Identifying The Best Legal Consultant For Your Business

Every business needs a legal consultant at some point in time irrespective of their size. While you may not feel the need to hire a legal representative when you start your business, it is highly advisable that you hire one nevertheless.

Professional business legal consultancy services will not only help you coming out of tricky legal situations but will also help you in every aspect of your business. Whether it is compliance auditing or copyrights issue, your legal consultant will be right by your side to help you and your business at every step. By this, you would not only avoid any legal complications but also ensure that you do all your legalities right from beginning and not have to go through repetitions or worse, incur financial losses.

Image Source

How to Hire Best Legal Consultant for your Business?

Putting off the decision to hire a legal advisor for business can end up backfiring for your business. You would be in a fix if you encounter some unanticipated legal glitch which you have no clue about. This is more the case if you are a start-up. Imagine having to go through contracts, legal documents, business formations, leasing commercial spaces, taxations and IP documentation yourself without any legal guidance.

Scary, right?

That being said, it is not really easy to get best legal consultant for your business, especially if your budget is pretty tight. There are so many things to consider when you try to choose the right business legal services for your company. The best ones are usually expensive or too busy, or at least that’s the assumption.

So if you haven’t identified a legal consultant yet, here are some tips to get the best one for your business.

1.   Do a Thorough Analysis of Your Business Needs

There are a variety of legal consultants in the market. While some might have expertise in certain areas, some others can handle end-to-end legal compliance. You must be able to analyze the kind of legal services your business might need. This might help you in cutting costs and also hire a legal advisor for business who would match requirements.

2.   Identify a List of Business Consulting Firms

Now that you know what you require from the legal consultancy services, make a list of potential fits that match your requirement. Check the number of years they have been in this industry and understand their client base.

It is very important that the legal consultant has an understanding of your industry and has worked with companies similar to yours at least in the past. It is never wrong to ask straight-forward questions about the kind of legal compliance situations they have handled or if they can handle some specific situations and glitches you might encounter.

3.   Cost Flexibility of Vendors

This is another aspect you need to be clear about especially if you are a start-up with a fixed budget. You need to be aware if your lawyer would give you some time to reimburse the fees incurred in case of a sudden legal glitch or if they would be ready to work for a contingency fee which you would pay on completion of the project or work.

Understand if there are any flat fee rates for regular work and what all would the fee include. There are many types of billing prevalent among the legal consultancy services. While some work on monthly retainer fees, some others work on an hourly rate. Few others would prefer a higher billing rate on the success of the project/case and some would get a percentage of proceeds on succeeding.

While it is important that you hire a good business legal advice for your company, it is equally important to understand if your legal consultant is money focused or not. A legal advisor who is more focused on monetary gain might leave your work for a bigger deal in future.

4.   Availability and Response Time

Most of the best legal consulting firms are bound to be busy as well with a big clientele. But you need to understand if your legal advisor would be there for you in case of an emergency situation. Who will take care of your work in case the prime consultant is busy?

If they have paralegals who would work on lawyer’s behalf then it is important to analyze the experience levels of such paralegals. It is also important to understand if the lawyer would be able to give direct attention in case of bigger and more serious legal services.

5.   Size of Legal Consulting Firms

There is a general assumption that a bigger legal firm equals bigger fees. That might be true in some cases. However, there are greater concerns you need to address while deciding the size of a law firm. It is a known fact that bigger a law firm, bigger is its clients and busier the lawyers.

However, going for a smaller firm might mean they lack the expertise to handle difficult and challenging situations. You need to identify the kind of outsourcing law firm that would be there for you and has requisite expertise to handle emergencies.

Size of firm doesn’t really matter if the attorney you are dealing with has the connection or network to handle any situation easily. They must be able to refer you to other business legal services or lawyers for specialized situations.

Image Source

Conclusion

Choosing a legal consultant can be really daunting but has to be done with utmost care. The most fool-proof way is to trust your instincts. You must be able to trust and like the person on a professional level. Expertise is important but what is more important is how approachable they are.

A business start-up consultant whom you can’t reach or communicate when you need is of no use to your business. You also need to see if they are not too far from you as during your initial phase you would have to meet them on a regular basis for various legal compliance works.

The best one would ideally be the one who would suit your needs and fits your budget ultimately!

Featured Image Source