1. How do you define your legal practice and typical clients?
Bottom line, I am an investment management lawyer. My practice is focused on several types of entities, all inter-related: pooled investment funds, investment advisers and distribution firms. Sometimes they are affiliated, sometimes not. What they have in common are a series of federal statutes and regulations adopted under the Securities Act, Investment Company Act, the Investment Advisers Act and the Securities Exchange Act, as well as ERISA and various state corporate and securities laws.
I advise fund managers and fund sponsors on fund formation issues as well as operational, offering and governance issues, as my typical client relationship is soup to nuts in nature, starting at the formation phase and moving to the operating phase, which can be decades long. The relationships are typically ongoing in nature, therefore, and allow me to work with all parts of these businesses.
2. Tell us about your legal career journey. What made you become a lawyer?
Going to law school and becoming a lawyer was a long-standing goal for me. Learning about the law and how the legal system in all its forms operates really appealed to my desire to understand how the “law” worked and to become someone who could work with the law as my profession. I love asking (and still ask) “why are things that way?” and I discovered that much of the answer lies in the law – in legislation, in regulation and in the judiciary. Whether I agreed with a given outcome or approach was not as important as understanding the “why” of it all. You can tell a great deal about a society or a culture by gaining a close understanding of how and what it chooses to legislate and regulate.
I have not been let down by my choice to place the law at the center of my career focus. That said, I felt early on the desire to experience different perspectives on the law as seen by different businesses and professions that are part of the investment management industry. Those different businesses come at the law of investment management from different standpoints – seen through their own eyes, the law can be an operational challenge, or it can be a procedural set of conduct rules, or it can be a jumping off point for creativity and development.
To fully experience those perspectives, I have worked with different firms and found different ways to be engaged with funds, advisers and distributors. I have served these clients from a law firm perspective and have held roles within these firms such as legal counsel, chief operating officer and even chief executive officer. Those differing perspectives and skill sets have all contributed to my ability to see and help my clients with their needs, both legal and business.
Editor: How did you land at Practus? Or in your case, how did you land at Practus – again?
Over my career, I enjoyed being part of several top-notch law firms. We did cutting-edge work for clients and enjoyed solving difficult challenges for them. I joined Practus in the well-founded belief that it gave me an ideal platform from which to serve clients in the ways that THEY wanted to be served by their attorneys. After several years, I was recruited to join a Practus client as general counsel and chief operating officer, which I enjoyed enormously. I had the opportunity recently to return to Practus and once again serve clients as an outside attorney and I couldn’t be more pleased.
3. What about the Practus model serves you as a legal professional, and as a person?
Practus embraces the idea that we are experienced lawyers who want to and know how to build practices that let us best serve our clients while allowing us to promote our own professional development and personal goals. It tries to break the binary, “either/or” model of being a lawyer and instead gives us room to build an approach to client service that works for our own skill sets and our own goals and priorities. I truly derive great professional satisfaction from helping clients achieve their goals.
4. Sometimes our best quality is also the one that gets us in tough situations. Tell us about your best quality and how it has mostly worked for you, except that one time …
My best quality is my ability to see what the path forward looks like and how it might work. And to believe that I have what it takes to get them to their goal. But that quality can get me into tough situations when I have not predicted an obstacle that threatens the schedule or goal. I have learned that I still have to project forward to the desired outcome, acknowledging that things might intercede that we cannot predict and pushing forward anyway.
5. When you’re not working at Practus, what’s keeping you busy? Any cool hobbies or hidden talents we don’t know about?
Going all the way back to my formative years, I have enjoyed playing drums. I have played in rock bands of all sorts, during high school, college and afterwards, and in jazz bands both large and small. I play in a jazz trio called Standard Time with some long-time friends who are wonderful composers and players; I enjoy that enormously and occasionally jam with some old rock band colleagues. I listen to and enjoy nearly every genre of music. My musician buddies call me “Sticks” (how original) or “Shades” – I don’t care what they call me, just that they call.
Editor: Are you impressed I played the snare in 3rd grade?
Yes, I am. I couldn’t get my parents to see past the clarinet for me until 7th grade. Almost too late. But once I got the snare (a “starter” snare), I was hooked and playing “traps” within the year. Did you quit after 3rd grade?
Editor: It might have been suggested to me by someone else in the band (clearly jealous) that I should explore other hobbies. Whatever.
6. What would your colleagues be totally shocked (or mildly surprised) to find out about you? Do you kill at karaoke? Write political thrillers? Watch Star Trek (original) reruns?
Maybe not shocked, but they would likely be amused by the fact that I participate in the annual American Crossword Puzzle Contest hosted by the NYT puzzle editor, Will Shortz. Doing puzzles every day keeps my brain sharp and breaks up the day when I pick up the paper or open my games app.
BONUS QUESTION: What would you do if you weren’t an attorney?
I would work for the government as a securities regulator. Or run a wine shop with lots of tastings and small charcuterie boards for sale.
Editor: Now we have to ask – what makes for the best charcuterie board?
Genoa salami, taleggio cheese, prosciutto and a Spanish blue cheese. And almonds and some honey.
