What to Look for When Hiring an Attorney-Nicholas Troxel

Winning On Main Street - Small Business Podcast

I’m a big hockey fan so today I’m wearing my Colorado Avalanche jersey in recognition of our Stanley Cup win. Growing up I played hockey quite a bit with my friends, never seriously but I enjoyed it. Football was the sport I took a bit more seriously. Unfortunately, a string of injuries prevented me from continuing to pursue my dream of playing in the NFL. I grew up in Lincoln, Nebraska, which was a nice little college town, but I wanted someplace a little bigger when I went to college. I initially considered law school in Los Angeles, hoping to attend either USC or UCLA. However, when I visited the CU campus in Boulder I fell in love with the area and decided to go there instead.

Going into business with friends has its challenges but it is something that works well for Josh and I. Both of us are direct communicators and have thick skin. This helps a lot when we’re trying to work through problems or resolve miscommunications. I was always intrigued with entrepreneurship because it is a different approach to living life. Once you’ve made peace with the risk aspect of being an entrepreneur, I see it as a lot of fun and thus when we opened our firm, we focused on working with clients who were also entrepreneurs. In addition to our law practice, we have a couple of other entrepreneurial ventures on the side.

One of the most common mistakes we see entrepreneurs make is not forming a business entity. A lot of people simply operate under a trade name which essentially means they are a sole proprietor or general partner. However, what most entrepreneurs don’t consider is that it is the riskiest way to operate a business. The idea behind limited liability is that it protects your personal assets from being at risk if someone were to sue the business. If you don’t take that step, you are not only putting your business at risk, but you are also putting at risk everything else you own. Law is intimidating to most people, so we aim to make it digestible and understandable to our clients.

The biggest mistake I see people make when they are hiring an attorney is to simply price shop for the lowest rate. Unfortunately, because law can be a complex topic, people don’t get what they need because they don’t understand what they’re being asked for or don’t know what to look for in the agreement. Your primary goal when you are looking for an attorney should be to find someone you can trust, even if their prices aren’t the lowest in town. If you are only looking for the lowest price you will often find yourself less protected than you thought you were, which only adds to your frustration when you’re in the middle of a situation.

Resources Shared:

• Troxel Fitch Law
• Thryv