I'm going to make a chocolate cake for my work friends next week (its been a rough week - downsizing, hours cut, benefits cut, etc). I'm wondering if anyone has any tips or ideas for using a filling with mini chocolate chips. Should I mix them with a fudge or something? I don't want them to be fully melted, but also not sure if I can just put them between layers and if it would be ok.

Sure you can, but only use the choc. chips in the filling. Make sure that you still ice with a stiff BC, otherwise the little chips will tear holes in your cake as you are trying to ice it.

I use mini choc. chips in cannoli filling, my fudge overload filling, my turtle filling, etc. If you dont really want to mix them into your BC, then fill your cake and sprinkle them on top (I do this for the turtle filling, vanilla bean BC, with chocolate fudge, caramel drizzled on top, then pecans and mini choco. chips sprinkled on top, top with your other layer of cake.) That way you can use the same BC or filling and frosting, and only have the chips in the middle.

HTH