See around legal corners.
Spot what's coming.
Plot your course. Land your plan.
The issues that derail ambitious business plans are rarely surprises.
They're visible.
The trick is knowing where to look.
And looking early enough to plot the right path forward, so you land your plan.
Every business needs a plan.
Plans are energising. Plans deliver progress and growth.
But plans involve projections. So plans are vulnerable.
Especially to what you can't see from where you're standing.
Legal and compliance risks rarely announce themselves. They don't show up on your radar until they're already costing you. And by that time, your options are reactive, limited & expensive. And your plan is already off course.
But that doesn't mean those risks are unforeseeable & inevitable. It doesn't mean they can't be predicted and evaded.
All legal and compliance stuff is thought up and started by a person.
And that means you can think of it too.
Legal and compliance stuff is predictable, and it can be foreseen and steered around.
Especially if you have someone who knows where to look, what to look for and what to do about what is identified.
If you're serious about landing your business's long-term plan, its time to stop sitting back, waiting to see if legal stuff will come up while hoping that it doesn't
Our proactive legal intelligence will give you confidence that your business will land its plan without being derailed by unexpected legal stuff.
And allow you to focus on building something you can proudly tell your grandkids about.
This is the better way to 'do legal' for ambitious, growing businesses. Proactive legal intelligence.
Relationship First Law
"A breath of fresh air
compared to the trad model"
Trusted by ambitious businesses across many different industries
Take our Long-Term Plan Confidence Check
Want to be even more confident that your business will land its long-term plan?
Our free Long-Term Plan Confidence Check assessment gives you an honest picture of where your plan's foundations are strong, and where they can be bolstered, across five areas that directly affect your ability to land your plan:
customers & suppliers; products & services; people; brand; and governance.
You'll come away with specific, actionable things to focus on in each area. And an honest picture of where your instincts are working for your plan, and where they're quietly sabotaging it
Its free. It takes five minutes. The output is immediate, giving you useful pointers to help land your plan.
How We Can Help
Every engagement starts with a conversation.
But here's what working together typically looks like.
Radar
The Black Swan
Risk Workshop
A single day with your exec team to surface what you're not seeing.
No risk registers. No spreadsheets. No jargon. Just fresh, honest thinking, structured around a handful of carefully crafted questions that look at your business from angles your team is too close to see. You come out of it with a clear list of actions to make yourself more robust, without slowing down.
The right starting point if you want to know what you're missing.
One day. Fixed price.
A focused 4-6 month engagement built around landing your plan.
We scan ahead together, legally, structurally, from a compliance angle, identifying everything that could undermine what you're trying to build, then plot the best path through.
You come out of it knowing exactly where you're exposed, what to do about it, and confident to keep pushing forward towards your goal.
The right choice if you want to make sure nothing derails your big plan.
4-6 months. Fixed price.
Vantage
The GC Elevation Programme
Your GC is one of your most underleveraged assets.
Vantage changes that. Over 4-6 months, I work with your GC to help them operate at their very best: not just as a lawyer, but as a genuine strategic business driver. They develop the perspective, confidence and tools to scan ahead, protect the plan and sit at the table as a true peer to your leadership team.
The right investment to increase your GCs range & effectiveness.
4-6 months. Fixed price.
Strategic Legal Insight On Tap
For businesses that want more than a project.
Bearing is an ongoing strategic partnership: a permanent presence in your corner, helping you move forward on the optimal bearing, and right there alongside you the second something ever comes up.
You can start here. But if Horizon or Vantage has shown you what this kind of thinking can do for your business, Bearing is often the natural next step.
We only work with a select, small number of businesses at this level, so availability is limited.
Ongoing. Monthly retainer.
Not Sure Where to Start?
Most businesses begin with Radar — a single day to surface what they're not seeing. It's the lowest commitment and often the most revealing.
From there, the path depends on where you are. If you don't have a GC, Landfall is the right choice if you want to make sure nothing undermines your plan, as with this programme you will plot a path through the landmines so you build the business you always wanted. If you have a GC, Vantage elevates them to do that from the inside.
And for businesses that want ongoing strategic legal presence, permanently in their corner, always scanning ahead, as determined as you to land your plan, Bearing is the natural home.
Every journey starts with a conversation. There's no wrong entry point, just the one that's right for where you are now.
Proof It Works
"Makes law feel accessible, demystifies the complex, and makes the process easy"
Louise Barnard, Producer, DO Radio
I’ve seen first hand what happens when businesses flip the script & steer away from stressful, expensive legal combat to focus instead on long-term opportunities:
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A five-year IP battle I led cost millions but was finally resolved not through devastating arguments, but through a simple act: me going off-script and apologising. That apology ultimately built the relationship that led to the resolution.
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A ticking time bomb of anger on social media from aggrieved designers was defused with a credit that recognised their creativity, rather than an expensive, careful analysis to try to prove there was no copying.
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An urgent new multi-national opportunity was landed by ditching a contract & using a focussed discussion document, written in plain English in a conversational style, to quickly get the comfort needed, as we knew we never had the budget to sue the bigger player.
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Thousands in legal fees & months of wasted management time were avoided, and a strong new relationship was secured to replace a toxic broken one, by focussing on replacing the lost business, rather than running off to court, when a partner simply halted supplies.
Businesses really can convert their legal headaches into strategic advantages that empower them to land their plan.
This isn’t theory. It works.
Most businesses have a plan. Fewer land it.
Let's close that gap.
It may seem like all legal stuff is unpredictable and comes from out of nowhere. But it doesn't. All legal stuff is started by a person. And if another person is capable of thinking of that legal thing, then so are you.
Clear Course is a weekly newsletter that will help you land your long-term plan.
Each edition of the newsletter will have one Driver - one thing to implement that builds plan confidence - and one Sleeper - one thing to wake up to before it wakes you up. Clear Course will help you look up and look round legal corners. It will help you better position your business to spot what's coming, and plot the safest, quickly path forward through the legal landmines. It will enable you to become more robust at the same time as staying fast.
And, most importantly, it will give you ever-greater confidence that your business will land its long-term plan.
This is proactive legal intelligence for CEOs who intend to land their plan.
Subscribe to Clear Course today.