When the word “lawyer” or “attorney” is mentioned, most business people either make a joke about how lawyers belong in hell, or complain about how their attorney recently overcharged them. As the head of operations for several companies, I had to deal with attorneys almost every day. I was also part of a law firm at one point in my career, so I have developed a very intimate and unique perspective of the inner workings of the legal industry.
So why am I writing this open letter to lawyers? Like many others, I have a love and hate relationship with attorneys. I don’t expect I can change much, since many bad practices become engrained during law school. But, us business people will always need lawyers, so I have a vested interest in helping attorneys understand our perspective.
One of the top five issues I’m passionate about is the need to increase the number of women executives, techies, scientists, and entrepreneurs. Why does this subject get so much of my mental energy?
Back when I lived in Chicago, I had the pleasure of working with a really grounded and wise CFO. He was an “old dog” with a CV many would envy. During one of our conversations about work environments, he said something that stuck with me: “companies that get unions deserve them”. If you treat your people fairly, invest in them, and genuinely care about their future, no union or 
I was recently helping a good friend with some logistics for an event she was organizing and I got a little frustrated, because I knew I could have contributed more if she would have asked for my help earlier. This inspired me to say: “Emmi, I am going to write an article about how to ask for help!” In any business endeavor when resources are tight (e.g. money, time, sleep, etc), one must know how to ask for help or a favor.
Apolinaras is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of building scalable and capital-efficient operations for technology and professional services companies.