Director of Legal Services

Legal Counsel for Youth and Children (LCYC) seeks a Director of Legal Services ready to lead a team of passionate attorneys fighting for youth justice. If you are committed to challenging the barriers our young clients face and transforming the child welfare system, please join our mission-driven, values-aligned team. As Director of Legal Services at LCYC, you’ll work with a team of supportive, creative, risk-taking, and flexible people seeking to disrupt the status quo.

The Director of Legal Services will strengthen and expand excellent legal advocacy for young people in Washington by supporting the development of a diverse pipeline of children’s attorneys and influencing Washington’s children’s representation practices, policies, and culture.

OPPORTUNITIES & ESSENTIAL RESPONSIBILITIES

The Director leads LCYC’s Child Welfare and Youth Defense programs. The Director of Legal Services is responsible for strategic, big picture program management, including organizational and program mapping, systemic advocacy, ensuring excellent legal service delivery, budget development and monitoring, and overall operations of the programs they lead. The Director also directly supervises Supervising Attorneys, who lead their attorney and legal assistant teams.

PROGRAM MANAGEMENT

• Lead on developing, implementing, and improving child welfare legal services and infrastructure to strengthen and expand excellent child welfare advocacy statewide.
• Expand efforts to build a pipeline of child representation attorneys throughout the State.
• Manage an LCYC-led law school clinical course on Children’s Representation in child welfare at Seattle University School of Law.
• Support Youth Defense legal services team in King County and Statewide Youth Access to Counsel program with program and contract management.

SYSTEMIC ADVOCACY

• Lead an effort to provide Washington State children’s representation attorneys community, resources, and opportunities to organize systemic issues through the Children and Youth Representation Advocacy Hub (CYRAH).
• Expand the impact of direct legal services through systemic advocacy.
• Build and foster relationships with community partners, including funders.

TEAM LEADERSHIP & SUPERVISION

• Lead hiring, onboarding, and training of new team members.
• Supervise Supervising Attorneys through progress reviews, supporting professional development, ongoing feedback, and coaching.
• High-level assessment and strategizing with Supervising Attorneys on flow of case assignments, revenue, and assessing staffing needs.
• Support supervisors in leading their teams to deliver excellent services.
• Plan and lead regular team meetings.
• Support staff in connecting to colleagues, mentors, and LCYC, particularly BIPOC and LGBTQ+ staff, staff in satellite offices, and novice staff.
• Support staff well-being.
• Advocate for needs of the teams within the organization.

OPERATIONS

• Identify and problem-solve organization-wide needs to advance LCYC’s sustainability.
• Oversee State and County contracts. Support grant writing and reporting to funders.
• Review and utilize data and emerging best practices to assess and adjust outreach strategies, practice standards, supervision, and program design.
• Work closely with the finance team to ensure accurate data reporting, invoicing, managing spend downs, and grant reporting.
• Timely track hours and expenses utilizing LCYC’s online tools, including Clio and Ramp.
• Participate in ongoing professional development trainings, anti-racism trainings, identity group conversations, and project specific workgroups on equity and systemic racism.

QUALIFICATIONS

The ideal candidate will bring an unwavering commitment to LCYC’s mission, values, and principles. While no one candidate will embody all of the qualifications below, the ideal candidate will possess many of the following professional and personal qualities and will be able to identify where they need to learn and grow:

ALIGNED WITH ORGANIZATIONAL VALUES

• Committed to incorporating anti-racism into every decision and action.
• Commitment and ability to engage in culturally competent relationships.
• Capable of building positive relationships of trust with staff, funders, youth, and community partners.
• Ability to be flexible and adaptable, adjusting to the needs of the organization, staff, and community.
• Demonstrates humility and a commitment to continual learning by proactively seeking knowledge, integrating feedback, and fostering innovative solutions.

STRONG LEGAL, SUPERVISION, AND TEAM LEADERSHIP SKILLS

• Licensed to practice law and in good standing in Washington State or qualify for admission.
• At least five years’ experience providing direct legal representation in child welfare cases. Although not required, experience in juvenile defense is highly desirable.
• At least 2 years of supervision and team leadership experience.
• Strong emotional intelligence and strong verbal and written communication skills.
• Able to navigate difficult conversations, conflict, and challenging behaviors in a productive manner that accounts for differences in perspectives and experiences.
• Fosters an inclusive and collaborative work environment to promote respect for diverse perspectives within all aspects of the organization’s work.
• Strong self and other awareness: a clear understanding of strengths and weaknesses as a colleague and leader.
• Understands the effects of vicarious trauma and the importance of work balance and boundaries to support personal well-being.

PROGRAM MANAGEMENT AND STRATEGIC THINKING EXPERIENCE

• Program management experience: program design and implementation, utilizing data to assess and adjust, partnership building, and strategic problem solving.
• Demonstrates strong strategic, systems thinking skills: considers long-term goals and the strategic implications of their individual and organizational work, and effectively analyzes and solves complex problems by understanding and tackling their root causes.
• Outstanding project management and administrative skills: excellent in managing shifting timelines and priorities, and able to manage multiple initiatives at once.
• Creativity, proactiveness, and the ability to work independently and ask for support.
• Experience making difficult decisions and delegating, and working collaboratively with a team to inform decision-making.

SYSTEMIC ADVOCACY EXPERIENCE

• Strong public speaking and writing skills; the ability to communicate complex policy issues and potential solutions to a wide variety of audiences, and communicate strategically in the systemic advocacy environment, including with young people, nonlegal community partners, lawmakers, and legislative staff.
• Experience with work groups, reviewing proposed legislation and amicus briefs, testifying before a government body, meeting with government staff or representatives, problem solving potential systemic solutions to barriers in child welfare, youth defense, immigration, or youth homelessness is highly desirable.

ADMINISTRATIVE SKILLS

• Experience developing and implementing internal policies.
• Experience managing program funds, involvement in budget development, navigating spend down, and developing or informing financial policies tied to service delivery.
• Ability to navigate and train others to navigate LCYC’s case management system and other operational systems.

Comprehensive benefits include Flexible Time Away (FTA); medical, vision, dental, life, and disability insurance; a health care FSA; paid sick and safety time; a 403(b) plan; and home office essentials (laptop, cell phone, desk, chair, and printer). LCYC pays the full cost of employee medical, vision, and dental premiums and 15% of dependent premiums. Under the FTA model, full‑time staff bill 1,800 hours a year and receive seven weeks of vacation, with holidays selected based on what matters most personally. Exempt team members have some flexibility in setting their weekly schedules to support the Director and meet program needs.