Employment law attorney, author, and Founder/CEO of the Crone Law Firm, Alan Crone reveals the list of things a new or small business absolutely MUST do to stay on the right side of the law.Hear Alan's full interview in Episode 475 of The Action Catalyst.
Let's say I am a small business owner. Five things that I should have to protect my business, my assets. I come to you, hey, I'm starting this business where I've got it up and running. We're a couple million in revenue. What do I absolutely got to do?
Well, the first thing is, no matter how big your organization is, you need an employee handbook and you need written job descriptions for every position for all the reasons we've been talking about. It's one of those things that you say that to operations people in a business and they, oh, job descriptions. And it's one of those check off kinds of things. No, no, no.
This is a great business tool because you really need to make sure that what you say people are doing or what they actually are doing. And that is so important, whether it's compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Fair Labor Standards Act, Title VII, all those things. The first thing that a plaintiff lawyer is going to ask for and discover is, give me the job description.
If the job description is wrong, a good trial lawyer can just make you look silly because your job description is wrong. I could do a whole show on job descriptions. So that's the number one. Job descriptions, employee handbooks, which is another way of saying, communicate your expectations, communicate your standards. The second thing is, once you've communicated your standards,
once you've communicated your expectations, they're non-negotiable. If they're negotiable, then they're not a standard and they're not an expectation. And you should make sure everybody knows. If five widgets a month is a non-negotiable and the person can't do five widgets a month, ask them to seek their salvation elsewhere, as they used to say at my high school. It's non-negotiable.
That's going to do two things. One, your guys that are doing eight widgets a month are going to appreciate you because they see that you value their efforts The people who are doing four realize, I got this really, they're serious about that. And you're going to get better production out of it. The next thing everyone should have is you should protect your intellectual property.
My product or my service is not the value of my company. The value of my company is how I do those things. They're agreements. that you can have that really tie that stuff down, non-competes, non-solicitation. Those agreements can be enforceable. Most of them are not as enforceable as people think because, again, they're kind of off the rack.
Somebody says, well, those salesmen, we need to get a non-compete with them. And so they go to
uh the internets they pull down an agreement and they everybody signs it and then when you have to go and enforce it there's problems because it's not customized to your situation and i'm not in the the person who ordered it isn't going to get what they thought they were getting and they're going to have some lawyer like me say well you know give you that kind of experience which which you don't want so understanding what your intellectual property is and what it isn't is crucial
Part of it may be the cocktail of vendors that you have assembled. The identity of those vendors is proprietary. And that doesn't necessarily mean that it's secret, that somebody couldn't figure out who you use for SEO or who you use for supplying that vanilla that makes your cupcakes taste so good. But somebody doesn't have to do a commercial about it or publicize it.
So you want to make sure that if that vendor relationship is important, that you protect it either through exclusive contracts with the vendor or non-disclosure agreements or whatever it is. Of course, part of that means you've got to understand what it is and then communicate that to everybody else. So the third thing I would say from a legal standpoint is have a relationship with a lawyer.
Have a relationship with an accountant, with a banker. You should be going to lunch with those folks once a quarter at least. To keep them apprised of your situation and ask them for advice and so forth. Keeping good tabs on those professional relationships and advice. And then finally, I would say, be fair. Be fair, be real, be human. When you start a business, you're not starting a family.
We're not family. But you're a good team. You're a collaborative team. Have values. Have a mission. Have a reason other than just making money. that you come to work every morning. I find that when I put my focus on that vision, and my professional mission is to transform the American workplace, one client, one case at a time. That's not something that's going to happen overnight.
That's why we have that disclaimer at the back of it. But when I keep my focus on that mission, great things happen. When I'm concentrating on me, how much money I'm going to make, how much growth my firm has and that sort of thing. That's when it all kind of falls apart because true success is elevating other people.
And so if you do those things every day, then every day you're going to be a little bit better. And you're going to look up after a year, after five years, after 10 years and say, man, we really have come a long way, although I don't remember getting here. Those are the things I would do.
Super helpful.