Darcy is a Senior Associate at McMillan LLP (Ottawa) advising on all aspects of corporate and commercial transactions, general contract law, financial institution regulation and insurance matters. Darcy also has experience in the area of payments, having spent 3 months working with the team responsible for Canada’s essential payments systems on a secondment basis. Darcy is an alumni of the University of Ottawa where she obtained her LL.B. in 2010. She then went on to practice out of McMillan’s Toronto office for 5 years before returning to the nation’s capital. When not in the office, you might find Darcy hiking around Gatineau Park or otherwise relaxing at one of her favourite brunch spots.
In this episode, we have a candid conversation with Darcy. She tells us more about financial services, her transition from Toronto to Ottawa, and her experiences in law school.
In this episode, Chris sits down with Michelle Moldofsky (for the second time on the LSS) of the Moldofsky Professional Corporation. At the Moldofsky Professional Corporation Michelle provides legal advice in health law and corporate commercial law affecting not-for-profit health organizations. Prior to founding this company, Michelle was General Counsel at St. Michael's Hospital. Stay tuned to hear Michelle discuss her approach to making a successful career transition and the difficulties and opportunities she experienced along the way.
To learn more about Michelle visit:
Moldofsky Professional Corporation
Corporate Advisory Counsel, Law Practice Program
LinkedIn Profile
LSS Ep 20: Michelle Moldofsky, General Counsel at St. Michael's Hospital
Sam Witherspoon is the Founder and CEO of MiraLaw - a legal tech start up based in Ottawa. Focused on leveraging technology to address access to justice issues, MiraLaw has created a product, Thistoo, that is intended to help mitigate the A2J issues faced by parties in Family Law.
In this varied conversation, we talk about Sam's journey from law school to founding MiraLaw, the idea behind Thistoo and Miralaw's other product Compass, the future effect of technology on the practice of law, and the challenges of founding your own legal tech start up.
Sam recommends the book The Hard Things by Hard Things by Ben Horowitz. You can also find more info on MiraLaw here.
What resources are available for first generation students who are studying law? In this episode Brooke Longhurst and Dianna Robinson will be talking to us about the First Generation Network and why this network was created.
Brooke is a second year JD student at the University of Toronto. Before law school, Brooke completed her Master of Philosophy the University of Cambridge. She is the founder of the First Generation Network, and President of the organization’s UofT Law chapter.
Dianna Robinson is a third-year JD/MBA student at Osgoode Hall Law School and Schulich School of Business. She is the president of a group established to provide support to students who are the first in their families to attend post-secondary education; the Osgoode First Generation Network.
The First Generation Network was created at Osgoode Hall Law School in December 2015 with the aim of reducing the professional, social and financial barriers to law school faced by students who are the first in their family to attend post-secondary education. The Network expanded to University of Toronto Faculty of Law in September 2016. The Network has a strong focus on activities that involve members of the legal community who were also the first in their family to attend post-secondary education.
If you want to start a chapter at your own law school, email: [email protected]
Check out the First Generation Network at your school: Toronto, Osgoode, Western, Ottawa, Windsor, and Lakehead.
Ever wonder what it is like to work at TD Bank Group? Jeff Smolkin, a Managing Counsel, leads and manages TD Bank's online and mobile service offerings, innovation and mobile payment initiatives and strategy, such as UGO Wallet and TD Labs, as well as TD Bank's FinTech. He shares how he transitioned to IP law and some tips to succeess like being open to trying new areas of law. Tune into this episode to learn more!
Sari de la Motte advises attorneys, corporations, and government organizations in the United States about non-verbal communication. In this informative episode, Sari gives tips on non-verbal communication for litigators in the courtroom and applicants at the job interview.
FORTE’s free voir dire guide: https://nonverbalforte.com/voirdireguide
You can find more about FORTE here: https://nonverbalforte.com/
Are you curious to learn what a career as a trademark attorney entail? In this episode, we sit down with Ms. Andrea Pitts, a trademark attorney from Borden Ladner Gervais LLP, and discuss how trademark prosecution is a niche, rewarding profession. Listen-in to gain advice and perspective from this accomplished in-house practitioner.
In this exciting interview, we sit down with one of the founders of Legal Cafe, a startup looking to enhance the communication between legal professionals.
Co-founded by Shaunt Tokmakjian and Ari Comert, LegalCafe, as the name suggests, is a warm and inviting place for lawyers to connect and support each other quickly and easily, at home or on their smartphones. What makes this idea unique is that it fosters the creation of an online legal community through technological innovation, cost-effectiveness and profit sharing.
LegalCafe aims to solve the following three problems: (1) Poor support networks: Without strong networking, or large firm support, lawyers, especially new lawyers, are often left without a proper support network. This has the potential of impacting quality of service for clients. (2) Redundant Research and Cost: Often times lawyers are looking for answers hundreds of other lawyers have already researched. (3) Community: Memberships to the various legal bar associations can be cost prohibitive especially for new lawyers. In addition to the annual fees which range in the hundreds of dollars, members are often expected to pay for the various events they attend. The goal of LegalCafe is to leverage technological innovation to create an online and effective community with low cost to members.
If you want to learn more about LegalCafe, check out www.legalcafe.ca.
Aaron Wenner is a father, a graduate of Harvard, a graduate of McGill Law, a coder and an entrepreneur. In this episode, Aaron tells us about the product he created, aptly called CiteRight. CiteRight is an intelligent legal assistant that formats citations, assembles books of authority, and notes-up precedents. It saves lawyers’ time and clients’ money, and makes drafting litigation documents smarter, faster, cheaper. Aaron tells us about why he decided not to work in a traditional legal job and the process he has lived in getting CiteRight to market.
Are you interested in learning more about corporate finance and securities law or mining law? Then tune into this episode featuring Linda Misetich Dann. She is a partner and Co-Head of the Capital Markets and M&A group at Bennett Jones LLP. She shares her journey as a law student to a partner, the challenges she faces within these practices, the qualities needed to succeed in these areas of law. This is a very interesting episode, so please tune in!
