Posted by admin in Lawyerpreneur, Small Business on December 23rd, 2011
A popular statement these days is to try and find a work-life balance. A happy person is supposed to be able to effectively balance home life and work life on a 50/50 basis, thus making everyone at home happy and everything at work just peachy. Back when I was a human resource professional I drank the work-life balance Kool-Aid and sold the concepts to employees far and wide. Maybe it is possible in Corporate America (which I doubt), it certainly is not possible in the world of entrepreneurism. The term is a misnomer. The truth is you are either going to give a greater percentage to your work at the expense of home or vice versa. It all depends on where your values lie. It is not wrong to give work or life more attention; the key is to be real with yourself and real with your loved ones and hope and pray that they will accept your disposition and stick with you. Involve them in your mission, because when they are involved they are more prone to appreciate what you are doing and thus tolerate you.
Is work-life balance possible? The obvious answer is that anything is possible. But I believe it is improbable. When I reflect back on my life, if I am honest with myself I will be able to point out different times when I put family first and other times when I put work first. Rarely if ever was there a consistent period of true balance. Truthfully, I am wired to put work ahead of life and family more often than not. Does this make me a bad person? Some may think so but I think it just is what it is. My wife loves and appreciates me for who I am. In fact, we have been able to build a wonderful union by both venturing into the world of small business ownership. We share office space and make sure to focus on different tasks so that we can both enjoy each other’s company while at the same time not stepping on each other’s feet by playing in the other person’s sandbox too often. This works for us. In fact, my wife frequently jokes that if we didn’t work together, she would never see me due to the fact that my typical work day starts at 5:00am and does not end until about 7:00pm.
Be mindful of the fact that as a start-up business owner, the business will demand a lot of your time. Just like an infant needs a vast amount of love and nurturing in order to grow into a fantastic person, your business needs the same love and attention during the infant years. In time, it will grow up and begin to take on a life of its own and need your time a little less. Until then, I can promise you that if you are devoted to business growth, the work-life balance scale will tip substantially in the direction of work. I hope you have had a conversation with your home life so that they understand!
Posted by admin in Labor & Employment on December 17th, 2011
As I watched the rise and fall of Godfathers Pizza magnate Herman Cain, it took me back to the days when I worked in human resources. In particular, there was a story I used to share with new employees as I conducted sexual harassment training. The story went something like this:
During a sexual harassment training, a man who was fed up with the topic stood up and said “Why are we spending so much time on this topic? Aren’t we just making a big deal out of nothing? Why can’t people just be left alone to handle themselves as they see fit? All this sexual harassment stuff is destroying the workplace!” To this tirade, the trainer responded, “Ok, well how would you feel if your daughter came home one day and told you that a co-worker had groped and fondled her and wouldn’t stop even though she pleaded with him to leave her alone?” To this, the man stood up and blurted “I’d go down there and kill the son of a @$&#!”
Yes, sexual harassment usually doesn’t resonate with people until it hits close to home, or at least until it accumulates to the extent that it cannot be ignored. Which takes us back to the Herman Cain experience. In my humble opinion, one allegation of sexual harassment is problematic, especially considering it is against a man that is vying for the highest office in our nation. Indeed, if Bill Clinton could get mercilessly attacked for consensual infidelity, why would this country fathom electing a man with multiple allegations of sexual harassment against him?
And multiple is the key word. While it may make sense to look aside and reason that one allegation could simply be untrue, multiple allegations are alarming. As it has been said, if one person tells you that you have a tail, that person must be crazy. If two people tell you, you should start to wonder. If three people tell you, you should turn around and check.
And then there is Herman Cain, a man who not only denied each and every allegation but even went so far as to make jokes about the situation on television. The audacity to make light of such a serious situation! Now that the heat has gotten too hot in the pizza kitchen, Mr. Cain has removed himself from the presidential election discussion. However, he is hopeful of being appointed Secretary of Defense by whomever wins the election. Ignoring for a second the fact that he knows little about foreign policy and what is going on in Ubeki Beki Beki Stan, would you want your wife or daughter working next to a man repeatedly accused of trying to use his power and influence for sexual favors in the workplace? I for one must answer that question in the negative.
Posted by admin in Dispute Resolution on December 4th, 2011
While most people view mediation as a process to help individuals work out there differences in an amicable fashion, few are aware of the existence of an elaborate international platform. Indeed, the United Nations (UN) employs mediators and deploys them to conflict and post-conflict countries in an attempt at helping them prevent or end violent turmoil.
