Aclu Senior Advisor, Affiliate Legal Programs at ACLU provides strategic advice to affiliate Legal Directors to build strong legal programs. The role supports integrated advocacy strategies and strengthens affiliate legal capacity.
Responsibilities
Reporting to the Senior Director of Program and Strategy, the Senior Advisor, Affiliate Legal Programs serves as a senior resource and strategic advisor to affiliate Legal Directors and their teams, helping affiliates build and sustain strong, effective legal programs appropriate to their unique circumstances and contexts. Drawing on deep expertise in nonprofit civil liberties and civil rights legal program practice and management, the Senior Advisor proactively identifies opportunities to strengthen affiliate legal programs and works with affiliate leaders to develop and implement improvements in legal strategy, docket development and management, cooperating attorney relationships, program infrastructure and systems, staffing and leadership, and alignment with affiliate priorities.
A central part of the role is helping affiliates drive legal work as part of an integrated advocacy strategy. The Senior Advisor works alongside affiliate legal, advocacy, communications, organizing, legislative, and other colleagues to help determine how the range of tools can be deployed most effectively to achieve shared goals. This includes helping affiliates assess when litigation is the right tool, when it should be combined with other tools or other approaches, and how different capacities and strategies can reinforce one another to maximize impact.
While there is no one single model for a strong affiliate legal program, the Senior Advisor also works across the affiliate network to identify emerging needs, share and scale effective practices, strengthen connections among legal leaders, and develop resources and approaches that advance effectiveness across the nationwide organization. The role will also partner with National colleagues to strengthen affiliate legal programs and advance integrated advocacy.
AFFILIATE LEGAL PROGRAM STRATEGY, CAPACITY, AND LEADERSHIP
Serve as a senior resource and strategic advisor to affiliate Executive Directors, Legal Directors, and other leaders building and sustaining high-quality, effective legal programs tailored to their differing circumstances; help leaders assess the strengths and limitations of their current programs and proactively identify opportunities for improvement; work with affiliate leaders to develop and implement strategies to strengthen legal program quality, effectiveness, and impact.
Support affiliate Executive Directors in hiring and onboarding Legal Directors, and advise Legal Directors on building and managing strong legal programs, including developing strategically focused, organizationally-aligned, and appropriately resourced legal dockets, case selection and prioritization, litigation management, staffing and supervision, program planning, intake and referral systems, and effective management of cooperating attorney relationships, and other external legal resources.
Work with Legal Directors and legal staff to understand legal program strengths, needs, and opportunities; help affiliates set ambitious, right-sized goals; and support implementation and progress toward those goals.
NETWORK-WIDE PROGRAM DEVELOPMENT, TOOLS, & BEST PRACTICES, AND LEARNING
Drawing experience across the affiliate network, identify, develop, and scale effective practices for building and running powerful and impactful affiliate legal programs; translate learnings into practical frameworks, tools, and models, and proactively support their adoption and adaptation by affiliates within their own circumstances and capacity.
Help affiliate leaders develop, implement, and manage integrated advocacy approaches that align legal, organizing, legislative, communications, and other capacities to advance shared goals.
Promote and support the application of Department resources, such as the Program and Strategy Playbook, Envisioning a Stronger Future: A Guide to Building ACLU Legal Programs, and related frameworks to advance meaningful improvements in affiliate legal programs, adapting approaches to differing circumstances and capacity.
Develop practical tools for assessing affiliate legal program capacity, effectiveness, and progress; establish approaches to regular reflection, debriefing, and learning that help Legal Directors and affiliates understand what is working, where change is needed, and what can be learned across the network.
Qualification
Required
Deep expertise in nonprofit civil liberties and civil rights legal program practice and management
Experience working with legal programs in nonprofit or affiliate contexts
Ability to develop and implement strategic improvements
Strong collaboration skills across multiple disciplines
