Branding is everything, even in naming a business. What do you think of these names and tag lines seen during our road trip?

Spotted Car Wash (would you take your car there to be washed/cleaned?)

Patrick Dempsey’s Lodge ... Booze Food and Snooze

Best wishes for the holiday and the holiday season approaching ...

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Negotiating the Negotiations Process

The negotiation process for the sale of a law practice is a very delicate matter.

To obtain the best results, negotiations must be handled with the greatest degree of forethought, as well as a certain aloofness and lack of ego or emotionalism. Take this as a hint that you will not be best served by handling your own negotiations when selling your practice. After you have worked for a number of years to make your practice grow and blossom, you are the wrong person to cool-headedly negotiate for the best possible price and terms.

Presuming that you are planning ahead and have a reasonable amount of time in which to sell your practice, you should take advantage of the time you have to hire the right professionals to help you. Don’t try to conduct the negotiations yourself for the same reason that you don’t usually want the client in the room when you are negotiating that client’s contract. The issue is understandably quite personal and emotional. Effective negotiations require distance from the emotion so that the work can be done professionally and intelligently. Let another professional handle your negotiations, and the result will be considerably less stressful for you—and will probably be financially better for you as well.

It is also essential to underscore another very human element in seller psychology: essentially, once someone makes the actual decision to sell, there is a great temptation, or tendency, to lessen one’s level of intensity in both servicing existing clients and developing new clients. To ensure your own success in the practice for the time remaining before the close of the sale transaction and to obtain the highest sale price possible come negotiation time, it is imperative that the practice continue to function as it always has and that you continue to seek new clients and improve the firm’s billings.

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Negotiating the Negotiations Process

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LawBiz® Registry: Buy or Sell Your Practice

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