B-law B-law B-law: Ethics for Business Lawyers
| Publication year | 2020 |
| Author | Neil J Wertlieb |
Neil J Wertlieb
Neil J Wertlieb is a Founding Member and Co-Chair of the California Lawyers Association Ethics Committee. Mr. Wertlieb is an experienced transactional lawyer, educator and ethicist, who provides expert witness services in disputes involving business transactions and corporate governance, and in cases involving attorney malpractice and attorney ethics. For additional information, please visit www.WertliebLaw.com. The views expressed herein are his own.
Welcome to the inaugural edition of B-Law B-Law B-Law: Ethics for Business Lawyers, a new feature of the Business Law News, focusing on ethical issues of particular interest to business lawyers in the State of California.
This column is supported by the members of the Ethics Committee of the California Lawyers Association (CLA). By way of introduction, this first edition will briefly describe the work of the Ethics Committee and highlight the resources currently available for CLA members. Should you have suggestions for future topics of interest to business lawyers, please feel free to submit them to the Ethics Committee (keeping in mind that no legal advice can be provided, and that any responsive article will be delayed by at least three months).
During the summer of 2019, the Board of Representatives of the California Lawyers Association approved the formation of a new Ethics Committee to help ensure that CLA members stay up-to-date with their ethical obligations. The initial meeting of the newly-appointed members of the Ethics Committee was held a few months later, in October 2019, at the Annual Meeting of the California Lawyers Association in Monterey, California. Since then, the Ethics Committee has been very active.
The Ethics Committee was charged with the responsibility to create educational content, comment on proposed rule changes, write advisory opinions on emerging ethical issues, and issue ethics alerts and reminders to CLA members. The activities of the Ethics Committee since its initial meeting include all of the following:
The work of the Ethics Committee includes both in-person presentations and webinars by Ethics Committee members providing ethics MCLE credits. Such presentations include the following (many of which can be found under the Education tab on the CLA's website):
- Breaking Away: Ethical Concerns when Leaving a Firm to Start Your Own Practice, CLA Solo and Small Firm Summit, Virtual (October 7, 2020)
- Show Me the Money—Ethical Issues in Charging and Collecting Attorney Fees, CLA Annual Meeting, Virtual (September 26, 2020)
- Hindsight in 2020: A...
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