (EST)
Description to come.
The Small Law Department network consists of ACC members who fall into two categories:
- Members who practice in, or are concerned with issues relating to, small corporate law departments. While there is no specific limit, it is expected that most members will practice in departments with between one and five attorneys.
- Members who practice in large departments either as a legal "generalist" or at a remote location with few lawyers.
The network's goal is to develop and explore practice methods by which attorneys in small law departments and generalists in larger departments can most effectively and efficiently provide legal services to their corporate clients.
Join the Conversation:
