When starting a business, it’s always a good idea to seek out people with experience. Seasoned accountants, lawyers, and people who ran successful businesses before you are an invaluable resource. While this is not necessarily mandatory, the truth is that it makes your job so much easier. One example is the idea of hiring or at least consulting a lawyer when starting a business. Here are the six most compelling reasons why you should do so.
- Contracts
As a business, you will need a lot of contracts to be made in order to efficiently run your business. Signing contracts with your employees will ensure that both parties know their rights and responsibilities. Contracts with your clients are there to protect everyone’s interests and ensure that you have legal mechanisms to protect yourself from any eventual problem. Contracts with investors and partners will resolve questions regarding equity, which may cause a lot of uneasiness in the future. Overall, in order to allow contracts to perform this function, you need to ensure that they’re legally binding. This is the way to do it.
- Tax
Tax liability is one of the biggest issues that you will need legal help with. You see, there are a lot of businesses that are operating internationally, which causes so many legal issues regarding the repatriation of profits and more. In some business hubs, legal procedures are quite complex and you’ll need the help of a legal expert to untangle this intricate web. For instance, if you planned to start a business in Dubai, you would face three different potential jurisdictions. Mainland, free zone and offshore. Unfortunately, this is not the only place with such a complicated legal structure for businesses.
- Intellectual property protection
Preventing others from profiting by using your ideas is not a matter of vanity. It is an act of self-preservation and something that you can’t stress out enough. Your business model, your products and your unique ideas, in general, may be eligible for protection as an IP. In order to check whether this is the case, you need a skilled legal expert on your team. Sure, you can do research on your own but the only way to be sure is to have a professional in your corner. This is something that needs to be handled as soon as possible since there’s no such thing are too small to steal from in the world of modern business.
- Ensuring continuity
No one lives forever and what happens next usually depends on how well the person in question managed their estate. Even if there’s no need to worry about such things, as of yet, the uncertainty regarding this continuity and the future (legacy) of the business needs to be taken into consideration. So, what you need to do in order to ensure continuity is to look for a reliable wills lawyer to explain to you the best options. Your wishes should be the law but there are a lot of things to consider when managing your estate, things that might otherwise slip your mind.
- Permits and certificates
While permits and certificates need to be listed on the website of the governmental body, there are some things you need to keep in mind when starting a business. Getting the paperwork is not necessarily that difficult but there are a lot of benefits that you may access that you aren’t even aware of. A skilled accountant could warn you of any tax deductions that you might have missed or some unexpected government grants that you are eligible for. Still, there are quite a few starting tips from a lawyer that you could access, as well.
- Picking a business structure
A business structure determines both the equity in the business and its tax scheme. You can start as a sole proprietorship, partnership or an LLC. The thing is that this determines your legal liability and the scheme according to which you get to pay taxes. Every structure has its own set of advantages and downsides. It also has a list of requirements that you have to fulfil. This is definitely something that you should consult a legal expert about. It is a simple matter when handled by a professional but quite confusing when dealt with by a layman.
In conclusion
One of the most important things to keep in mind is the fact that hiring a lawyer isn’t mandatory but it is more than advised. Sure, you can do the research on your own, fill out all the legal forms, and monitor every tiny detail. However, do you have enough time and energy to spend on such things in a stage where you should focus on other administrative tasks, tasks that can’t be handled without you? Instead, leave this to professionals and focus on the growth and development of your business.