Our mission is to simplify the transaction management process. In fact, it’s the core of our existence! We’ve been fortunate to connect with firms from around the globe to help make closing their deals that much easier. Throughout our Client Profile series, we’ll be featuring our valued clients. To kick it off, we chatted with Megan Cornell from Momentum Business Law.
What is the most rewarding part of practicing law?
My firm works with entrepreneurs, so playing a role in helping entrepreneurs grow and scale their businesses is a never-ending source of motivation.
As the firm’s founder, I’m an entrepreneur myself. So it’s even more rewarding to witness a firm that I started as a solo lawyer in my home office grow into a business that supports many professionals and an ever-growing group of entrepreneurial clients. As the boss and Chief Innovation Officer, I get to implement every crazy idea, adopt any new innovation or technology I want and learn and grow from those trials. I know that this isn’t everyone’s experience in law, so I count myself lucky that I get to do this every day and that I have a team, and innovation partners (like dealcloser!), who enable this.
What made you decide to become a lawyer?
My grandmother gave me a book at around age 10 called The Scales of Justice—that was my personal call to the profession and the need to right the wrongs in the justice system. Over the years I veered off into business law, but that sense of creating an even playing field and providing access to legal support to everyone who needs it has continued.
Where did you study law school?
I studied law school at Queens University in Kingston, Ontario.
What advice do you have for aspiring and other lawyers?
This isn’t always an easy or rewarding profession. There are certainly easier and more predictable ways to earn a living. So think carefully about other options that might interest you before you dive into the cost and commitment of a law school education. If you have selected this profession, don’t assume that there is one direct path you can take from law school to retirement. Make choices that allow you to make other choices as much as possible—i.e. don’t commit to a certain lifestyle that requires you to continue in an environment you don’t thrive in. Have an open mind to where your law degree can take you—it might even take you to create a legal tech startup!
Please give a brief background of your firm and your practice.
Momentum Business Law provides business law support to entrepreneurs across Ontario. Our commitment is to provide the best legal support for businesses through thoughtful advice, efficient services and transparent prices. We work to deliver on that commitment every day through process and service innovation with a focus always on the client experience.
Officially launched in 2015, the firm provides a range of service options for clients. We offer traditional legal advisory services, flat-rate work, a soon-to-launch DIY Legal Information and Documents site, an Academy to train other business lawyers, and agency-style work for other lawyers and firms dealing with business clients.
We have an ever-growing 20 person team spread out across Ontario. Our head office is in Ottawa, with other office locations currently in Toronto and Hamilton. Thanks to a lot of heavy lifting on processes and procedures prior to 2020, we seamlessly transitioned to a virtual work environment over the last year. But we’re looking forward to finding the perfect mix of virtual and communal work in the future.
What’s your favourite dealcloser feature?
The ease of organizing documents and assigning and collecting signatures definitely shines. The user interface is intuitive and comfortable. However, the feature we’ve gotten the most use out of is the ability to edit documents right in the platform and then to easily run a document compare (or allow other counsel to do so!). This feature is a huge time saver and elevates the experience.
What is the most remarkable experience you’ve had using dealcloser?
The most recent experience was seamlessly closing a transaction with a more experienced counsel on the other side. When we first saw that he was called in 1974, we groaned a little and expected the demand for wet signatures and 8 copies of all documents. To this counsel’s credit, they embraced the dealcloser platform even though it was unfamiliar. The ease of use for both the counsel and his equally experienced client was a huge credit to dealcloser. This experience provided us with complete confidence that we do not need to back away from using the platform working with counsels who are unfamiliar with it or reluctant to try it. We can persist and all parties involved with the deal will have a good experience.
It was a joy to hear about Megan and her firm Momentum Business Law, and we’re so excited to see more and more firms adopting innovation.
And of course—if you or your firm is looking to adopt a new innovation to help streamline the deal closing process, be sure to check out how dealcloser can help.
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