Outside General Counsel Services
Why Use Outside General Counsel Services?
We recognize that growing and successful companies in our region need access to first-rate legal advice, but also need to control the costs associated with obtaining legal support and advice. For certain clients in Southwest Virginia, and the neighboring areas of Tennessee, North Carolina, and West Virginia, we alter our billing arrangements from a traditional hourly rate format to a monthly-retainer basis. Our goal is to provide our clients access to quality legal services with a predictable cost structure. Serving as your Outside General Counsel, we will bring the resources of our firm to bear on the issues you confront in managing the growth and success of your business. We will enable you to be proactive in your legal strategy and not simply be forced to react to situations once they are out of hand.
CowanPerry’s client base includes a diverse array of manufacturers, technology firms, service businesses, governmental entities, and start-up firms. Our attorneys currently serve as Outside General Counsel for a variety of these companies in our region on long-term, successful, monthly-retainer arrangements. We provide legal services to company executives across a wide spectrum of our legal practice, including timely advice on specific legal questions, corporate compliance, transactional representation and potential litigation matters as they arise. Our Outside General Counsel service includes services in all seven of our core service areas: business and employment litigation, corporate and tax, ERISA and employee benefits, intellectual property, labor and employment law, land use and commercial real estate and trusts and estates, including business succession planning .
To get the process started, our attorneys will meet with you and together evaluate your needs, and develop a scope of work and client service structure that fits your business. Generally, a retainer arrangement will include the following services: unlimited telephone and e-mail consultation; contract drafting, review and negotiation; strategic planning; labor and employment law compliance and training; intellectual property protection; attendance at officer and board meetings, as requested; and preparation and maintenance of state reporting requirements, such as annual reports. Because it is impossible to predict the occurrence and cost of unusual events, such as most litigation, a merger or acquisition, patent applications, sale of all or a portion of your business, or the sale of securities to raise private capital, budgets or fixed-fee proposals for these types of non-routine items will be established as the arise, and will be outside our regular monthly retainer arrangement.