Anita Britton
Anyone who has been an employee and then a business owner knows there are pros and cons to both sides of a paycheck. It’s true in any profession, even the law. Attorneys decide to start their own businesses for the same personal reasons anyone else does.
Anita Britton, managing partner of Britton Osborne Johnson (www.bojfirm.com), spent 28 and a half years at Stoll Keenon Ogden before going out on her own. She calls starting her own practice “the most frightening and exhilarating thing I’ve ever done.”
She wanted a different endgame to her career. Instead of retiring with an established firm where she had a successful family law practice, Britton was in a position to create her own firm. She could afford to take the risk. Plus, there was something appealing about “the sisters doing it for themselves,” she said.
On Jan. 4, 2011, Britton, along with Crystal Osborne and Amy Johnson, left Stoll to open their own doors.
“It hurt to leave [Stoll Keenon Ogden]. I wasn’t running out the door. I love those people. I think they're the best lawyers in Lexington. The firm had been very, very good to me,” said Britton.
The law firm of Britton Osborne Johnson works with family law and securities arbitration, among other areas of legal practice, with three partners, two associates, three staff members and a student from Transylvania who is a runner/messenger.
“I never planned to have this be an all-women law firm,” Britton said. “It just turned out that way. I think our atmosphere is very family-oriented, and by that I mean we treat one another as family. We're very close.”
Before starting her own firm, Britton relied heavily on repeat business. “I had to get up every day and reinvent myself,” she said. “My portfolio of clients is built by bringing new clients in the door literally every day.”
She thought she had a portable practice and that if she was able to do it at Stoll, she could do it anywhere.
“But you don't know until you try,” she said. “It is a scary proposition. It turned out happily.”
John Brugger
John Brugger is an attorney at law who set up his own practice a decade ago, after spending the first six years of his legal career working for law firms. He handles estate, business and tax planning, as well as probate and tax controversy.
“There have been far more positives to working for myself than in a larger firm,” he said. “However, it has not been necessarily easy.”
One of the not-so-easy things is that overhead expenses are all on his shoulders as a solo practitioner. He does not have a website but he does share clerical staff with another long-term attorney friend of his. On the plus side, Brugger is no longer a slave to the billable hour requirement, choosing instead to charge most of his work on a flat-fee basis.
“Clients know at the beginning about how much their legal fees will be at the end,” he said. “With flat-fee billing, I do not bill for every email, telephone call, bad joke, etc. Instead of focusing on billable hours, I am focused on getting clients’ documents to them. For hourly work, I have the unilateral ability to adjust bills. In the end, this has allowed me to be more efficient and considerate to the always fee-conscious client.”
Being self-employed also gives him the freedom to take time off for his daughter’s dance recital or a school meeting.
“I remember when I was a child, my father was always too busy to spend time with me,” he said. “I vowed I would not let that happen to me.”
Brugger represents a lot of business owners, which he says is an unforeseen positive.
“It is nice to be able to share my real-world experiences as a business owner to give advice to clients, particularly new business owners,” he said.
Hard work and perseverance go hand-in-hand with owning a business. “It takes sacrifices, both personal and professional,” Brugger said. “It’s not a part-time job. It’s a full-time job with far more pluses than minuses. The good thing is that your hard work goes into your pocket.”