It can be irritating when people make offhand remarks about how business owners should create more jobs or offer more benefits to their employees. While a qualified legal advisor like a business attorney probably works with business owners and companies on a daily basis, this can still occur with otherwise intelligent lawyers. The fact is, it’s hard to understand what a business owner faces unless you are one yourself. Here are a few key reasons why your business attorney should be a business owner too.
They’ve Done This Before
One of the first things you ought to ask a prospective attorney is whether their specializations in the field of law are a match for your needs. A general business lawyer who helps businesses incorporate every day is completely different from a litigation attorney for business disputes related to intellectual property. This same train of thought needs to apply to whether prospective attorneys have personal experience with owning or managing a business because they’ll be able to give sound advice when it’s something they intimately understand.
Ownership from a Legal Perspective
Unless you are a legal expert yourself, you’ll need the advice of key advisors like business attorneys as you build your business. In considering various possibilities, there’s something particularly helpful about consulting with a legal expert who also knows what it means to be a business owner. In this case, they not only have the theoretical knowledge and expertise that comes with practicing law, but they have the practical experience of navigating legal issues as a business. That valuable insight can be leveraged with your business too.
An Additional Advocate and Sounding Board
If there’s one thing you need when you’re starting a business, it’s qualified advice. Obviously, you won’t find it at all difficult to run across plenty of people with opinions on how you should manage your business, but these uninformed opinions don’t necessarily help you succeed. That’s where talking with other business owners becomes crucial. While a lawyer is there to advise you on legal matters primarily, that doesn’t change the fact that it’s useful to have the advice of someone with real experience in owning a business on your side. Since you’re already working with your particular company attorney and comfortable with that relationship, you might find yourself with access to key answers on a wide variety of general topics that go beyond legal matters.