One way to be proactive is in drafting contracts and agreements. Partnership or operating agreements, homeowner-contractor contracts, employment agreements, non-competes, transactional and other kinds of agreements are the first steps in dispute prevention. A good contract lawyer will work with his clients to know their businesses well, anticipate the kinds of issues that will come up and address them in the contract. That’s what makes an agreement that a lawyer worked on valuable and very different than the boilerplate templates that people try to get online and then plug in their names. A good contract lawyer will make sure that the specific issues that are part of his client’s business are addressed with tailored clauses ahead of time, before they come to a head.

One issue to address early is what the contracting parties do if they get into a dispute. What approaches or processes will they use that will be best for the situations that might arise? It’s always more effective to discuss and decide what people will do before a dispute arises, while heads are cool and while the parties are working well together than after it happens and the added tension and stress is now a part of the equation.

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