New Businesses
Start-Ups
If you are interested in starting a new business, you are in the right place.
Launching and operating a successful business requires careful planning and execution. There are many issues to consider before you form a company, during the formation stage, during the opening stage, and during the operational stage.
Here are a few of the important issues to consider:
- Where Can I Get the Best Advice Before I Open My Business?
- What is the Best Form of Entity for My Business?
- What Kind of Workers Do I Need?
- How Do I Choose the Right Key Partners?
- How Do I Protect My Business with Contracts?
- How Do I Protect My Business with Policies and Procedures?
- How Do I Protect My Trade Name, Idea and other Intellectual Property?
- What Advice and Planning Do I Need to Reduce My Risks?
- What Do I Need to Improve My Business?
- What Do I need to Grow My Business?
Get Expert Advice
First, you must get the right counsel to help you on this journey. Private Corporate Counsel business lawyers have the legal and business education, training, and experience to help you. They also have practical experience representing businesses in many sectors, and operating businesses themselves, giving them added insight on what new entrepreneurs often tackle. Your Private Corporate Counsel (“PCC”) can help you in many ways, including:
- Help You Analyze and Your Business Ideas
- Help You Analyze and Improve Your Business Plan
- Help You Understand Your Options
- Help You Decide the Best Form of Entity
- Help You Decide Where to Form Your Business
- Help You Analyze Investors
- Help You Analyze Key Partners
- Help You Analyze Opportunities
- Help You Understand Legal and Regulatory Issues
- Help You Understand The Tax Issues
- Help You Make Good Decisions
Help you Maximize your Potential
CAUTION: DO NOT USE AN ACCOUNTANT, BOOKKEEPER OR NON-LAWYER CONSULTANT FOR LEGAL ADVICE, TO FORM YOUR COMPANY, TO NEGOTIATE CONTRACTS, OR DRAFT ANY LEGAL DOCUMENT. NOT ONLY DO THEY NOT HAVE THE EDUCATION, TRAINING, LICENSE, OR EXPERIENCE NECESSARY TO HELP YOU COMPETENTLY AND PROTECT YOUR INTERESTS, BUT ALSO IT MAY BE THE ILLEGAL UNLICENSED PRACTICE OF LAW FOR THEM TO ENGAGE IN THESE ACTS AND THEY MAY CAUSE YOU EXTREME HARM.
Form Your Company
The next step is to start the process of forming your company. Once you understand the differences between n Sole Proprietorship, Corporation, Limited Liability Company, and Partnership, your Private Corporate Counsel can help you form the entity that is best for your company, and help you with the rest of the formation process, including the following:
- Design a plan before forming your company
- Chose a form and entity that is best for your plans
- Corporation Formation
- LLC Formation
- Partnership Formation
- Joint Venture Formation
- Obtain your Federal Tax ID
- Obtain your State Tax ID
- Obtain your Licenses
- Register your Business
- Comply with City and County Codes
Open your Bank Accounts
Staff Your Company
Once you have formed your business, you will need workers to help you operate it. Qualifying and choosing the right workers is one of the most important functions in the entrepreneurial process. At this stage of the process, it is important to consult with your Private Corporate Counsel to analyze whether or not you have the right people (who want to work for you, understand what you need, and have the capacity to do the job), and how to structure the relationship between your company and its workers to strike a balance between minimizing costs and maximizing potential for the advancement of the company, and themselves. During this stage, you should discuss the following with your Private Corporate Counsel:
- Hire the right people
- Employees – Part-time vs. Full-time
- Independent Contractors vs. Employees
- Internships and other Training Programs
- Contracting with a Company
- Contracting with Individuals
- INS Form I-9 Eligibility Verification
- Volunteers
- Other Workers Related Issues
Strategic Partners
In addition to the workers who help you operate your business, it is also important to have key partners who can help you with the essential goods and services to maximize your potential for success. At this stage, you should consult with your Private Corporate Counsel to identify, evaluate, and choose key external partners, including the following:
- Accountants
- Banks and Other Financial Institutions
- Suppliers
- Vendors
- Specialty Providers
- Consultants
Contracts & Agreements
Having the right internal workers and external partners is essential; They bring hope, opportunity, and promises. They also and bring risks to your business. In order to protect your business, you need to have them all sign contracts designed to protect you and your business. Therefore, before you hire or engage any employee, worker or partner, you should consult with your Private Corporate Counsel to learn how to identify and analyze the risks they bring, and develop strategies to minimize these risks, including negotiating, drafting and executing the right contracts, including the following:
- Confidentiality Agreements
- Dispute Resolution Agreements
- Drug Free Workplace Agreements
- Employee Agreements
- Independent Contractor Agreements
- Internet and Computer Use Agreements
- Joint Venture Agreements
- Loyalty Agreements
- Non-Compete Agreements
- Non-Solicitation Agreements
- Operating Agreements
- Shareholder Agreements
- Trade Secret Agreements
- Vendor Agreements
Policies & Procedures
While contracts are effective tools to protect your business against risks and threats from internal workers and external partners, you can enhance this protection by having good policies and procedures in place that guide your workers in their daily tasks and ensure that everyone complies with the standards you set for the business. This will help create and maintain the positive culture you need to grow and improve your business. Therefore, it is a good idea to consult with your Private Corporate Counsel about the following:
- Anti-Discrimination Policies
- Anti-Harassment Policies
- ADA Policies
- Vacation, Sick Leave and Volunteer Leave Policies
- Pay and Overtime Policies
- Conflict Resolution Policies
- Performance Improvement Plan Policies
- Grooming and Dress Policies
- Media Policies
- Social Media Policies
- Crisis and Disaster Relief Policies
Intellectual Property
When you have a unique brand, idea, concept, invention, or other intellectual property (“IP”), you will want to protect it from competitors and others who will want to take unfair advantage of you and your business. Protecting your trade name, trademark, service mark, original work, innovative ideas and other IP is important because the protection allows you to stop others from using them without your permission, or from unfairly competing with you. Therefore, it is critical that you consult with your Private Corporate Counsel about all of your IP and ask about what is required to ensure that you are protected.
