NASHVILLE, Tenn.—Tennessee Defense Lawyers Association (TDLA) has selected Stites & Harbison, PLLC attorney Rachel Dix Bishop as the recipient of the 2021 Rising Star award.

The Rising Star award honors a TDLA member who has been practicing law for 10 years or less and who has made significant contributions to TDLA, to the defense bar and/or who has promoted the interests of young lawyers in Tennessee this year. Bishop has been active within TDLA’s Young Lawyers Division (YLD). She served as the YLD coordinator for the Middle District of Tennessee, chaired TDLA’s 2020 Annual Meeting, served as the YLD Liaison to TDLA’s Board in 2020-21 and was recently elected to TDLA’s Board as a Director for the 2021-22 term.

Bishop is an attorney based in Stites & Harbison’s Nashville, Tenn., office. She is a member of the firm’s Employment Law Service Group and serves as a management-side litigator and counselor on complex employment law issues. Bishop’s practice concentrates on litigation involving employment discrimination, harassment, retaliation, wage and hour claims, restrictive covenants, trade secret misappropriation, intellectual property infringement and general tort and contract claims. She also regularly assists her clients with employee and management training; preparing and updating employee handbooks; conducting wage and hour audits; drafting and negotiating various employment agreements, including confidentiality, non-disclosure and non-competition agreements; and walking her clients through separation procedures, including reductions in force.

Within Stites & Harbison, Bishop is active in a variety of leadership roles. She is a member of the Nashville Office Recruiting Committee and S.W.I.F.T. (Stites Women Investing in our Futures Together). Outside of the firm, she participates in numerous professional organizations. Bishop is active in the Tennessee Defense Lawyers Association, where she serves on the Board, and in the Tennessee Bar Association, where she serves on the Young Lawyers Division Board as the Nashville District Representative. She is also a member of the Lawyers Association for Women, Defense Research Institute, Society for Human Resources Management and the Nashville Bar Association. She was recently selected to participate in the Nashville Bar Foundation Leadership Forum Class of 2022. Bishop has also been recognized by Best Lawyers on their “Ones to Watch” list for two consecutive years in the fields of labor and employment law, intellectual property law and commercial litigation.