Why mission driven businesses are crippled by avoidable legal trouble.

As a mission driven business, I am your biggest fan. I admire the work you do in providing products or services that make our world a better place and focusing on making your employees feeling part of something greater than themselves is something so few truly get to spend a life dedicated to.

Unfortunately, I’m  saddened to see so many of these amazing businesses crippled by legal issues that could have been avoided. 

Of course, it’s not their fault, the average mission driven company usually has a tighter budget and therefore can’t afford high priced attorneys on speed dial.

As a consequence though – they often make judgement calls that can lead to expensive losses and costly business mistakes.

That is why, today I’m going to show you 2 ways on how to protect your business from costly legal mistakes – without the big attorney bills and even protect you from employee-related costs at little or no expense. 

Mission driven companies avoid seeking attorney advice because it is expensive. 

It upsets me to see so many mission driven businesses make “finger crossed” decisions and do things without contracts in place, just to save legal fees. This often leads to putting the business at risk and in legal disputes that take away from their allocated budgets and focus from the important work they do

The solution to this is simple, we need to remove your barrier to calling an attorney. But how?

In short, by removing the barrier of cost. I always recommend that purpose driven businesses retain the services of a subscription based legal advisory… so they can get an attorney on speed dial without the per hourly rate. You’ll be surprised, it’s not as expensive as you’d think.

Robert is a great example of this.

Mental Health is one of Robert’s passions and understands that everyday life demands can cause stress, anxiety, depression and even restless sleep which take a toll on one’s body physically including muscle pain and inflammation, heart disease or other chronic health issues.

His goal was to create a treatment center to provide services for both the mind and body including massage therapy, hydrotherapy and acupuncture giving people the ability to reduce stress, decrease depression, improve their sleep and overall mental health.  However, he, himself, was stressed, distracted and faced sleepless nights worrying about the legal ramifications and liabilities of his clinic and the cost of attorneys that he didn’t have funds for. 

After a conversation about how a pre-paid legal subscription gives members access to law firms of attorneys without the worry high hourly costs, he enrolled in a business legal plan.  Soon enough Robert’s worries quickly decreased as he began consulting with multiple attorneys about various issues with his center starting with the center’s lease agreement making sure his best interest was looked out for. The attorneys assisted him in revising his therapist contracts that had red flags which could have become large costly legal issues if they weren’t addressed before signed and answers to numerous questions that arose as he continued forward with his grand opening. He felt a sigh of relief knowing that he was able to address the legal needs setting up the center properly to avoid major legal obstacles and keep his small budget intact. 

Robert shared with me that he now has peace of mind with attorneys on speed dial whenever he needs them to help keep his business safe without spending thousands of dollars. His primary focus is redirected back towards his passion of improving the physical and mental wellbeing of his clients so they can live everyday life a little easier. 

Mission driven companies don’t realize employees have legal matters and derail the mission. 

It also  saddens me to see so many mission driven businesses and nonprofits attract employees that often times accept a lower wage in order to make a difference. Yet for some reason many of their staff seem distracted and they are not sure why or how to help. 

Now this is going to sound crazy - but what you need to know is that your staff’s legal issues are costing you money and getting in the way of your important work…. So unless you give them access to recourses for their own legal issues, even small disputes can drag you down with them. 

The solution is easy and yet many employers are unaware that they can provide their employees with attorney access at little or no cost.

You see often, it’s the everyday life matters that steal the focus from employees during the workday and a simple call to an attorney can make all the difference in getting them back on track. That is what happened to Rose, a Development Assistant for an animal rescue. She landed her dream job and even took a pay cut to raise necessary funds to save local dogs and cats from euthanasia. 

One day Rose was found to be very upset, frazzled and was behind on her donor outreach. It turns out that she was spending hours at work on the phone dealing with a new cell phone carrier customer service because her new $650 cell phone continued to have technical issues for weeks. The stress and time trying to solve the issue on her own was distracting her away from helping animals in need. Customer service eventually agreed for her to return the phone without any cost and she could go back to her previous carrier. However, the next day, the new carrier customer service refused to take the phone back without her paying the $650 cost. Rose almost cried after spending so many hours and weeks trying to resolve this on her own and her fundraising was suffering. 