- Trade Names
- Trademarks
- Trade Secrets
- Customer Lists
- Systems
- Business Ideas
- Customer Lists
- Proprietary Policies
- Original Artwork
- Confidential Operational Manuals
- Licensing Agreements
- Service Marks
Risk Mitigation
Successful entrepreneurs recognize that there is always a risk to their business and personal assets since accidents do happen. They also recognize that changes in the environment, technology, and politics are unpredictable and can be devastating. They must take steps to protect their assets by creating a comprehensive risk management plan. The earlier they engage in risk mitigation planning, the more chances they have of creating a plan that will be effective when they need it. Therefore, at the onset, it is a good idea to talk to your Private Corporate Counsel about the following:
- Asset Protection Planning
- Company Structure Planning
- Estate Planning
- Segmentation of Risky Assets
- Key Contracts to Limit Risks
- Key Insurance to Cover Risks
- Ready Access to Private Corporate Counsel
Hire A Consultant
Entrepreneurs start a business to succeed, not only in their business life, but also in their personal life. They want to achieve prime in their personal life cycle, relationship life cycle, family life cycle, professional life cycle, work/job life cycle, and their financial life cycle. If the business is in its prime, the hope is that it will generate enough profit to provide the freedom and flexibility to help entreprenuers be the best version of themselves, and give them the opportunity to help others. In order to get their businesses into its prime, entrepreneurs must continually work on improving; they need a guide to help them maximize their time, energy and potential. The Private Corporate Counsel’s membership program provides unlimited access to business professionals to help entrepreneurs through each step of the journey and monthly coaching to address difficult issues and learn new concepts to ensure that they keep improving. With the help of Private Corporate Counsel, entrepreneurs can begin to transition out of “working in their businesses” to “working on their businesses.”
- Analyze and Improve your Business Model
- Identify and Understand Key Customer Segments
- Develop Strong Value Propositions
- Develop Strong Customer Relationships
- Analyze and Improve the Channels of Distribution
- Analyze and Improve Key Activities
- Identify and Source Key Resources
- Identify Key Partners and Form Key Partnerships
- Analyze Cost Structures
- Analyze and Developing Revenue Streams
Aspire To Greatness
Success includes growing your business to increase sales, expand its market share, expand to other jurisdictions, and expand its offerings. When you are “working on your business”, you will have time to expand your knowledge, skills, experience and relationships necessary to help you see the trends in your industry, and anticipate changes in the environment and technology. This allows you to identify opportunities that you are now ready to pursue. At this stage, it is critical to have your Private Corporate Counsel readily accessible to review and analyze the opportunities and help you choose the right opportunity for the moment. This requires consistent communications between you and your Private Corporate Counsel to help with the following:
- Analyze and Improve Your Business Model
- Analyzing and Improving Your Value Proposition
- Working on Innovation
- Differentiating From Competitors
- Identifying and Analyzing Trends
- Anticipating Changes in the Environment
- Preparing for Changes in the Environment
- Anticipating Changes in Technology
- Preparing for Changes in technology
- Analyzing Key Life Cycles
- Identifying and Analyzing Opportunities
- Taking Strategic Advantage of Opportunities
- Training Your Team to Ensure Readiness
Start Your Business Journey Today.
Start Building Your Crisis Management Plan Today
Download your free guide, Managing Your Business Through a Crisis: 7 Steps to Success, and discover the top recommended ways to prepare your company for the unexpected.
Get Personalized Guidance From PCC
Request your free consultation and we’ll get you started on implementing strategies to protect your business.