BlackBay Lawyers is a specialist litigation and employment firm founded in 2022. We are over 30 people today, growing at 96% year-on-year and continuing to scale. We act for ASX-listed companies, founders, boards and senior executives in complex employment disputes, high-risk terminations and executive exits. Many of our matters are high-profile and carry significant commercial and reputational risk.

We were named Boutique Law Firm of the Year in 2024 and again in 2026. We are the first law firm in Australia to be Excellent Place To Work-Certified™. We put our lawyers on national television and the mainstream press as a matter of routine, and the firm's digital presence is among the strongest of any law firm in the country. If you want a public profile to match your practice, we will give you the platform.

The work

The growth of the firm has created a need for an exceptional Special Counsel to join an established, high-performing team. You will lead Fair Work proceedings, general protections claims, restraint and confidential information disputes, and executive exits.

We have a deep experienced and highly regarded Crisis PR team in-house that will work closely with you on sensitive client issues that attract media attention. This is an advantage capability very few firms in Australia can offer a client.

You will:

- Run complex employment and workplace matters end-to-end
- Have autonomy to make strategic calls, while having the support of the Partnership to sense check
- Advise boards, founders, HR directors and C-suite executives directly, as their primary adviser
- Lead negotiations,



mediations and make the critical decisions
- Supervise and develop junior lawyers while staying hands-on in the significant matters
- Have the support to help build the employment practice

The path to Partnership

The title is Special Counsel. The next step is Partner. At BlackBay, Partnership is earned through performance and contribution rather than tenure. You will know within the first conversation exactly what the path looks like to make Partner.

What we have that boutiques usually do not

Senior lawyers hesitate to leave large firms because boutiques often mean losing the infrastructure. BlackBay trained its own AI that is implemented across the entire firm, with a skills library built for our practice areas that handles the first draft, the research memo and the chronology so that you spend your time on judgment. You have juniors to supervise, a marketing function that builds your profile, and a leadership team with open doors. You will have your own private office in our light filled, beautifully appointed premium office in Martin Place.

Who you are

- Approximately 10+ PQE in employment or workplace law
- Confident being the decision-maker on strategy, with clients and internally
- Comfortable being relied upon by clients, partners and juniors alike
- Digital and AI fluency, or the appetite to acquire it fast
- Someone who wants to build a practice, and expects to be rewarded for building it

Conversations are confidential. Most of the people we want to hear from are not actively looking.

#J-18808-Ljbffr

📌 Special Counsel, Employment - BlackBay Lawyers (New South Wales)
🏢 BlackBay Lawyers
📍 New South Wales