Rose getting nowhere finally contacted an attorney who wrote a letter on her behalf directly to that carrier’s legal department. The following week Rose received a call apologizing for the inconvenience, was waived the financial responsibility for the phone and wasn’t charged 3 weeks of service she had with them. Rose most likely would not have contacted an attorney for $300 or $400+ an hour for a $650 cell phone matter but because it didn't cost her anything having a legal benefit she was able to do so. Rose was so grateful that her employer provided the legal benefit because she now has this phone issue behind her so she can focus her time and energy back into raising the important funding to save more dogs and cats. 

Like Rose, employees typically don’t share their personal issues with their employers regardless of if it is large or small, yet either can take them hours away (even mentally) from the precious work they do which trickles down to project delays, added business expenses, and less products or services for the community which can be costly. 

Mission driven companies failed to reduce unknown expenses significantly.

Biggest issue I see with purpose driven companies has them working harder and worse making guesstimated decisions as opposed to getting the right answers which could lead to costly issues like sponsors not paying or tough supplier disputes. 

Of course, they are just trying to save money for the company they care about but what they don’t realize is, they can get their important work done and the right advice in an affordable way with no incremental line-item costs 

Wait….. what? What does that mean? 

The solution is simple, access to law firms on speed dial without the worry of cost. I know that sounds impossible, but it wasn't for Jim and if you choose, it won’t be for you either.

Jim owns a company that produces environmentally safe cleaning products. Jim’s passion is to have safe healthy products to keep homes and even office environments clean that are non-toxic, use sustainable materials and are cruelty-free. His vision is to have cleaner homes and planet one household at a time.

However, his journey consisted of constant speed bumps because his management team continually asked him questions that have legalities around the answers. Not being a lawyer himself and believing he couldn’t afford the cost of attorney fees, he and his team struggled taking time researching best answers they could find and made “finger crossed” decisions. The team constantly worried about if their efforts, not knowingly, put the business at risk. It became overwhelming for everyone in turn causing operations, sales and marketing of his products to suffer with less households to be safely cleaned. 

His Accountant Mary kept asking him questions regarding the business structure, liability insurance and distributer agreements. She was excited they were expanding their product line and also concerned about the risk if it wasn’t done right ahead of time. His Human Resources director, Sue, had employment questions around the employees, including one that left the company and was “bad mouthing” his employment. She knew what was being said was false and yet didn’t know how best to handle it and protect the business. 

Jim had recalled our conversation about legal subscriptions with multiple users and no attorney fees, so he reached out to me for help. After finding a subscription legal service he began redirecting his time researching and preparing for the new eco-friendly product line while Mary and Sue called the attorneys for advice, having liability insurance reviewed to be sure they chose the right policy best for the company, sending a letter to the former employee which caused him to stop his negative reviews and even collected outstanding $2,000 vendor debt after an attorney sent a collection letter all without any attorney invoices. 

His entire team felt relief as a huge weight had been lifted because they no longer wasted their time researching the law and potentially putting the business at risk instead, they saved many hours of valuable time and thousands of dollars that was used for their safe products. 

So the perception that legal help is expensive is common but not necessarily a reality. 

It’s a simple matter of attorney subscriptions that can be included in a budget at a little or no-cost line item.  

Just like medical issues while traveling internationally can be - but if your smart you get travel insurance and, if your smarter… you'll get a subscription legal service on speed dial… the peace of mind it gives you is priceless… and it doesn't come close to breaking the bank.

If you'd like a little advice about how to find a legal subscription service, how much you should pay and what is the right choice for you, I would be happy to provide you with some free guidance.  You're welcome to contact me for a free 30-minute call.

I hope to speak with you and learn about your unique business needs soon!