PMCW Law

As any entrepreneur knows, owning a business is an all-encompassing process. Your business requires constant attention and energy in order to thrive, and as the business owner you are constantly called upon to make important decisions regarding your company's livelihood. It will be up to you to determine how best to care for it throughout its various stages of growth. Ultimately, you will also have to decide what will happen to your business when you no longer wish to manage it. Business Succession Planning If you are like most people, you probably hope to retire someday. When that day comes, you will be required to make the (sometimes tough) decisions about what should happen to your business in your absence. Our Lake of the Ozarks business attorneys are here to help you devise the right strategy for your business succession plan. Asking yourself these questions can get you started on the right track. Question #1: Is There Someone I Want To Take Over The Business? Ge...

How can you know for sure if your business would benefit from having legal contracts? The short is answer is that companies can always benefit from using legal contracts to document their practices. In fact, our business attorneys at the Lake of the Ozarks would argue that drafting solid legal contracts may well be one of the most important steps new business owners can take. Keep reading to find out some of the different ways solid contracts can protect your company. Protecting Your Corporate Secrets It doesn't matter if you own a small company with three employees or a major company with over one hundred employees - every business has secrets. Whether your deal with recipes or corporate strategies, during your time in business you will develop your own unique ways of doing things. Having your employees sign legally binding confidentiality agreements can ensure that these secrets will be guarded - or, at the very least, give you an option for legal recourse if informatio...

As the owner of your new business, you are mostly responsible for your company's success. Your daily habits and business practices will directly impact the success of your company. As we enter into a new year, it is the perfect time to evaluate your current procedures and identify where to make improvements. As your trusted business attorneys at the Lake of the Ozarks , the attorneys at the Law Offices of Phillips, McElyea, Carpenter, & Welch, P.C. are here to help you brainstorm some ideas for the coming year. New Year's Resolution #1: Only Keep Top-Performing Employees Your employees' behavior (like your own) directly impacts the success of your company. As we enter into the New Year, evaluate your employees' performance carefully. If you have one or two employees who consistently fail to meet deadlines and/or expectations, it may be time to consider letting them go. Removing under-performing employees from your workforce will make room for more top-pe...

If you have ever purchased a house, you're probably familiar with the concept of a property lien. Essentially, a lien is a financial hold that is placed against a property when someone has refused to pay the money they owe to another party. With the lien in place, the party who should receive the money can be confident that the current owner will not be able to sell the property without first paying them the money that they owe. What if you are that person who deserves to be paid, but the other party isn't cooperating? How can you decide if you do need file a property lien - and if you do, how do you know which type of lien to file? The team at Phillips, McElyea, Carpenter, & Welch, P.C. is here to help. Different Types of Property Liens Property liens come in several different forms, and each one is specific to a different situation. Most of them are rather self-explanatory, but here are a few examples. Mechanic's Liens What happens if you fail to pay th...