One recent example of their efforts is the work that has taken place in the country of Liberia. For those unaware, Liberia has been continually undergoing a rebuilding effort following a 14 year civil war that claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of it’s people. Many survivors of the war (including my beautiful and strong wife Cheryl), have mentally struggled to overcome the emotional remnants of living through the horrific events that occurred during the war. Knowing the pain that such a high level of violence causes, it is pleasing to know entities exist that strive to help prevent repeated cycles of these genocidal events.
A motivating and stabilizing force that has helped Liberia overcome and remain conflict-free is President and Noble Peace Prize winner Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (the first female head of an African country). However, despite her efforts to keep peace within her country since first assuming the presidential office in January 2006, fears arose that violence would once again erupt as a result of the upcoming elections and her drive to be re-elected president. Leading up to the elections, many worried that her opposition, namely William Tubman and Prince Johnson, would attempt to take the office by vote, or worse yet, by physical force. Of course, any coup attempt on the government would surely send the country spiriling back into conflict.
In the country’s September 2011 General Assembly debates, Liberian Vice-President Joseph Boakai stated, “As a post-conflict country, Liberia has benefited immensely from multi mediation efforts ranging from national, regional and international initiatives aimed at restoring and maintaining stability in the country…Our experience leads us to suggest that greater emphasis be placed on preventive measures, and that the tools of mediation be employed as soon as early warning signs of conflict emerge. The benefits of establishing an early warning system that will deal with potentially explosive situations before they degenerate into full-blown infernos are obvious.”
Vice-President Boakai emphasized his pleasure in the fact that it is nearly a decade since the UN peacekeeping Mission in Liberia (UNMIL) came to the West African country of Liberia to help restore normalcy after the war and to help keep it from falling back into war by negotiating peace between the various competing political factions.
The UN Security Council also deployed over 9,000 police and military personnel to assist with the stability with the nearing elections. Notably, very few incidents of violence occurred during the October 2011 initial elections (where President Sirleaf defeated challenger Tubman by 10%) and the subsequent November runoff (where she garnered a whopping 90% of the vote despite low turnout amid cries of fraud and for a boycott of the elections by the Tubman camp).
Thanks to the leadership of President Sirleaf and the peacekeeping efforts of the UN and it’s team of mediators and security personnel, the growing country appears to have escaped violence and turmoil and can continue to build and develop into an economic and political force within Africa and the world.
Posted by admin in Small Business on November 23rd, 2011
The latest trend amongst socially conscious small businesses is to register or convert their business to an L3C (low-profit limited liability company). The L3C is a new business entity that was developed for social entrepreneurs with a socially beneficial mission. The nice thing about it is that it gives you the personal liability protection similar to the LLC while also giving you the ability to solicit funding from foundations and other non-profits. Because you are not a non-profit, you do not have to go through the rigorous 501c3 process, yet you still get the benefit of getting funding because those foundations – any even for-profit entities that like to donate to socially conscious causes – will be more prone to donate to your mission since they will have the ability to write off the donation if you are an L3C.
While very few states allow a company to form an L3C (Low Profit Limited Liability Company), all 50 states recognize the entity. Therefore, you could register your business in a state such as Vermont or Michigan (Vermont charges $100) and then you could register the business in Ohio as a foreign entity doing business in Ohio (Ohio charges $125). You will need a statutory agent in the state of registration (ie Vermont of Michigan). One can be found at www.registered-agent-listings.com. On average, they charge $100/year to serve as a registered agent. Alternatively, you can likely get it all done simply and at one place by going to www.legalzoom.com (Legalzoom has streamlined the process making registrations such as this easier).
Additionally, your operating agreement for the business would need to clearly spell out the social mission of the organization. This is something you should get an attorney to help you with. Lastly, you would want to make sure that you keep meticulous records just in case a potential donor or the IRS decides to question your true mission or focus. This way, you can easily present to them the good works that you are doing. Below you will find some additional IRS related information relative to the L3C:
“L3C” or “Low-profit limited liability company” means a person organized under this chapter that is organized for a business purpose that satisfies and is at all times operated to satisfy each of the following requirements.
(A) The Company significantly furthers the accomplishment of one or more charitable or educational purposes within the meaning of Section 170(c)(2)(B) of the IRS Code of 1986, 26 U.S.C. Section 170 (c)(2)(B); and (ii) would not have been formed but for the company’s relationship to the accomplishment of charitable or educational purposes.
