Sapna is a content writer at Sprintlaw. She has completed a Bachelor of Laws with a Bachelor of Arts. Since graduating, she has worked primarily in the field of legal research and writing, and now helps Sprintlaw assist small businesses.
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Legal advice is one of the biggest investments you will make for your business. It’s not something you want to do half-heartedly or avoid altogether, as this could expose your business to unnecessary risks. It’s always best to get the help of a legal expert.
When seeking out legal help, you’ll find there are some lawyers who claim they can handle all business law related tasks.
This is never a good sign.
It takes years of hard work and experience to build an expertise in any area of business law. So, it’s simply not possible for one person to ‘know it all’.
To give your business the right kind of protection, it’s important to seek out professional advice from experts in business law.
Let’s discuss this in more detail below.
Why Should I Get Professional Legal Advice for My Small Business?
When it comes to running a business, there’s a number of pieces that have to fall into place. You will likely need to have the right product or service, a decent marketing strategy as well as suppliers or distributors. However, everything can fall apart pretty quickly if you don't legally protect your business.
That’s why, when you're making plans for your business it’s important to take into account the legal factors that will impact your business. Some business owners chose to skip the legal aspect of running their business or cut corners. They often think, why fix what isn’t broken?
In some scenarios, that logic might work. However, when it comes to your business legals – preparation is key. Waiting for something to happen is one of the worst things you can do as by the time that happens, it’s already pretty late. Depending on the situation, your business might end up losing money, facing legal consequences and even suffering a bad reputation.
What makes it all worse is that in most cases, the situation could have been avoided if the business owner had just properly taken care of their legals to begin with.
Is It Necessary To Get Specialist Legal Advice?
So, we covered that professional legal services are important when running a business. However, do you really need a specialist? It’s not uncommon for business owners to believe they can simply go to one person for all their business legal needs.
As we mentioned above, it takes years and a lot of experience to become an expert in one area of business law. As you might have noticed, business law is an extremely broad industry. It includes matters like intellectual property, different types of contracts, employment law and regulatory compliance.
Specialists know the in and outs of the particular area they have expertise in, as opposed to a general knowledge. This means, they’ll be able to provide you with much better legal advice and solutions as they are much more familiar with that area.
What Kinds Of Specialist Legal Advice Can I Get For My Small Business?
There’s lots of different areas you might like to seek specialist advice from. Instead of running to multiple lawyers from different firms, it’s best to find a law firm that has all kinds of business legal specialists under one roof. In case you missed it, at Sprintlaw, we offer exactly that (plus we’re completely online so you can get in touch at your convenience).
Here’s a few areas you may want to approach a specialist for business legal advice.
Contracts
When you run a business, a key mistake to avoid is not having proper contracts in place. At times, business owners make the crucial blunder of relying on verbal agreements, downloading an online template for an important agreement or opting to draw up their contracts themselves. Contracts are what keeps your business protected from risks, so it’s important to have contracts that are expertly drafted and look out for your best interests. For all your business contracts, it’s imperative to get them drafted by an expert in contracts.
Intellectual Property
If you don’t take the steps to protect your business’s Intellectual Property (IP), then you could be opening the doors for unnecessary loss. IP is extremely broadly defined, it’s essentially anything original that has been created from the mind. Therefore, your IP could be anything from important resources your business has created, to a logo or a product design.
An IP expert can help you identify the types of IP your business has and determine the right avenues to protect it. For instance, if you have a logo then you need to register it as a Trade Mark. For other types of IP, you might need a Copyright Disclaimer or even an NDA. It will depend highly on the type of IP you have plus the purpose you plan on using it for, so it’s wise to get in touch with an IP expert and let them provide you with the right kind of guidance.
Employment Law
In New Zealand, employment regulations are taken pretty seriously. Breaking employment regulations can lead to some pretty serious consequences, so you want to make sure you’re on top of it at all times. An employment law expert can guide you through getting the right legal documents that can help in running a safe workplace, such as a strong Workplace Policy.
Moreover, they can guide you on the rules and laws you need to be following, so you know exactly what you need to be doing. If your business has employees (or will in the future), it’s worth seeing an employment law expert at least once.
Data and Privacy
When you run a business, you're tasked with protecting the privacy of your business and your business’s customers or clients. A data and privacy legal expert can let you know exactly what laws your business should follow and what legal instruments it can use for legal compliance. For example, if your business's website collects any kind of private information from its visitors, then you will need to have a Privacy Policy on the website. Chatting with a data and privacy expert can help you gain the clarity needed to ensure your business is navigating the legal aspect of data and the online world properly.
Next Steps
Specialist legal advice is the best way to go when protecting your business’s legals. You want to ensure you give your business the best protection you can, so it’s important to recruit the help of an expert that knows their field of business law well. To summarise what we’ve discussed:
- Legal advice is a crucial investment for your business, don’t let just anyone handle it
- Specialists are essential due to the complexity and depth of various areas within business law
- Neglecting legal aspects of your business can lead to significant financial and reputational damage
- Specialist advice is essential for things like contracts, intellectual property, employment law, data and privacy
- Experts can help ensure compliance, protect assets, and maintain a safe workplace as well as online presence
If you would like a consultation on your options moving forward, you can reach us at 0800 002 184 or team@sprintlaw.co.nz for a free, no-obligations chat.
Sapna Goundancontent writer
