Hiring a knowledgeable Business Attorney is crucial to any successful business.
Two crucial components to having a successful business are choosing an accountant and a business attorney who will help you set-up and organize a solid foundation for your business to grow. While an accountant will help oversee your business’s financial side, a knowledgeable business attorney will help set up your business’s compliance side.
Many businesses will “kick the can down the road” when hiring an attorney until they get a knock at the door or a letter in the mail of a summons informing them they have just been sued. Unfortunately, the need to establish an attorney relationship is a prudent step that should occur way before the summon showed up!
Let’s face it, the American judicial system is a lot like a lobster pot; once you’ve entered, it’s hard to get out before you have been cooked (financially). While no one likes paying an attorney, it will cost substantially less in the long run if your business uses an attorney up-front during the set-up process, than taking a risky bet that you’ll never have a problem that will require an attorney’s assistance to resolve, because fees charged for protecting your business from trouble are a fraction of what they will cost to get your business out of trouble. Hence it is always easier to deal with one attorney rather than two!
What does a Business Attorney do?
Business Attorneys are there to anticipate possible future problems that could arise with your business and put protections in place to avoid them from happening. They do this by understanding the in’s and out’s of how the company operates and future goals. Once your attorney knows how the business will function, they can begin to devise a protection portfolio for you by developing:
- Business Organizations: Advising you on the proper business entity that best suits your business profile, such as a corporation or limited liability company (LLC), and helping to file the appropriate paperwork needed to establish a legal entity within the states the business will operate in.
- Contracts: Are a crucial structural support of any business. Having an attorney who can anticipate the unforeseen and then analyze and craft a contract that will strengthen the company’s protection by clearly and decisively outlining terms and establishing remedies should there be a failure to perform the contract terms.
- Corporate Bylaws and Operating Agreements: Bylaws create the company’s structure assisting in its ability to run smoothly and are the internal rules that govern how shareholders, executives, and employees understand the fundamental rules of operation.
- Real Estate: Leases can be complicated and often more favorable to the lessor than the lessee. Having a competent negotiator is key to ending up with a fair, reasonable, and trustworthy contract that won’t cause undue harm.
- Taxes and licenses: Obtaining and registering your business for a federal and state business identification number (EIN).
- Non-Compete and Confidentiality Agreements: Developing a strong non-compete agreement helps prevent employees from leaving to work with a competitor or to start-up a similar business. Confidentiality agreements help secure that employees do not share confidential information such as know-how, technical data, business ideas, trade secrets, or proprietary information with competitors within the marketplace.
When looking for a business attorney, you should always do your research by asking others for referrals, contacting the Idaho Bar Association (IBA), and interviewing prospective attorneys. It will be essential that you choose an attorney to build a successful client-attorney partnership that will provide your company with expert, knowledgeable, and trustworthy counsel which focuses on reaching your business and individual goals.
Here at Dean Law, PLLC, we have a vast knowledge of corporate governance, counseling on business structure, negotiations, closing complex transactions, buying & selling assets, real estate, entity combinations, shareholder agreements, operating agreements, buy-sell agreements, vendor service agreements, employment agreements, and general business planning.
It would be our pleasure to help you grow your business to its fullest capabilities while helping you reach your goals.
If you’re seeking to establish a relationship with an experienced attorney where trust is a priority, we invite you to reach out to us at Dean Law, PLLC with a phone call or an email and we’ll be happy to schedule a free 30 minute consultation to determine if we’re a match.