(B) No significant purpose of the company is the production of income or the appreciation of property; provided, however, that the fact that a person produces significant income or capital appreciation shall not, in the absence of other factors, be conclusive evidence of a significant purpose involving the production of income or the appreciation of property.
(C) No purpose of the company is to accomplish one or more political or legislative purposes within the meaning of Section 170(c)(2)(D) of the IRS code of 1986, 26 U.S.C. Section 170(c)(2)(D).
(D) If a company that met the definition of this subdivision (27) at its formation at any time ceases to satisfy any one of the requirements, it shall immediately cease to be a low-profit LLC, but by continuing to meet all the other requirements of this chapter, will continue to exist as a limited liability company. The name of the company must be changed to be in conformance with subsection 3005(a).
Posted by admin in Dispute Resolution, Labor & Employment on November 11th, 2011
Last week, NBA Commissioner David Stern took a hard stance. He told the union representatives if the players did not accept the onwer’s 50/50 revenue split with the players offer by this past Wednesday, the offer would be “off the table” and would be reduced to a 53/47 split. Tough talk indeed. However, a funny thing happened on the way to the bluff bank…the players didn’t make a withdrawal. Instead of withdrawing, they stood firm.
When an aggressive negotiator finds out his opponent is not of the acquiescence mold, he has a difficult decision to make. He has to decide whether to stand strong and risk the negotiation breaking down to impasse, or back down and soften the approach but perhaps send a signal to the other side at the same time that he is weakening. The last thing a negotiator, especially an aggressive one, wants to do is give the opposition a sense of leverage or power at the table.
So what did David Stern do? He did what all negotiators do, he analyzed his BATNA and WATNA (best/worst alternative to a negotiated agreement).
His BATNA? He could walk away from the mediation table and let the dispute go to court. Maybe he believes he has a higher percentage of success in court than the union/players. A win in court would crush his foe and allow him to impose his will on the next CBA (collective bargaining agreement). And of course, while the case slowly meanders through the litigation system, he could find other nonunion players to play. Surely there are thousands of young men on the neighborhood basketball courts dreaming of one day playing NBA ball! And think of all the exceptional foreign players he could recruit! Or maybe he simply carries out his current threat of cancelling the season. Noone wins, but he surely does not lose. Oh the possibilities!
His WATNA? He could walk away from the table and go to court and lose. The players could get a preliminary injunction to prevent him from canceling the season, locking them out, and/or hiring “scab” players to replace them in the interim. This result would surely swing the balance of power towards his foe. Not a good alternative.
So what does he do? He “softly” backs down. But wait, he does not consider it backing down at all! According to Mr. not so Stern after all, he says that since the union continues to negotiate, he will “extend” the date to which his lower 53/47 split offer takes effect. Now the union has until “next week” to decide on their latest greatest offer (which would be similar to the 50/50 split previously rejected by the union).
Moral to the story: rarely are threats productive in negotiations, especially threats of the feigned variety. Just as they always say on the movies, ” If you are going to pull that gun out, you’d better use it!”. Similarly, if you are going to go to the “You have until Wednesday to decide!” card you had better mean it. Otherwise, just back down off your attitude horse and continue to negotiate in good faith and with dignity and respect for your opponent. I believe everyone will come out much better in the end as a result.
Posted by admin in Lawyerpreneur, Small Business on November 11th, 2011
A large part of running a successful small business is the ability to successfully manage contracts and contacts. What this means is being smart in knowing which contracts to sign and which not to sign, understanding the ramifications of those contracts, and being diligent in gathering and capitalizing upon business contacts.
There will be a lot of contracts that will be necessary for your business. When considering these contracts, do not forget that you are an attorney. A good attorney has an uncanny ability to make everything negotiable. Don’t be afraid to walk away from a deal if they do not want to make the deal better. For example, once you open your doors, you will be bombarded by Lexis and Westlaw solicitations. If legal research is important to your practice (and it probably should be), you will want to utilize one of these resources – assuming you do not opt for a free but less powerful research option instead. Lexis and Westlaw offers similar services at fairly similar prices. They always want to entice you into a long term contract. Be wary of signing a long term deal unless it is a steal of a deal. The reality is that you can easily have one year contracts with one vendor, then bounce to the other a year later and get better pricing. You can then repeat this procedure year after year to ensure you have the most competitive research pricing.
Similarly, you will be getting involved in lease contracts, phone contracts, advertising contracts and many others. Make sure that whatever contracts you sign you do not bite off more than you can chew. Sign a contract based upon your current revenue, not your projected revenue. The last thing you need to be worried about is a bill collector calling because you breached a contract. Lawyers should be pursuing those that breach contracts, not being pursued! Be especially careful of advertising contracts. Fast talking salesmen will promise you all kinds of benefits from advertising with them, and when the dust clears and the sales are nominal to nonexistent the salesman is nowhere to be found. One sales contract that I should have never signed was one to advertise in a large annual publication advertising prominent black professionals in the community. It is a nice, quality publication, but what I found is that it is more of a centerpiece on a table than a resource. I spent $5000 on a full page color ad and only one person told me they called me because of that advertisement over the next 12 months. I made $500 on that client. Do the math and it easy to see that was a horrible investment. But I learned, and told that salesman no thanks when he called the following year, the year after that, and basically every year since.
Contacts are critical for business. You will want to immediately begin building a contact list for services that are important to your practice and also important to your clients or potential clients. For example, if a potential client calls you but you are unable to assist them, make sure to have a list of other resources you can send them for help, such as legal aid, the local bar association lawyer referral program, or other lawyers who do similar types of law. Make sure to tell the potential client to let the other person know you referred them. Also, you should have already touched base with the people at that referral source so they know you exist and know you will be referring people. This helps build a referral system that will eventually return the favor and refer people to you as well. One caveat, if it is a bad case and you know it, do not refer it to your peer attorneys. They will grow to resent you for sending them obviously bad cases. Keep the golden rule in mind: Treat Others How You Want to be Treated! Everyone you come across is either a potential client or potential referral source. So treat contacts with dignity and respect and your business will prosper as a result.
Posted by admin in Lawyerpreneur, Small Business on November 4th, 2011
Not only is being professional with people with whom you interact the right thing to do, you also have an ethical obligation to be professional. Your obligation as a lawyer is not to simply win cases, but also to uplift the practice of law and the impression that the community has on lawyers and the world of law. Think I am wrong? Take a few moments to review the latest attorney disciplinary cases in your jurisdiction. Once you have read a few cases where lawyers are getting suspended and in some cases disbarred for their behavior, you will see my point!
Being professional to your customers should go without saying. If you are rude to your own customers, pretty soon you won’t have any! This may seem to be common sense. However, I learned a long time ago that sense isn’t all that common. That is why I am still sharing this point with you. For example, I once had an employee who really struggled in this area. While it is common that as a business owner you will periodically get a complaint about an employee from a customer, I got three times the amount of complaints regarding this employee than all my other employees combined. I had to seriously address the issue with my employee, because to let the problem foster would be tantamount to ignoring my customers and letting the community credibility and good will built up in the practice be eviscerated. Whenever a customer annoys me, I reflect back on the thought that without customers, my practice would not exist. This thought process helps me be much more tolerant.
While tolerating customer eccentric behavior makes sense, dealing with vendors can be much more trying. Nothing can work my nerves more than a sales person that that continually calls or drops by to sell me something I neither want or need. They only want a few minutes of our time – failing to realize that time is a precious commodity for a lawyer and small business owner. Time cannot be wasted when motions need to be written, and bills need to be paid. I believe that it is fine to avoid potential vendors, but we should do so with professionalism and respect. Why? For one, it is the right thing to do. But it is also incumbent upon us to remember that vendors are not just resources for products and services we may or may not need, they are also potential clients and referral sources. The impression you make on every single person you encounter will have a positive or negative impact on business development. Believe it or not, vendors are used to not getting time with busy business owners. It is okay to say no if you do not have the time. Just do it nicely. I’d rather leave someone with a decent or even an indifferent opinion about my practice and me than a negative opinion. Negative opinions inevitably result in them sharing their opinion about you with others within their circle of influence. I cannot over-emphasize that your reputation in this business is everything. Once it is damaged, it is difficult to recover. Protect your reputation and standing in the community as vigorously as you would protect your loved one from trouble.
Dealing with opposing counsel can be the most trying of all. For example, earlier this year I was at the courthouse for a final pre-trial conference. Opposing counsel had filed numerous motions for summary judgment and motions to dismiss trying to keep my client’s case from proceeding to trial. His behavior in the pretrial conference was borderline rude as he argued and interrupted everyone to try and make his point that the case should not go to trial. It took all of me not to lose my cool and give him a piece of my mind. But as I left the courthouse, I focused on the thought that what this attorney was doing was trying to advocate on behalf of his client as vigorously as possible. That is his job, to do everything legally allowable to get the case dismissed. When I focused on this aspect, I told myself that if I were in his shoes I would act similarly (albeit not quite so boisterously). By putting his behavior in the proper perspective, it helped me to not be as frustrated with opposing counsel. Also, by maintaining my cool in the judge’s chambers, I believe he respected my restraint and will take that in consideration when he rules on yet another attempt to dismiss my client’s case. At the end of the day, advancing my client’s interests by being professional in front of the judge is more important than a few moments of frustration from an overly zealous attorney.
Posted by admin in Lawyerpreneur, Small Business on October 16th, 2011
There is a huge difference between practicing law on the run versus running a law practice. As an entrepreneur, one of the hardest things to learn is how to work on your business without always working in your business. Reality is that we typically have less help than we need and an ever-increasing amount of tasks to get accomplished. The end result is often times that we just become an employee of our own business and lose focus on the real reason why we started this venture to begin with; which was to enjoy running our own business.
If you let your business, or in this case law practice, run you, you will ultimately run yourself raggedy trying to keep up. This occurs when you practice law on the run. You never get ahead of deadlines, never get to the bottom of that inbox, and therefore never get to the necessary tasks of marketing, strategizing, and directing the future outcomes of the practice. Be very careful not to fall victim to this practicing on the run/slave to my business mentality. It might be acceptable in the first 1-3 years of the business because reality says you will have to work long and hard to build a viable entity, but if you do not stay focused on transitioning into running the practice instead of letting it run you, the practice may run you straight to an early retirement, or worse yet, an early grave! That is not why you began this purpose-driven journey for sure!
To avoid is rut, make sure to stay in control of your calendar. The best way to stay in control is by going to the office with a plan of attack for your day already in place. This might mean that you engage in marketing on social media for the first hour in the office instead of returning calls from opposing counsel or checking email. This might mean telling your employees to hold your calls for the day while you explore new business development ventures, or going to a luncheon instead of packing your lunch and eating a homemade sandwich while reviewing a case file. If you have a plan of attack, you can carve your day into productive segments that allow you to both work in your practice while also working on building it.
Also, make sure to learn how to delegate. This is a difficult one for solo practitioners. You get so used to being everything to everybody that you do not know how to let go. But if you don’t learn how to let go, you will never be more than your own employee. Hire trainable compentent people and allow them to grow from their mistakes by delegating assignments to them. You may find that you will spend less time reviewing their work and redirecting them as opposed to doing the work yourself.
Trust me…being a business owner and lawyerpreneur, it is much more enjoyable when you run your law practice than the other way around. Dogs may enjoy chasing their tail, but should humans really enjoy doing the same? I think not!
Posted by admin in Dispute Resolution, Labor & Employment on October 13th, 2011
The last year has been very eventful for the world of mediation. First it was Major League Soccer that employed mediation in 2010 to help end a labor dispute and get it’s season underway (does anyone recall or care about MLS?). Next, after a failed first attempt, the second time was a charm with mediation helping end the massively popular NFL end its’ labor dispute and save this year’s NFL season. Next up…the NBA!
After being engaged in months of non-assisted negotiation with little ground being made between the league commissioner and union executive director, mediator George Cohen is once again front and center. As director of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Center, he holds a high profile post and thus gets a crack at a high profile dispute that impacts thousands of people and millions of dollars. The cancellation of the preseason and the first two weeks of the regular season will not only impact the jobs of seasonal workers, but empty stadiums could cause mass layoffs at ancillary service provider locations like vending concessions, ticketing workers, nearby restaurants and hotels and the like (lest we forget the financial fate of those poor scalpers of fake tickets and those t-shirt makers who steal intellectual property by putting team logos and witty saying on shirts and harass you outside the stadium to buy one or a dozen). With the country trying to climb out of a recession, this is a less than palatable scenario.
If the name George Cohen sounds familiar, it should. He presided over the first (failed) round of mediation with the NFL. Of course, ground was made during those sessions, and we all know in the world of dispute resolution that settlements sometimes happen much later from the negotiations that took place at the table if it could not be immediately settled while actually sitting there at the table. Once mediation was tried again before a new mediator and increased pressure of a cancelled season, the NFL and the players came to terms.
For the NBA, time is the enemy. They can ill-afford a failed mediation. Such a result would likely doom the season. While the casual fan may care less today, when February hits and football season is over, unless you enjoy the wonderful world of Hockey you will surely begin to miss slam dunks, no-look passes and LeBron James bashing. So let’s hope Mr. Cohen weaves some facilitative magic when the sessions begin next week. The world will be watching!
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